I Heard Someone Breathing Inside My Coffin

I was still alive when they buried me.

The worst part? I could hear them crying. I could hear my mother calling my name, begging God to bring me back. I could hear my younger brother telling everyone that I wasn't dead. But nobody listened to him.

I had no idea how I ended up in that coffin. The last thing I remembered was walking home through a lonely road at night. Something had followed me. I remembered turning around, seeing a tall figure standing beneath a streetlight, and hearing it whisper my name.

Then everything went black.

Now, I was six feet underground, struggling to breathe. I screamed until my throat hurt. I kicked the wooden walls until my legs felt numb. My fingernails scratched against the coffin lid, breaking one after another. Nobody came.

Then I heard something.
A scratching sound.
Not from above me.
From beneath me.
I froze.

Three slow scratches came from the bottom of the coffin.

Then a voice whispered, You're taking up my space.
I stopped breathing.
The voice sounded like an old woman speaking through a mouth full of dirt.
Please, i whispered. Please, help me.
Something laughed beneath my body.
The coffin suddenly shook.

I felt fingers wrapping around my ankle. They were cold, impossibly cold, and they tightened until I couldn't move.

I screamed.
The voice whispered again.
"You weren't supposed to wake up."
Then the fingers released me.
For a moment, everything went silent.
And then I heard another sound.
Someone was digging.

I began crying with relief. Whoever it was had heard me. They were coming to save me.
The digging grew louder. Dirt fell against the coffin. The lid creaked as the soil shifted above me.
Then a familiar voice spoke.

My own voice.
Almost there, it said from above.
I went completely still.
I knew that voice. I knew the way it breathed between words. I knew the little crack in it whenever I was frightened.
It was me.

The person digging above my coffin began laughing.
Then it said something that made me wish I had never been born.
Don't worry. I'll take your place.
Suddenly, the coffin lid began bending inward.
Something heavy landed on top of it.
I heard the sound of fingernails scraping against the wood, followed by a wet, choking noise.

Then silence.

I don't know how long I lay there.
Eventually, I stopped screaming.
I stopped crying.
I stopped trying to escape.
Because I finally understood something.
Whatever was buried beneath me had been waiting for someone to take its place.
And now, it was free.

Yesterday, a gravedigger told the family something strange. He said the grave was empty.
But last night, my mother woke up to the sound of someone knocking on her bedroom door.
Three slow knocks.

Then my voice whispered from the other side.
"Mummy, please open the door. It's dark out here."
My mother began crying.
Because she remembered burying me.
And because, from inside her bedroom, another voice whispered:
"Don't open it. I'm still here."

Some doors should never be opened. Some graves should never be disturbed. And some things should never be given a second chance to live.

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Photos: AI prompt