The apartment was a shithole, but it was a shithole he could afford. No first and last. No security deposit. No credit check. That's what happens when your mother drinks herself to death and your father disappeared when you were twelve. You take what you can get.
The landlord handed him a lease with a strange clause on page four: Tenant will not attempt to access the third floor after midnight. Tenant will not leave food items in common areas after dark. If tenant observes stairs leading upward from the second floor, tenant will not ascend. He read it twice.
"What the hell is this?" The landlord took a drag from his cigarette. "Old form. Previous building. Haven't gotten around to updating it."
"There's no third floor."
"That's right. That's why you don't need to worry about it." He signed anyway. What choice did he have?
Then the footsteps started. Every night. Just past midnight. Heavy and deliberate, directly above his ceiling—on the floor that didn't exist. Then things started moving. His keys. His food.
Then he saw the light under the closet door. And behind the coats, behind the boxes, hidden beneath layers of paint: a seam in the wall. A door. Stairs going up.
