My Airbnb Neighbour Checked in the Night Before She Arrived | Horror Story Animated

Why was Unit 3's key missing when the app swore nobody had checked in? I'd made a fresh cup of tea at ten-forty-nine. By ten-fifty-three it had gone cold. Hook three on the key box held nothing but air. Someone had made a very careful decision.

📖 Free book of Kettleby Archive files: https://louloubooks.com/horror/free?ref=podcast

Chapters:
0:00 The Light Was Already On
1:04 The Spare Key Was Gone
2:13 Something Like Wet Stone
3:00 Nothing the Platform Can Do
4:11 The Recording Only Had Static
5:15 Seven Days of My Routine
6:21 2:14 a.m., The Handle Turns
7:25 She Had a Key Cut
8:34 Check-Out: Yesterday

Written and narrated by Alice Kettleby.
Original fiction — names, places and events are invented.

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Why was Unit 3's key missing when the app swore nobody had checked in? I'd made a fresh cup of tea at ten-forty-nine. By ten-fifty-three it had gone cold. Hook three on the key box held nothing but air. Someone had made a very careful decision. The scrape of that empty hook is still in my head.

I crossed the hallway, pressed my finger to the bare metal, and stood there. The owner was in Dubai. I was the only keyholder on site. So whose hand had lifted that key, and where were they now? The ceiling was original Victorian plaster, eight millimetres, maybe less. Every footstep above would land in my ear like a knuckle on a desk.

So why, at half past nine on a Tuesday with zero guests booked, did I hear one? At ten-fifty-three I stood at the key box and counted the hooks. Unit 3's was bare. I told myself it had gone back to the office. I dead-bolted my door, got into bed, pulled the duvet up. Then, directly overhead: one slow creak.

Then nothing. Just silence pressing back. Wednesday, seven a.m. Priya messaged: noon arrival confirmed. I went up and checked Unit 3. Bed smooth. Windows locked. But the kettle was warm. I had not touched it. Nobody had checked in. The welcome basket on the counter was missing one bottle of water.

So who had been here? Priya arrived at 12:08, hauling a bright orange suitcase. I handed over the key. Down in Unit 1, I sat still and listened. Normal footsteps. Then at four p.m. , a second rhythm joined them, heavier, slower, moving to the far corner and back. Two people. One room.

I knocked on Unit 3. Priya answered, mid-video-call, annoyed. Said she'd been on it an hour. I apologised, turned to go, then that smell hit me. Damp, mineral, like wet stone. Nothing to do with the candle on her table. I walked downstairs and told myself: no offence committed yet.

Eleven p.m. One slow creak, then a low rhythmic scrape, a chair dragged an inch at a time. I texted Priya. She replied instantly: asleep. The scraping continued. I put my phone down. Calling 999 could get the property suspended, and the property was my free rent. So I said nothing.

I messaged the owner in Dubai. Auto-reply: out of contact until Friday. The platform confirmed one active booking, Priya, zero prior entries on record. Then the operative said something that stopped me cold: the key-box log showed a scan at 6:40 a.m. Wednesday. Before I was awake.

Thursday morning. Utility cupboard. Behind the boiler: a flattened sleeping bag and a water bottle, still cold, sealed, branded, the same as the welcome basket upstairs. Someone had taken it from Unit 3, come down here, and slept. The front door had been triple-locked all night. So how?

Back in my unit I found a voicemail I had missed, timestamped Tuesday, 11:52 p.m. Breathing. Then a woman's voice, calm as reading a list: 'Unit 3 is ready.' That was all. I had never given this number to any guest. The booking platform had no record of the call. Thursday night I propped my phone on the shelf to record audio while I slept.

In the morning the file held forty minutes of pure static. My phone had moved six inches left. And the interior bolt, the one I always throw last thing, was unlatched. I always throw it. Friday, eight a.m. Priya knocked, face pale. At the back of her wardrobe, behind the spare duvet, was a small canvas tote bag, mould dark at the base.

She had not put it there. I had not put it there. And the bolt on my door had been open all night. So I went up with Priya and retrieved the bag using a carrier bag over my hand. Inside: a hotel keycard, a folded paper covered in handwritten times, and a photograph. The photograph showed our shared hallway, taken through a cracked door.

The timestamp in the corner read three weeks ago. I read the times aloud: 7:15, 8:40, 11:00, 1:30. They repeated across seven days. My alarm. My coffee. When I watched television. When I went to bed. Someone had recorded my entire week. Paper-clipped to the back was the receipt for my £3.

40 coffee. They had been that close. I called 999. Two officers walked every room with torches. Found nothing. My tea went cold while I watched them. I almost said the words building-centred fixation but I didn't know them yet. I just sat there not quite believing my own evidence.

Then the floorboards above us started again. The officers checked Unit 3 a second time. Still nothing. Priya changed her code. We sat with tea until the building went quiet. She dozed on my sofa. I turned the lamp off and watched the gap under my front door. A thin shadow moved along it and stopped.

At 2:14 a.m. my door handle turned. Then something slid under the gap. A single strip of paper. I did not touch it. I did not look away. On it, in small neat handwriting, was tomorrow's date, and my name. I did not open the door. I called Priya's number, let it ring twice, then hung up.

That was our signal: call 999 now. Then I called 999 myself and said I could smell gas. Police respond faster to gas. I watched the handle. It did not move again. Police arrived in nine minutes. In the stairwell they found a woman sitting on the top step, knees drawn up, a dark rucksack on her lap.

She did not run. She gave her name as Cora and said, in a flat and reasonable voice, that there must be a mix-up. She had a printed booking confirmation. It was cancelled. The officers arrested Cora and took her out. One stayed for our statements. Priya checked out at five a.m. and I did not blame her.

Before leaving, the officer said carefully: 'She had a second key cut from the original. Three stays ago. ' I remembered then. Cora had been a guest in Unit 3 eleven weeks earlier. DS Alderton called Monday. Cora had stayed three times under different names, mapping routines, layout, every guest.

Building-centred fixation, he called it. I asked him to repeat that. Then he said: 'Your name appeared on thirty-one of forty-seven pages.' I said nothing for a long time. I changed every lock, fitted a door bar, resigned the role two weeks later. I still write my daily times down each morning, and I still cannot explain why I started doing that before I ever read the notebook.

Who taught me to keep that record? I have no answer. Six months later a notification appeared on the old app. Unit 3. A new booking. Guest name: C. Alderton. A blank grey silhouette. Check-in listed as tonight. Check-out listed as yesterday. I stared at that screen for a long time.

Then I called DS Alderton. He said his name was not Cora.