The bottle had stopped, pointing squarely at Max. The basement smelled like beer and feet. Halloween decorations drooped from the ceiling. Someone’s older cousin had brought tequila. Everyone was fifteen or sixteen and pretending not to care what came next.
Max hesitated. He didn’t like being dared. He especially didn’t like being told what he was too scared to do.
“Dare,” he said, trying not to look at Jenna.
Ryan grinned, the kind of grin you give someone before you shove them into oncoming traffic.
“I dare you to go into the Crawl.”
A few people gasped. Someone muttered, “Don’t be a dick, Ryan.” But it was too late. The group had already pivoted from giggles to anticipation.
The Crawl wasn’t a room. It was a jagged hole in the far wall. The old owner’s son had died down there, they said. Broke his neck on a pipe. Or got stuck and starved. No one knew. Parents pretended it didn’t exist.
Max stood. “How long?”
Ryan shrugged. “Five minutes. Alone. And take this.” He tossed a cracked phone. “Camera’s on.”
Max stepped over beer bottles and into the quiet at the edge of the party. The Crawl looked smaller up close. Maybe three feet high. Cold air breathed from it.
He crouched and went in.
The walls scraped his shoulders. It smelled like wet dirt and insulation. Behind him, the basement sounds faded. In front of him, blackness.
He clicked on the flashlight app. Dust floated in the beam. There were pipes, a broken tricycle, and boxes soggy with mildew. The air felt thick.
“Just five minutes,” he whispered.
Then something moved.
Not big. Just a scrape. But he turned too fast and his head hit a pipe with a crack that made his vision go white for a second.
“Shit—”
Another sound. A whisper this time.
“…Max…”
He spun, heart galloping now.
Silence.
He started crawling backward, flashlight shaking, when the phone slipped from his hand and skittered ahead into the dark.
“No, no, no—”
He scrambled after it. His fingers brushed the edge.
Then something grabbed his wrist.
Cold. Too thin. Too long.
It yanked.
Max screamed. The flashlight twisted as he kicked back. For one second, he saw a face—
Mouth sewn shut.
Eyes wide with hunger.
Then it let go.
Max burst from the Crawl like a kicked dog, sobbing, shirt torn, hands bleeding.
Everyone stared.
“What the hell, dude?” Ryan’s voice cracked.
Max looked up, eyes wild. “There’s something in there.”
Jenna knelt beside him. “You’re bleeding. What happened?”
Max shook his head, choking on air.
“Truth or dare?” Ryan called from across the room, voice mocking.
Max looked at him.
“Truth,” he said. “I’m never playing again.”
Behind him, in the Crawl, the phone buzzed once. Then again. Someone—or something—was watching.
And it wanted the next turn.