The Stairway to Nowhere
Never before had the phone rung so early. Least of all for him—Philip Montgomery, a GP with thirty years of practice, whose days ran like clockwork: a strong cup of tea at 7:15, the morning paper, a leisurely walk to the surgery. Everything was orderly, predictable, like a Swiss watch. But not today. At 5:42—a time when even London still dozed beneath a thick blanket of silence—the call came, harsh as a stitched wound.
He rose, tossed aside the duvet, found his dressing gown by touch, and picked up the receiver without turning on the light.
“Yes?”
“It’s Beatrice Wilson… from Flat 16… You might not remember… My neighbour, Anthony… He’s… I think he’s dead.”
Her voice was brittle, crackling like an old tape played one too many times. There was no hysteria—just bewilderment and fear, as if this were a bad dream from which she couldn’t wake.
“Call an ambulance,” Philip replied, though he sensed it was already too late.
“I’m afraid to go down alone… He’s in the basement. Said the light only works till six. Asked me to call you if… if anything happened…”
He fell silent, breathing heavily, as if standing outside a hospital room where hope had long since faded. This was the part of medicine no university or residency had prepared him for.
“He said if I heard the scraping… that was it. The end,” she whispered.
And then he knew—sleep was over.
Forty minutes later, he stood before an ageing council block on the outskirts of Birmingham. The building sagged with weariness—peeling paint, faded windows, an air of abandonment. Beatrice met him in a thin robe thrown over her nightdress, sleeves pulled down, eyes downcast.
“Last night, he said… said someone was calling to him from the basement. I laughed… Then, in the night… a scream. Scraping. Then… silence.”
She spoke almost soundlessly, as if the walls themselves were eavesdropping. Philip nodded. No words needed.
The basement entrance was at the back—broken steps, an unlatched metal door swaying in the wind. Gripping his torch, he clenched his jaw and descended.
The air was thick with damp and mould, untouched for years. The flickering bulb gave out, leaving only his torchlight to catch on cardboard boxes, cobwebs, old furniture—and a figure.
A man crouched, facing the wall. His coat hung open, hands limp on his knees. Philip stepped closer. His pulse thudded in his ears.
“Anthony?”
Silence. Only when he was nearly upon him did the man’s shoulders twitch.
“I hear them,” he murmured, his voice alien, as though spoken by another man hiding inside.
“Who?”
“The ones left… beneath us. They whisper. They remember. They wait. They know everything… about everyone.”
He turned his head. His eyes were hollow, lifeless—like smothered glass. Philip placed a hand on his shoulder. No reaction.
“It’s too late,” Anthony breathed. “I’m going to let them in.”
Then—from the depths—came the scraping. Long. Metallic. Piercing. And Philip heard it too. He trembled. Not from fear, but from knowing some things could never be unseen.
The ambulance arrived fifteen minutes later. Anthony was found unconscious but alive by the wall. Diagnosis—acute psychosis triggered by severe depression, worsened by guilt. The duty doctor filed it mechanically, without questions. No one asked what the man had truly heard beneath the stairs.
Philip didn’t go home. He sat by the basement entrance. Lit a cigarette—his first in twenty years. Drew the smoke in slow, as if inhaling another’s pain. He thought not just of Anthony, but of himself. Of how, with age, a stairway downward grows in each of us. Sometimes narrow, barely visible. Other times—wide and steep. But never with a railing.
And of how vital it is that in the darkest moment, someone chooses to descend with you. Not to save you. Just to be there. So the scraping isn’t heard alone.
He stubbed out the cigarette. Stepped outside. The morning was grey, but within the grey—light lived. And Philip understood: today, he was needed. By someone. Even if only by himself.
