When She Woke Up, There Were 17 Voicemails From A Stranger



The morning light, thin and gray, filtered through the blinds, illuminating the rumpled sheets of Ione’s bed. She had flicked her eyes open, feeling groggy and disoriented, and groaning, she rolled over to hit the dismiss button on her phone’s alarm. But her thumb froze in mid-air. The blinking of her phone’s screen was the first thing she noticed—a pulse of green light against the pre-dawn gloom of her bedroom. She was expecting a missed call or an early message from a friend. Instead, the screen displayed a chaotic array of notifications: 17 Missed Calls. 17 New Voicemails.


Seventeen. Not three, not five. Seventeen. All from an unknown number.


A cold prickle of unease ran up her spine, banishing the last bits of sleep. Who would call her seventeen times before 6 AM? And why was there not a single text?


Annoyance surfaced first. Probably a spam bot gone haywire or a wrong number, she thought, sitting up and rubbing sleep from her eyes. Ione was a graphic designer, which meant her number was on a few public-facing websites. It happened. She unlocked her phone, her thumb hovering over the voicemail icon. Annoyance clawed at Ione, with a nascent curiosity. She tapped the voicemail icon, intending to delete them all in one fell swoop, but curiosity got the better of her. She pressed play on the first one.

A man’s voice, smooth and deep like polished river stones, filled the quiet of her bedroom.


Voicemail 1: (1:14 AM) “Irma. It’s me. I know it’s late, but I couldn’t wait any longer. We need to talk.”

Ione frowned. Irma? A wrong number. Obvious, but the calm certainty in his tone was unsettling. She was about to delete it when the next message started automatically.


Voicemail 2: (1:19 AM) “Don’t ignore me, Irma. I saw you again today. You have this… aura. A beautiful, chaotic energy that needs to be tamed. My energy.”


A shiver ran down her spine. This was more than a wrong number; it was deliberate. It sounded like the desperate ex of someone who had recycled the number. Her finger hovered over the delete button, but she couldn’t bring herself to press it. A morbid impulse took hold.


Voicemail 3: (1:25 AM) “You were at that little coffee shop again. ‘The Daily Grind.’ Large black Americano. You see, I notice the patterns, Irma. The little rituals that make you who you are. Consistency is a virtue we can build a life on.”


The blood in Ione’s veins turned to ice. She had been at The Daily Grind yesterday afternoon. A large black Americano was her regular order. Her heart started to thud—a heavy, panicked drum against her ribs.


Voicemail 4: (1:35 AM) “That red scarf you wore on Tuesday… a splash of defiance in a sea of grey. I liked it. It showed me the fire inside you. The fire I’m going to control.”


She remembered the scarf, a birthday gift from her sister. She’d worn it because the wind had a bite to it. How could he know? She scanned her memory, trying to recognize a face or a lingering stare, but all she could summon was a gallery of anonymous city dwellers.


Voicemail 5: (2:43 AM) “I don’t like your friends, Irma. That loud one, Maya, and the one who always touches your arm, Brea. They’re frivolous. They dilute your potential. They don’t understand you like I do.”


Her breath hitched. He knew their names. They’d all gone out for drinks last Friday. A cold dread, heavy and suffocating, began to settle in her chest. This wasn't a mistake. He was watching her. But why was he calling her ‘Irma’? It felt like a deliberate, cruel mockery, a way to disorient her, to make her feel like she was losing her mind.


She listened, captivated by the horror, as the disembodied voice detailed her life.


Voicemail 6: (3:02 AM) “You looked so lovely in that green silk dress at the gallery opening. A little too much leg, though. You tend to invite the wrong kind of attention. From now on, I’ll help you decide what to wear.”


He had been at the opening of Maya’s new gallery, with Ione replaying her interactions with the patrons. Did she meet this guy? Did she talk to him?


Voicemail 7: (3:16 AM) “Did you feel me watching you at the market on Saturday? I was behind the flower stall. You were admiring the lilies. I was admiring you. You are a work of art, Irma, but one that needs a very specific frame. My frame.”


