First day at Renhe Nursing Home, Uncle Zhou told me three rules.
"When an old person presses the call button, you must arrive within two minutes."
"Don't skip the last room at the end of the hallway during rounds."
He finished two, lit a cigarette, and didn't rush to say the third. Smoke drifted up to the fluorescent light in the duty room, pale white. I waited. Finally, he spoke:
"Never look when you hear the bed creak at midnight."
"Which room?"
"317." He crushed the butt in a water bottle, *sizzle*. "End of the west wing hallway. Last room."
"Why?"
"It won't do you any good to see."
I tried to ask more, but Uncle Zhou already unfolded his cot and lay down. Fifty-six, eleven years at this nursing home, slightly hunched back, a scar under his left eye—from an elderly patient who attacked him during a fit, he said.
I was twenty-four, just got my nursing certificate, here for internship. Room and board included, monthly salary 4,200 yuan, 50 yuan night shift bonus.
First night passed without incident.
Second night too.
Third night, I was woken by a sound.
*Creak.*
Far away, through the hallway, through several doors—but it drilled deep, like someone scraping a fingernail along the inside of my ear. I rolled over. The cot's springs creaked, blending with that sound.
*Creak. Creak.*
Slow rhythm, with the dry friction of metal on tile. Not wind—wind isn't this regular.
I checked my phone. 3:17 AM.
Uncle Zhou's snores came from the lounge next door—long, short, steady. He hadn't woken. Or rather, he was used to it.
I stared at the duty room door. White panel, a gap at the bottom letting in green light from the emergency exit sign. That sound came from the direction of that green glow.
317.
I counted twelve beats before the sound stopped. 3:21 AM. The hallway was so quiet I could hear the clock's second hand—*tick, tick*.
I lay back, pulled the blanket to my chin, and stayed awake until dawn.
Morning rounds at 6:50. I pushed the care cart from east wing to west wing. Morning light streamed through windows, casting stripes across the anti-slip patterns on the floor. Room 317's door was slightly ajar. I pushed it open—cold metal handle.
An elderly woman lived here, Mrs. Lin, seventy-nine, post-stroke, legs weak, wheelchair-bound during the day. The bed next to hers was empty—I'd made it myself yesterday, the sheet so white it looked blue.
Now, the corner of the blanket was flipped back.
Just a corner, about thirty centimeters—like someone had crawled out from underneath and casually tossed it aside.
Mrs. Lin was awake, leaning against the headboard, smiling at me: "Young man, did you sleep well last night?"
I said okay. My eyes drifted to the empty bed.
"My sister came to visit me." She said.
"Your sister?"
"Mm. She used to live in this room, slept in that bed. Left twelve years ago—stroke, couldn't get up, her head hit the bedboard, hit all night."
She said it casually, like telling someone else's story. My back felt cold. I walked over to tuck the blanket in. Just as my hand touched the sheet, Mrs. Lin suddenly said:
"Don't make it too neat. She doesn't like it."
My hand froze mid-air.
"She loved rocking the bed when she was alive," Mrs. Lin looked out the window, "said it was too hard, couldn't sleep—had to rock it soft first. She still rocks it after leaving. For years."
I said nothing, left the blanket as it was, and backed out of the room.
At lunch, I sat across from Uncle Zhou with my tray. He shoveled rice, not looking up: "Heard it last night?"
"Heard it."
"Didn't look?"
"No."
He nodded, kept eating.
"Uncle Zhou," I said, "Mrs. Lin says her sister used to live in 317, slept in that empty bed. Why isn't there a record?"
Uncle Zhou's chopsticks paused: "There is. Twelve-year-old records, locked in the second-floor storage. You don't have clearance."
"Her sister died of stroke?"
"Mm." Uncle Zhou put down his chopsticks, looked at me, "When she died, her body stiffened, head tilted way back, neck bent like this"—he held his fingers in an obtuse angle—
"Her head kept scraping against the headboard, trying to sit up, couldn't. When the nurse found her, the headboard was covered in blood, a patch of her scalp rubbed off."
My stomach churned.
"After that, that bed creaks at midnight," Uncle Zhou said, "metal frame scraping tile, creak creak, like someone rocking at the head of the bed.
The previous director brought a Taoist priest. The priest said it wasn't haunting—it was unfinished business. She died with too much obsession, body couldn't move, but her soul kept scraping."
"Why not throw the bed away?"
"Tried." Uncle Zhou took a sip of soup, "Got a new bed, it creaked too the next night. Got another one, still creaked. Stopped replacing it after that."
"What about Mrs. Lin? Why did she move into 317?"
Uncle Zhou put down his bowl, wiped his mouth: "She requested it. Said her sister was lonely living there alone."
Fourth night, I was woken by the creaking again.
3:17 AM. As punctual as a clockwork.
