Hey night owl,

Time for another transmission from Nightmare Nook Files.

This series crawls across the cracks in everyday life—one case at a time.

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CASE FILE 002: THE PHONE THAT ALREADY KNEW HIS NAME

For years, Mark kept his ringer switched off. Robo-calls, wrong numbers, spam—best let them go to voicemail. That night, love for silence saved him from noticing anything strange… until his phone vibrated—three sharp pulses—long after midnight. The screen read:

INCOMING CALL
Jack Bremer

He didn’t know a Jack Bremer. No picture, just a number, not in any of his apps or messages.

Mark let it go to voicemail.
But the number never showed up in his call log.

The next evening—three pulses, again at 2:14 a.m.

INCOMING CALL
Carla Renners

This time, he answered. Silence. He listened for static, then a voice. All he heard was his own breath, feeding back through a distant echo. Chills pinched his neck. No one spoke. He hung up.

He searched for the name. No contacts. No emails. Just cold, blank search results.

On the third night, Mark set an alarm—disbelief makes you bold. At 2:13, he watched the phone, thumb hovering, camera ready.

INCOMING CALL
Mark Bremer

That was his name. His own. Not a prank name—his real, full, double-checked spelling. The number looked normal, except the area code matched his hometown… the place his family had moved away from after their old house burned down.

He turned on airplane mode. The screen still lit up:
Mark Bremer

A single vibration. He froze, then accepted the call. Something like his own voice, distant and wrong, whispered back:

“Don’t answer again.”

Then his ringer bursts to life—every contact in his address book starts auto-calling him in rapid fire succession. For a split second, every name on the screen is his.

The next day at work, he deletes old voicemails. But one is new, timestamped 2:14 a.m., labeled Unknown. He listens. The voice is warped, blurred with static—his own, slowed down, dragging:

“If you answer, you leave the line open. If you answer twice, you let them find you.”

For weeks, Mark’s phone stays off. He can’t get calls to ring at all. No one gets through. His mother meets him for coffee, frustrated she can’t reach him. As she flips her phone to show the failed call attempt, Mark sees:

INCOMING CALL
Mark Bremer

He didn’t touch his phone. Her screen keeps buzzing. He never called.

He’s never had a landline, but late that night, the apartment intercom rings. No number. No caller.

He listens through the speaker. Far—somewhere outside the building—he hears:

“You answered twice.”

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Your Turn

Stranger than spam—right? Hit reply and let me know:
– Ever had a call or text from a number you know shouldn’t exist?
– What would you do if your phone called you back?

I’ll read every strange theory.

Signing off, but don’t pick up if you see your own name.

— Jake
Nightmare Nook Files

P.S. Know a technology skeptic or superstition fan? Forward this email, or let them sign up for more at nightmarenookfiles.com.

Hey night owl,

Welcome to Nightmare Nook Files.

Here’s how this works:
Most nights, I send you a short case file — part true account, part reconstructed detail — about something that doesn’t sit right in the daylight.

You read it.
You decide if it’s explainable… or if something’s wrong with the story.

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CASE FILE 001: THE KNOCK FROM INSIDE THE WALL

The first night, Jenna thought it was the upstairs neighbor.

Three slow knocks, spaced out, right behind the living room wall.

thunk
…
thunk
…
thunk

She muted the TV and waited for a fourth. Nothing. Just the hum of the fridge and the faint traffic outside her Portland apartment.

Old building, old pipes. Easy enough to ignore.

Until the second night.

Same time — 11:37 p.m.
Same wall.
Same three knocks.

She walked over and pressed her palm flat against the paint. Cool plaster. No vibration, no rattling, no obvious source.

“Probably the radiators,” her landlord said over the phone. “They do that in winter. Don’t worry about it.”

It was October. The heat wasn’t on.

Night three, Jenna decided to test it.

When the first knock came, she knocked back.

Three times, matching the rhythm.

Silence.

She laughed at herself — a little too loud — and turned back toward the couch.

thunk… thunk… thunk… thunk

Four knocks this time.
Closer together. Impatient.

She moved the furniture the next day. Couch to the opposite wall. Bookshelves against the knocking side. If it was in her head, fine. If it wasn’t, at least she wouldn’t feel it over her shoulder.

Night four: 11:37 p.m.
The wall behind the new couch knocked.

Same pattern. Same stretch of plaster. Different side of the room.

That was the first night she didn’t sleep.

By the end of the week, it wasn’t just knocks.
She started hearing a faint scraping between the studs, like someone dragging a ring along the inside of the drywall. Whenever she pressed her ear to the wall, it stopped — like whatever was inside was listening back.

She called maintenance. A bored guy in a polo came out with a flashlight and a moisture meter.

“No leaks, no pests,” he said, tapping the meter. “It’s probably just expansion and contraction. These walls are basically cardboard.”

Jenna almost believed him… until he moved his hand.

Where he’d been leaning, the wall had picked up a faint pattern of grease and dust.

Four vertical lines.
One diagonal, slashing through them.

Not random streaks.
Tally marks.

That night, she didn’t wait for 11:37.

She was halfway down the stairwell with a suitcase when she heard it again, muffled through the floor:

thunk
…
thunk
…
thunk

Followed by a new sound she’d never heard before:
Her own phone vibrating in her pocket, with a text from an unknown number:

DON’T LEAVE ME IN HERE

And that’s where the official record stops.

She turned in her keys. The unit is listed as “currently vacant.”
No one at the building will talk about why the drywall in that apartment was replaced in the middle of the night.

The work order just says:
“Noise complaint. Wall opened. No source found.”

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Your Turn

If this landed in your inbox, the shadows are listening.

Hit reply and tell me:
– What do you think was in the wall?
– Would you have opened it… or moved out like Jenna?

I’ll feature the best theories in a future case file.

Until then, don’t tap back if something knocks first.

— Jake
Nightmare Nook Files

P.S. Know someone who loves creepy, unexplained stories? Forward this email to them. When they’re ready, they can join the list at nightmarenookfiles.com.