The Last Comment

I used to moderate a small paranormal subreddit—nothing huge, just a few thousand people who liked sharing spooky photos and ghost stories. Most of it was fake, obviously. Blurry shadows, “orbs,” reflections mistaken for demons. I’d seen it all.

But then u/ColdFloorboards appeared.

Their first post was simple:
“Does anyone hear footsteps after they go to bed?”

Nothing unusual. People replied with jokes, advice, and ghost stories. But the original poster didn’t interact. They only posted again the next night:

“They were louder today.”

That’s when I checked their profile. Completely blank. No comment history. No posts before yesterday. Brand‑new account.

The third night, the post read:
“I tried locking the bedroom door. It didn’t help.”

People were loving it—thought it was an ARG or some creative writing project. But something felt different. The timestamps were always around 3:14 a.m., down to the second. The tone never changed. Always short. Always flat. No punctuation errors, no slang. And they never responded to anyone.

Night four:

“It stood in the doorway tonight.”

Someone asked for a picture. The OP didn’t reply in the comments, but an hour later, they posted again with a link.

The photo… honestly? It was nothing. Just a dark hallway. Slight grain. You could maybe imagine a shape, if you wanted to. But the weird thing was the metadata. The timestamp was from two days in the future.

I deleted the thread, assuming it was some weird exploit or bug. But the account posted again anyway:

“Why did you delete it?”

I banned them.

Five minutes later, without any account, without any username, a post appeared out of nowhere. Reddit shouldn't allow anonymous posts, but there it was—no user tag at all.

“It’s inside.”

I messaged the Reddit admins. No response. The post vanished on its own after a few minutes.

That was two nights ago. I thought it was over.

But last night, at 3:14 a.m., I heard a single footstep in my hallway.

And this morning, when I opened Reddit, waiting at the top of my inbox—despite the OP being banned, despite the fact the account no longer exists—was a message:

“Don’t close your door tonight.”