They Said This Black-and-White TV Had Been Broken Since 1988—Until He Brought It Home and Realized the Image on the Screen Was Showing His Own Room… With a Stranger Standing Behind Him
For thirty years, the old wooden-cased CRT TV sat collecting dust in the corner of a pawnshop storage room.
No power cord. No antenna. Its glass screen was scratched and pitch black.
An electronics repairman bought it for next to nothing just for spare parts.
He hauled the heavy TV down to his basement workshop.
It was a night of pouring rain.
He placed the TV on a wooden workbench, switched on his single desk lamp, and began unscrewing the back panel.
Suddenly…
Snap.
A faint pop echoed from the picture tube.
The glass screen flickered to life.
A cold, pale blue light cast across his face.
He flinched and stepped back.
The TV wasn’t plugged in. The power cord was still coiled on the floor.
Yet the screen was displaying a crystal-clear image.
It wasn’t static.
It was a black-and-white photograph of a room corner.
There was a wooden workbench. A desk lamp. And a man leaning over, unscrewing a panel.
His heart stopped.
It was him.
The image on the TV screen was showing this exact room, at this exact second.
He slowly raised his head and looked around. The room was empty.
He looked back at the screen.
The image had changed.
Behind the man in the photo… a dark figure was now standing in the shadowed corner.
Its emaciated hand was raised, pointing directly at the back of his neck.
And on the screen, static-laced text began to form at the bottom:
“Don’t turn around. It only moves when you’re not looking at the screen.”
PART 2 IN THE FIRST COMMENT…
Cold sweat poured down his neck.
His eyes were glued to the glass screen, his pupils dilated with sheer terror.
The dark figure on the screen took another step forward.
It was closer now. The distance between it and his back in the photo was less than an arm’s length.
Its emaciated hand with abnormally long fingers reached out, inches away from touching his shoulder.
At the very same moment, slow footsteps dragged across the basement floor right behind him.
Shuffle. Shuffle.
The pungent stench of rotting fabric and burnt ash filled his nostrils.
It was right here. In the room.
His entire body trembled violently. He wanted to turn around. Instinct screamed at him to spin around and fight or run. But the static-laced text on the screen flashed incessantly:
“DON’T TURN AROUND. LOOK AT THE SCREEN.”
He strained his eyes, staring intently at the dark figure in the photo.
This time, he noticed a horrifying detail on its face.
It had no eyes. Its face was completely flat, save for a wide, gaping mouth smiling silently.
And pinned to the creature’s tattered collar… was a name tag.
The name tag of the pawnshop owner—the man who had suddenly passed away last week, the very man who sold this TV.
A bone-chilling whisper echoed right beside his left ear, its icy breath burning his skin:
“You’ve been looking for too long…”
The TV screen abruptly cut to black.
Everything plunged into absolute darkness.
FOLLOW FOR THE FINAL PART TOMORROW…
