The song played normally this time. Driving drums, shredding guitars, M. Shadows’ signature snarl: “Now your nightmare comes to life…” Leo nodded. Good. That’s what he needed.
He never downloaded another album. But sometimes, at 1:47 AM, he’d hear a faint drumbeat from his closet—double bass, syncopated, inhumanly fast—and he’d whisper into the dark: “I’m sorry, Dad.”
His father’s voice.
Leo scrambled for a translator app. He replayed that section five times. The taps spelled: ROOM 217.
His blood chilled. He paused the music. Listened to the silence. The house was empty. Still, he called his father. Voicemail. He texted: Call me.
“Leo, don’t look for me. Just remember the good stuff. Delete the files. And son… the real nightmare isn’t death. It’s living with what you could’ve fixed.”
Then a faint hum. Then a whisper, not in the song’s actual lyrics: “You shouldn’t have done that.”
No response.
Room 217. His childhood address. The room he’d found his mother’s empty pill bottle when he was twelve. No one had ever known about that. Not his father. Not his ex. No one.