Last Shift

                                    

                                          
They told me working the night shift at Presley Gas Station would be easy. "No one comes by after midnight," the manager said. "Just lock up at 6 AM, and you're good." I needed the money, so I took it.
I shouldn't have.
It's been three weeks, and every night feels longer than the last. It's not the silence that gets to you—it's the little things. The hum of the old fluorescent lights, the way the security cameras glitch for no reason, and how the shadows don't always line up with where the lights are shining.
Last night was supposed to be my last shift.
At 12:14 AM, the bell above the door rang. I looked up from my phone, expecting the usual—some trucker buying snacks or a drunk looking for cigarettes. But there was no one there. Just the door swinging open on its own.
I checked the security footage. The camera facing the entrance showed the door opening, but no one came through. Just... empty air.
I locked the door after that. I wasn't taking chances. But at 1:07 AM, I heard footsteps in the aisles. Slow, deliberate, like someone dragging their feet. I looked over the counter, and—nothing.
The cameras told a different story. On the screen, a figure stood in aisle three. A tall, blurry shape, its limbs too long and its head tilted unnaturally to one side. It wasn't moving, just standing there.
But when I looked up again—aisle three was empty.
I stared at the camera, my heart pounding. The figure was closer now, standing at the end of the aisle. Still unmoving.
I grabbed my phone to call someone—anyone—but there was no signal. The clock on the wall had stopped at 1:07.
The lights flickered. The cameras glitched. When they came back on, the figure was gone.
I thought maybe it was over. I was wrong.
At 2:18 AM, I heard a voice. It came from the back room where we keep the supplies. "Help me," it whispered, soft and broken. It sounded like a child. I knew better, though. My mom always said, "If you hear a voice calling for help and you're alone, don't answer."
But I couldn't stop myself.
I opened the back room door.
Empty.
Then the door slammed shut behind me.
The storage room doesn't have lights. My phone flashlight barely cut through the dark, and the air smelled rotten, like something dead had been left there for years. I turned to leave, but the door... wasn't there.
Something breathed in the dark. Close enough for me to feel it against my neck. I swung my phone around, the light catching something tall in the corner.
It didn't move. At first.
But then it smiled.
Its teeth were too many, its mouth stretching impossibly wide. And it started crawling toward me. Fast.
I don't remember how I got out. I woke up this morning in the parking lot, my shirt torn and my hands covered in dirt. The gas station manager found me there, staring blankly at nothing.
"Are you okay?" he asked. "Why'd you leave the door unlocked?"
I tried to tell him what happened, but he just looked at me, pale and quiet. Then he said something I'll never forget.
"You're not the first to say that."
I quit. I don't care about the money anymore. But there's one thing I can't stop thinking about.
When I checked my phone this morning, there was a video. It's grainy, recorded on my phone's camera. It shows me, standing behind the counter at 2:18 AM. Smiling.
But I swear I wasn't smiling.
And I don't remember taking the video.