*Creak. Creak.*
Louder than last night, the metal-on-tile friction harsher—like the rubber pads had worn through, metal scraping directly on tile. I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, counting the rhythm.
One. Two. Three.
At seven creaks, the sound changed.
It came from closer—like someone had pushed the bed out of 317 and was moving it down the hallway, inch by inch. Metal legs scraping tile: *creak, stop, creak, stop*.
I sat up. The cot's springs creaked—I couldn't tell which sound was mine, which was outside.
The hallway's motion-sensor lights didn't turn on. Only the emergency exit's green sign glowed, a thin line of light under the door.
The sound stopped at the duty room door.
I stared at that door. Under the green light, the panel looked sickly green.
Three minutes. Five minutes. Ten minutes.
The sound started again—retreating, inch by inch, back toward the hallway end. *Creak, stop, creak, stop*.
Until it returned to 317, resuming its original rhythm—slow, dragging, like it would never stop.
I didn't dare sleep. Kept my eyes open until dawn.
Morning rounds—Room 317's door was wide open. I walked in. Mrs. Lin sat in her wheelchair, combing her hair facing the empty bed.
The empty bed's blanket was fully thrown back, piled at the foot. Pillow on the floor, pillowcase crumpled. The sheet had wrinkles running from headboard to footboard—like someone had rubbed it repeatedly with their hands.
What made my scalp prickle was the headboard.
On the wooden headboard, several faint white scratches. Fresh. Like something hard had been rubbed back and forth.
"She wasn't happy last night," Mrs. Lin said, comb stuck in her gray hair, "said you didn't go see her."
"What?"
"My sister." Mrs. Lin turned to look at me, eyes bright, "She pushed the bed to find you, you didn't open the door. She came back very angry, rocked all night."
My throat went dry: "Mrs. Lin, the bed... it's dead, can't be pushed."
"Can be pushed." Mrs. Lin smiled, showing a missing front tooth, "She pushed it when she was alive. Couldn't sleep at night, pushed the bed around the room, said to stretch her legs.
After she died, she got lighter—pushes the bed all over the hallway, very fast."
I looked down at the floor.
On the tiles, from Room 317's door to my duty room door, a faint trail. Pale white lines where metal had scraped tile—intermittent, like something dragged past, then dragged back.
I knelt down, rubbed my finger over the trail. Gray-white powder, same color as the headboard scratches.
"Young man." Mrs. Lin's voice came from behind, "Go see her tonight. She just wants you to look at her. Once you do, she'll stop rocking."
I stood up, said nothing, and exited 317.
I was distracted all day. During afternoon training, the head nurse said the safety rules three times—I didn't remember a word.
That night I didn't sleep in the duty room. I told Uncle Zhou I had family business, took a night off. He looked at me for two seconds, said: "Okay."
I went back to my apartment, lay in bed, lights off, listening to traffic outside. At 3 AM, I woke up. Checked my phone—3:17 AM.
The apartment was four kilometers from the nursing home. I heard nothing.
But I kept feeling—something was there. From far away, through walls, through streets, drilling into my ears.
*Creak. Creak.*
I turned on music, put on headphones, cranked the volume to maximum.
Fifth night, I returned to the nursing home.
Uncle Zhou looked at me, said nothing. At midnight, the sound came on time.
*Creak. Creak.*
I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. Louder than all previous nights—like someone was rocking with all their strength, metal frame creaking, bedboard thumping.
Then, another sound mixed in.
*Thud. Thud.*
Like someone banging their head against the headboard.
Slow, heavy, two seconds between each hit. Intertwined with the creaking: *creak, thud, creak, thud*.
I sat up abruptly.
This was wrong. Uncle Zhou had said—Mrs. Lin's sister died with her head hitting the bedboard, over and over, until her scalp rubbed off.
I got off the cot, bare feet on the floor. Tile was ice cold.
Don't look. Don't look.
I walked to the door, pressed my ear to the panel. Sounds flooded from the hallway end—creaking, head-banging, mixed together like some beast gnawing bones.
Then the sounds stopped.
Silence.
I held my breath.
*Thud.*
Not from the hallway end.
From outside the door.
Less than half a meter away.
Someone was outside the duty room door, banging their head against it.
*Thud.*
Slow, heavy. The door vibrated with each hit, my eardrum aching.
*Thud.*
I stepped back.
Under the door gap, on the tile lit by the green light, a shadow slowly appeared.
A flat human-shaped shadow, like a large rag spread on the floor. Its edges writhed, like many tiny legs crawling.
I stared at that shadow, frozen.
The shadow stopped.
Then, from its center, something slowly rose.
A head.
A head rising from the flat shadow, straight up like a sprout. Gray-white hair hung down, covering its face.
It had no neck. Or rather, its neck was too long—like a stretched rubber band connecting the flat shadow to that head.
