The Call You Don’t Remember Making

The phone rang at 3:11 a.m.

Not a notification.

Not an alarm.

A real call.

Omar stared at the screen through half-closed eyes. Unknown Number. He almost ignored it—almost—but something about the timing felt deliberate, like the call had waited for him to wake up before ringing.

He answered.

“Hello?”

Static. Then breathing.

Not heavy. Not rushed. Calm. Familiar.

“Omar,” a voice said softly. “You told me to call at 3:11.”

His stomach tightened. “Who is this?”

A pause.

“…You don’t remember?”

The line crackled, and the voice continued, “That’s okay. You said this might happen.”

Omar sat up, heart pounding. “I’ve never called you. You have the wrong number.”

“No,” the voice replied gently. “You said you’d forget. That’s why you left instructions.”

A faint clicking sound echoed through the call—like fingernails tapping plastic.

“Look at your left hand,” the voice said.

Omar hesitated, then lifted it into the dim light of his bedside lamp.

Written across his palm in black ink were three words:

DO NOT HANG UP

His breath caught.

“I didn’t write this,” he whispered.

“You did,” the voice said. “After the first call.”

“There was no first call.”

Silence.

Then: “Omar… check your call history.”

Hands shaking, he opened his phone log.

Dozens of outgoing calls.

All to the same unknown number.

All at 3:11 a.m.

Every night.

For two weeks.

His chest felt tight, like something heavy had settled inside it.

“I don’t remember any of this,” he said.

“I know,” the voice replied. “That’s the problem.”

The breathing on the other end changed—closer now, wetter.

“You asked me to remind you what happens when you sleep.”

Omar swung his legs out of bed. “This isn’t real. I’m dreaming.”

“You said you’d say that too.”

A noise came from the hallway.

A soft dragging sound.

Something being pulled slowly across the floor.

Omar’s eyes snapped toward the bedroom door.

It was open.

He was sure he’d closed it.

The voice on the phone lowered. “It’s early tonight.”

“What is?” Omar whispered.

“You.”

The dragging sound stopped outside his room.

A shadow stretched across the floor—too thin, too long to belong to a person.

Omar backed against the wall. “What did I do?”

The voice sighed. “You wanted to know why you wake up tired. Why your body hurts. Why things in your apartment move.”

The shadow shifted.

A hand appeared first—pale, jointed wrong, fingers bending backward as it gripped the doorframe.

“You wanted proof,” the voice continued. “So you started calling me. So you’d have a witness.”

Another hand joined the first.

Then a face leaned slowly into view.

It looked like Omar.

But hollowed. Skin stretched tight over bone. Eyes too dark, too deep.

Its mouth opened.

And spoke in perfect sync with the voice on the phone:

“You leave every night.”

Omar screamed.

The thing stepped into the room, movements jerky, like it wasn’t used to weight anymore.

“When you sleep,” it said, “you come to me.”

The phone grew hot in Omar’s hand. The voice was no longer distant—it was inside his head.

“You don’t remember what you do,” it whispered. “But your body does.”

The thing reached out.

Omar tried to run, but his legs locked. His vision blurred as pressure built behind his eyes, like memories trying to force their way back in.

Flashes hit him—

Standing over his own bed.

Watching himself sleep.

Dialing the number with shaking hands.

Begging someone—anyone—to keep him awake next time.

“You said if you ever stopped calling,” the voice murmured, “I should come get you.”

The thing smiled.

Its teeth were wrong.

Too many.

The phone slipped from Omar’s hand.

As it hit the floor, the screen lit up.

CALL CONNECTED — 3:11 A.M.

Omar woke up gasping.

Morning light filled the room.

No shadow.

No figure.

No voice.

Just his phone on the bedside table.

He laughed shakily, wiping sweat from his face. “A nightmare,” he muttered. “Just a nightmare.”

His body ached.

His call log was empty.

Relief washed over him.

Then he noticed the ink on his palm.

Fresh.

Darker than before.

A new message had been added beneath the first three words:

TONIGHT, ANSWER FASTER

At 3:11 a.m., Omar’s phone rang.

And this time—

he remembered dialing.