Submitted by: Daniel, 23
Food-delivery driver
I delivered food while studying at university. Most nights were boring. This happened during my final shift.
The order came in at 11:48 p.m.
It was for a family meal from a chicken restaurant: two large boxes, four drinks and several side dishes.
The address was about fifteen kilometres outside town.
The customer’s name was listed as M. Hall.
I nearly rejected it because of the distance, but the app showed a large prepaid tip.
The navigation led me onto a narrow road surrounded by forest. After ten minutes, the streetlights disappeared. The rain became heavier, and my phone lost signal.
I eventually saw a house at the end of a gravel driveway.
It was a two-storey wooden building with white walls and dark windows. A porch light flickered above the door.
I carried the food up the steps and knocked.
A girl answered.
She looked about twelve. Her hair was wet and stuck to the sides of her face. She wore a pale nightdress and no shoes.
I asked whether her parents were home.
She said, “They’re in the dining room.”
Behind her, I could see several people sitting around a table.
Nobody spoke or moved.
The girl reached for the food, but the app required a four-digit delivery code.
She looked back into the house.
A man’s voice said, “Nineteen eighty-seven.”
The app accepted the code.
That should have been impossible because delivery codes used four random digits and rarely resembled a year.
The girl took the bags.
Her hands were freezing.
Before closing the door, she asked, “Did you see the smoke on the way here?”
I told her I had not.
She looked relieved.
“Then you still have time.”
The door closed.
I returned to my car and noticed that the app had frozen. The order remained marked as undelivered.
Then I smelled smoke.
At first, I thought it came from my engine. But when I looked back, grey smoke was leaking from the house windows.
Flames appeared behind the curtains.
I ran toward the porch and called emergency services.
Before I reached the steps, the upstairs windows exploded outward.
I could hear people screaming inside.
I tried the front door, but the handle was too hot to touch.
Then my phone regained signal.
The dispatcher asked for the address.
When I gave it, she became confused. She said no residence existed there.
I looked up.
The house was gone.
There was no fire, no porch and no driveway.
I was standing in front of a blackened concrete foundation covered in weeds.
The fire service arrived twenty minutes later. One of the firefighters knew the location.
A house had burned down there in 1987.
A family of five died during a late-night electrical fire. The youngest victim was a twelve-year-old girl.
Investigators believed the fire began in the dining room.
I checked my delivery history the next morning.
The order had vanished. The restaurant had no record of preparing it, and the money never appeared in my account.
However, the four-digit code remained in my phone’s clipboard.
1987.
Three nights later, someone left two empty food bags outside my apartment.
They smelled of smoke.
Inside one of them was a handwritten note:
You took too long.
Editorial note: This is an original fictional horror story presented in a realistic user-submission style. It is not a verified eyewitness account.