The Landline

Some calls should be impossible to answer.

My phone buzzed as I jogged down the stairs toward the subway platform. I pulled it from my bag and glanced at the screen.

My parents.

But their landline? I thought they’d disconnected that years ago.

Not now.

I thumbed a quick text to my mom- I’ll call later- and shoved the phone back in my bag. The train screeched into the station as I hit the bottom step.

The doors slid open. A flat voice announced, “Uptown.”

I stepped in, dropped onto a seat, and wedged my bag between my feet, hand tight on the strap. It was a trick I’d picked up watching a woman of small stature fight off a thief- if it had been on her lap, it would have been a goner.

The doors slammed shut. A chime, a lurch, and we were moving.

Buzz.

I fished out my phone. The landline, again. I tapped to silence it. Too much noise to talk on a short ride anyway.

The car rattled through the tunnel. Passengers hunched over glowing screens. One or two clung to actual newsprint.

Another squeal, another halt. The doors slid open once more .

“Midtown.”

Buzz.

I sighed, grabbed my bag, dug for the phone.

The landline- again.

I swiped to answer as I stepped out. “Hello? Mom? Dad? Everything okay?”

Nothing.

“Hello?” This time sharper, more demand than question.

Not silence exactly- more like a low crackle, a steady hum, as if I were catching the wrong side of a broadcast.

I climbed into daylight, and stepped into the swarm of foot traffic. Too much noise. Too much static.

“Hello,” I said again, dragging the phone from my ear-

“Hello?”

The word bounced back, same tone, same inflection. My stomach clenched. An echo, but not quite.

“Hel-” I started.

“Hello?” The interruption cut across mine, pressured, urgent.

The static thickened, blanketing everything. I pressed the phone hard against my ear, sealed the other with my finger, stumbling through the crowd.

“You’ll have to speak up!” I shouted. “Something’s wrong with this call-”

The static broke with a jagged hiss.

“Rowan!”

My name, sharp, frantic, unmistakable.

“Please! Rowan!” The sound of it, so familiar, now pleading and desperate.

My breath hitched in my throat.

The voice on the phone was…mine? And from the other end of the line, it screamed:

“RUN!”