The head slowly turned toward me.
The hair parted.
I saw a face.
Not Mrs. Lin. Not Mrs. Lin's sister. I didn't recognize this face.
Its skin was translucent—like cooked egg white, revealing black veins underneath, squirming. No pupils, all white—but the white was moving, searching, scanning.
It was looking for me.
The corner of its mouth lifted.
Stretching all the way to its ears. No teeth, just black inside its mouth—like a well.
Then it spoke.
The voice didn't come from its mouth. It sounded inside my head.
"You... saw... me..."
I spun and dove back onto the cot, pulling the blanket over my head, shaking violently.
The thudding outside stopped.
The shadow was gone.
But that voice kept echoing in my head, over and over:
"You saw me... you saw me..."
I don't know how I fell asleep. At 6 AM, Uncle Zhou shook me awake. I threw off the blanket—found myself huddled in the corner, clutching the pillow, the pillowcase torn by my nails.
"You looked." Uncle Zhou said. Not a question.
I didn't speak.
"Through the door gap?"
I nodded.
Uncle Zhou sighed, sat on the bed edge. He didn't smoke today, hands empty.
"Twenty years ago, when I first came here, I looked too." He said, "Back then, 317 wasn't Mrs. Lin—it was an old man.
Midnight bed creaking, I looked through the peephole. Saw him sitting on the bed edge, back to the door, swinging his legs. I watched for a minute. He suddenly stopped, tilted his head back—back until his skull touched his spine—and looked at me through his legs."
My stomach convulsed.
"What happened after?" I asked.
"After, I was transferred to the east wing." Uncle Zhou said, "Three months without a sound, I thought it was over.
Fourth month, my wife woke me up in the middle of the night, said she heard bed creaking. I said we don't have metal beds—all wood. She said it wasn't wood—it was metal frame scraping tile, creak creak, coming from the balcony."
"Your home..."
"We live on the seventeenth floor." Uncle Zhou looked at me, "Below the balcony is empty. No bed."
"What happened next?"
"My wife left." Uncle Zhou stood up, patted his pants, "Not divorce—left. 3:17 AM, she got up to use the bathroom, never came back.
I searched all night. Found her on the balcony in the morning. She was leaning over the railing, head down, skull touching her spine—same posture as that old man."
Silence hung in the duty room for a long time.
"Uncle Zhou," my voice was hoarse, "what do I do now?"
"Quit." He said, "Change cities, go as far as you can."
"Will it help?"
Uncle Zhou didn't answer. He walked to the door, pulled it open. The hallway motion-sensor light turned on. He looked back at me: "I've been here eleven years because I can't leave.
If I go, it follows me home. My wife is already gone—I have to stay here, keep it contained."
He paused: "You're not married yet. Go."
I submitted my resignation that afternoon.
The director said nothing, signed it. Uncle Zhou helped me pack, walked me to the nursing home gate. June sun was scorching, heat waves rising from the asphalt.
"Uncle Zhou," I said, "what is that thing? Is it Mrs. Lin's sister?"
Uncle Zhou shook his head: "Don't know. Maybe it was, at first. But too many people have seen it. It remembers too many faces, too many shapes. Now no one can say what it is."
"Why does it rock the bed?"
"Because it wants to get up." Uncle Zhou said, "When it died, it wanted to get up but couldn't. Now it still wants to stand, but it has no legs.
It can only rock. When someone looks at it, it borrows their eyes to see the world one more time."
"And after that?"
Uncle Zhou didn't answer. He patted my shoulder: "Go. Don't look back."
I left.
Went back to my hometown—a small county in Hunan. My mom asked why I was back, I said it didn't work out there. She found me a nursing job at the county hospital. I worked three months, heard no strange sounds.
Fourth month, I was assigned to night shift.
First night, Old Chen who trained me told me three rules. After two, he lit a cigarette—smoke drifted to the fluorescent light, pale white.
I waited for the third.
He finished half the cigarette before speaking:
"Never look when you hear the bed creak at midnight."
My blood turned to ice.
"Which room?" I asked.
"317." He said, "End of the west wing hallway. Last room."
"Why?"
Old Chen looked at me, strange expression: "It won't do you any good to see."
That night, I lay on the duty room cot, eyes open, waiting.
3:17 AM.
The sound came.
*Creak. Creak.*
From the hallway end, through six doors, drilling into my ears.
I sat up, bare feet on the floor, walked to the door.
Under the gap, emergency exit green light leaked in. The sound came from that direction—slow, dragging, never stopping.
I did not look.
I knelt down, left eye pressed to the door gap.
The hallway was empty. Motion-sensor lights off, only the green sign glowing faintly.
The sound came from 317.
I held my breath, looking out the gap. The hallway was long, anti-slip patterns on tile stretching to that white door at the end.