Ione, her fear rising, tried hard to remember. Did she see someone behind the flower stall? No, she wasn’t really paying attention. She was fearing the thought of listening to anymore. But something compelled her to keep playing the messages.


Voicemail 8: (3:21 AM) “You need my guidance. You stumble through life, a beautiful, clumsy thing. Remember when you dropped your keys outside your building yesterday? I almost came to help you. But not yet. Soon, you won’t have to worry about such things. I’ll take care of everything.”


Ione’s hand flew to her mouth, silencing a sob. She recalled dropping her keys, the metallic clatter on the pavement, and her frustrated sigh. He had been there. He had been right there.


Voicemail 9: (3:36 AM) “We belong together. It’s destiny. Any resistance you feel is just fear of the inevitable. Fear of a love so powerful it will consume you. Don’t be afraid. I’m here.”


Voicemail 10: (3:42 AM) “I know you feel it too. That pull. The sense of being seen, truly seen, for the first time in your life. It’s intoxicating, isn’t it?”


His voice was a poisonous lullaby. Each word was an invasion, stripping away her privacy, her independence, her sense of safety.


Voicemail 11: (4:00 AM) “I followed you home from the gym tonight. You shouldn’t walk with headphones in, Irma. It’s not safe. The world is full of predators. You’re lucky you have me to protect you from them.”


The irony was a sharp, bitter acid in her throat.


Voicemail 12: (4:26 AM) “Your apartment. Third floor, corner unit. A cozy little nest. But the locks are cheap. You should be more careful about who you let in. Or who can get in.”


Panic took over her. She quickly got out of bed, her bare feet cold on the hardwood floor, and checked the deadbolt on her front door. It was locked. For now.


Voicemail 13: (4:40 AM) “I don’t like it when you draw the blinds so tightly. Are you trying to hide from me? You can’t hide from your own soulmate, Irma. It’s impossible.”


She had drawn them last night, feeling an inexplicable chill and a sense of being watched that she’d dismissed as paranoia. It wasn’t.


Voicemail 14: (5:05 AM) “Stop this game. Answer the phone. Your silence is disrespectful. And I don’t tolerate disrespect.”

The smooth tone disappeared, replaced by a raw, jagged edge of anger. It was more terrifying than the fake affection.


Voicemail 15: (5:17 AM) “Let me in, Irma. Mentally. Emotionally. Soon, physically. Let me take control. You’ll feel so much better when you finally surrender. No more decisions. No more stress. Just me.”


Voicemail 16: (5:41 AM) “I’m getting tired of waiting. My patience is not infinite. You are pushing me, Irma. And you won’t like where you push me to.”


Only one message remains. Ione’s hand trembled so badly she could barely hold the phone. Her apartment, once her refuge, now felt like a prison. Every shadow seemed threatening, every creak of the old building sounded like a footstep on the stairs. She took a ragged breath and pressed play on the final voicemail. His voice was now a whisper, intimate and eerily close.


Voicemail 17: (6:00 AM) “There you are. Awake now, sitting up in your bed, take a drink of water and lie back down for thirty minutes until your alarm goes off. That lavender and black lace nightgown you’re wearing… it’s my favorite. I’m so close now, Irma. So very close.”


A sound escaped Ione’s throat, a strangled gasp of pure terror. Her eyes darted down at her own body. She was wearing a lavender nightgown, trimmed with delicate black lace. The very one he’d described. He wasn’t just remembering things she’d done. He was seeing her. Right now.


Her head snapped up, her eyes fixed on the window, on the narrow gap in the blinds she had not closed completely. Outside, the world was cloaked in the early dawn gloom. Across the street, beneath the dim orange glow of a streetlight that was shutting down for the night, a figure stood. A man dressed head to toe in black, his face hidden in shadow. He was perfectly still, like a nightmare carved into stone.


As she stood frozen, he slowly raised a hand.


And he waved.


It was not a friendly wave. It was a gesture of ownership, of arrival. The phone slipped from her numb fingers and clattered to the floor. The screen cracked, but the silence that followed was far more devastating. And in the suffocating stillness of her own home, Ione realized that the voicemails had stopped because the monologue was over. The conversation was about to begin.