I froze.
Slowly, I turned around.
My husband was standing in the hallway. Perfectly still. Just… staring.
“Toby?” he said softly. “Who are you talking to?”
My heart pounded. “He called me. He said you were acting strange.”
My husband frowned. “I’ve been asleep in our room. I just woke up because I heard you come in.”
I looked back at Toby. He was shaking his head violently.
“No,” he whispered. “That’s not him.”
A chill crawled up my spine.
“What do you mean?” I asked, kneeling beside him.
“The other New Dad woke up,” Toby said, clutching my shirt. “He came into my room. He was smiling but… not with his eyes. He said not to tell you.”
The air felt heavy.
I turned back to my husband. He looked confused—concerned, even. “There is no ‘other’ me,” he said carefully.
Just then, we heard it.
A floorboard creaked.
Not from the hallway.
From upstairs.
All three of us slowly looked toward the staircase.
My husband swallowed. “We’ve been down here this whole time.”
Another creak. Slow. Deliberate.
Toby buried his face in my chest. “That’s him.”
My husband grabbed the fireplace poker and motioned for me to stay behind him. We moved toward the stairs together, each step heavier than the last.
Halfway up, the house went silent again.
Too silent.
At the top of the stairs, the bedroom door stood slightly open.
But we had left it closed.
My husband pushed it open with the poker.
The room was empty.
The bed was untouched.
The window, however, was wide open. Curtains fluttering in the wind.
And on the floor beneath the window… muddy footprints.
Bare footprints.
Leading from the window.
Into the hallway.
And stopping right outside Toby’s bedroom door.
I felt my stomach drop.
My husband turned pale. “Call the police.”
Minutes later, flashing red and blue lights filled the street. Officers searched the house and the yard. They found more footprints outside beneath the window—leading into the woods behind our property.
No one was caught.
The police said it was likely a break-in. Someone must have been inside the house while my husband slept. Watching. Waiting.
But Toby refused to sleep alone for weeks.
And sometimes, late at night, he would whisper:
“Mommy… what if he comes back and pretends again?”
We installed cameras after that.
The first night they were up, I couldn’t sleep. Around 3:17 a.m., my phone buzzed with a motion alert.
Living room camera.
I opened the app.
The room was dark.
Empty.
Then, slowly, from behind the couch—
A man stood up.
He turned directly toward the camera.
And he smiled.