Room 317's door.
The door was moving.
Vibrating with the creak—once, again. Under the door gap, something black writhed.
Then that thing stopped.
Like it sensed me watching.
I pulled back abruptly.
Too late.
Under the door gap, a flat shadow slowly formed. Edges writhing, like many tiny legs crawling.
From the shadow's center, a head rose.
Gray-white hair hung down, translucent skin revealing squirming black veins underneath.
Its pupil-less eyes looked straight at me—across six doors' distance.
The corner of its mouth lifted.
Stretching all the way to its ears.
Then its mouth moved. No sound, but that sentence echoed in my head:
"You... saw... me... again..."
I spun and dove onto the bed, pulling the blanket over my head.
Outside the blanket, a sound came.
Not bed creaking.
Metal scraping tile—from the hallway end, slowly approaching.
*Creak, stop, creak, stop.*
It was pushing the bed over.
This time, it didn't stop at the duty room door.
The sound kept getting closer.
Closer.
Even closer.
Finally, it stopped outside my door.
The door began to vibrate. The lock clicked against the frame—*ratchet, ratchet*.
Then I heard a sound.
From the other side of the door, right next to my ear.
Scraping. With nails.
Slow, heavy, each scratch like it was scraping my skull.
Scrape. Two seconds pause.
Scrape again.
I curled under the blanket, shaking, eyes squeezed shut.
I don't know how long it lasted. The sound stopped.
The hallway went quiet.
I slowly lifted the blanket corner, peeked out.
On the duty room door, five scratches.
Fresh.
From doorknob height, all the way to the floor.
Like someone had crawled down the door using their nails.
I stared at those five scratches for a long time.
Then I heard a sound.
From behind me.
*Creak.*
I slowly turned around.
The cot was rocking.
Under the blanket, a human shape bulged, slowly swaying back and forth.
The blanket slipped down.
Two feet emerged.
Hanging in mid-air.
Not touching the bed.
Toenails were gray-purple.
Ankles bent at impossible angles—like the obtuse angle of a broken neck.
That foot turned toward me.
Then a voice came from inside the blanket.
Not from a mouth. From the folds, from the gaps in the cotton—like wind through torn paper.
"You... look... at... me..."
"See... I... stood... up... didn't... I..."
I stared at that foot.
It hung at the bed edge, swaying, swaying.
Like a pendulum that never stops.
I slowly backed away, all the way to the door, pulled it open, stepped out. I didn't run—I stood in the hallway, listening to the bed creaking from 317, until dawn.
Next day I submitted my resignation. The director signed it, asked nothing.
I went home, found a day shift in the Hunan county. No night shifts—I thought it was over.
First month, nothing.
Second month, I started waking up exactly at 3:17 AM. Not woken by sound—my leg moved on its own, hanging over the bed edge, swaying, swaying.
Like a pendulum.
I went to the hospital—neurology, orthopedics, psychiatry. All tests normal. Doctor said maybe stress.
Third month, not just 3:17 AM. During the day, sitting in a chair, my leg would lift on its own, hang over the edge, sway.
I tied it down—tight. The muscle twitched under the skin, jumping, like something crawling inside.
Fourth month, I stopped tying. I learned to let it sway.
Fifth month, I returned to Renhe Nursing Home of my own accord, applying for night shift. Couldn't do days—leg swayed too much, couldn't work.
Night shift was better. At 3:17 AM, I could sway openly.
I sat in the duty room, right leg hanging over the cot edge, swaying, swaying.
The bed was wood, no metal frame. But in my head, I heard metal scraping tile—*creak, creak*.
Beat after beat, never stopping.
I knew where that sound came from. From inside my bones.
It couldn't get up. So I rocked for it.
I looked down at my leg, hanging there, toenails gray-purple.
Footsteps at the door. A new intern pushed in: "Brother, why aren't you sleeping?"
I said nothing—leg cramp.
He nodded, started to leave. I called him: "Hey, let me tell you three rules."
He froze.
"When an old person presses the call button, you must arrive within two minutes."
"Don't skip the last room at the end of the hallway during rounds."
"When you hear bed creaking at midnight"—my leg kept swaying—"never look."
"Why?"
I looked at my leg, swaying, swaying.
"Because if you look, it can't stand up."
"If it can't stand up, you have to rock for it."
The intern stared at me, confused.
I smiled. I didn't know when I'd lost half a front tooth—noticed it in the mirror that morning.
"Go sleep," I said, "it's 3:17."
He walked out, closed the door.
I lay back, right leg hanging over the bed edge, swaying, swaying.
*Creak. Creak.*
The sound came from my bones, through the mattress, through the floor, bouncing in the hallway.
I knew it was listening.
It knew I was rocking.
We didn't speak.
This is the rule.