Patient File No. 7
They transferred Patient No. 7 to the psychiatric emergency ward. The doctor on duty, after examining him, said it was severe nervous shock, likely caused by an acute psychotic episode. He wanted to know what had happened.
I couldn't tell the truth. I said he'd had an anxiety crisis.
They kept him for observation. As his treating physician, I was allowed to see him — but when I went to visit the next day, what I found was not what I had expected.
He was sitting on the bed, calm, almost unnaturally calm, and when I entered, he smiled — a smile that reminded me of my reflection's smile, that Monday morning.
"Are you feeling better?" I asked, cautiously.
"Much better," he said, his voice steady, without the tremor it always carried. "I think I finally understand what he wants."
I sat on the chair beside his bed. "What does he want?"
"He wants someone to stay," he said, turning his gaze away from me and fixing it on the room's window — a window that faced an interior courtyard, with no particular view. "For twenty-two years, I was the only one who could see him. The only witness. And witnesses... witnesses eventually either run away or break. He's tired of being alone, Doctor. He wants someone else to stay too, with him, forever."
Something in his tone worried me — not the content, but the strange calm behind it.
"You're not well," I said. "You need to rest."
He laughed — a short, bitter laugh. "Rest. Funny you use that word. He used to say the same thing. 'Rest. Let me do my work.'"
Before I could respond, a nurse came in and said visiting hours were over. I stood to leave, but before I went, he grabbed my hand — cold, far colder than a hand should be.
"Doctor," he said, quietly, so only I could hear. "Be careful. I think he likes you. And when he likes you, he doesn't let go easily."
---
That night, when I got home, the first thing I noticed was the smell of bread — before I even opened the door, from behind it.
I was prepared. Or I thought I was.
I opened the door. The apartment was dark, except for the faint glow of the streetlight coming through the window. I turned on the light.
Everything was in its place.
Except for one thing.
On the kitchen table, a package of fresh bread, still steaming, sat exactly in the center.
I didn't go near it. I just stood and stared, while my mind tried to find logical explanations — maybe someone had broken in, maybe it was a prank, maybe...
My phone rang. The hospital's number.
I answered, my voice trembling.
It was the ward nurse. Her voice was strangely formal and cold, the way people deliver bad news.
"Doctor, I'm sorry to inform you... your patient, about half an hour ago, disappeared from the ward. The cameras show nothing. It's as if... as if he just vanished."
My grip tightened around the phone. "How is that possible?"
"We don't know, Doctor. We've checked all the cameras. One moment he's on the bed, the next moment he's gone. No open doors, no alarms triggered."
I thanked her and hung up, my eyes still fixed on the bread on the table.
The bread, slowly, began to collapse in on itself — not as if someone were pressing it, but as if it were rotting from within, rapidly, far faster than nature allowed, until it turned into a black, moldy mass right before my eyes.
Its smell, instead of fresh bread, was now the stench of decay.
And on the surface of the table, beneath that black mass, letters had been carved — as if scratched in with a fingernail or something sharp, letters I was certain hadn't been there before:
"He doesn't need me anymore. You do."
My legs gave out. I sat on the kitchen floor, my back against the cabinets, and for the first time in this entire ordeal, I truly thought I was losing my mind — not because I was seeing strange things, but because the strange things were starting to seem logical.
---
I don't know how long I sat there. All I know is that at one moment, I heard knocking.
Three taps. Soft. Exactly as Dr. Rostami's neighbor had described.
I didn't get up. I couldn't.
The knocks repeated. This time, a voice accompanied them — a voice from behind the door, Mr. Monday's multi-layered voice, but softer now, almost gentle:
"Doctor? I know you're awake. I just want to talk. Without the intermediary. Just you and me."
My body froze.
"I know you're afraid," the voice continued, "but you shouldn't be. I don't want anything bad. I just want you to understand me. All those who left me never truly understood me."
I couldn't answer. I couldn't move.
After several minutes of silence — a silence that felt as long as a lifetime — the voice came again, this time with something in its tone that resembled anger, an anger hidden beneath that artificial calm:
"All right. It's fine, Doctor. There's plenty of time. I always have time."
I heard footsteps — footsteps moving away from the door, but strangely, instead of fading, they simply vanished, suddenly, like a sound someone had cut off.
Absolute silence returned.
I stood, trembling, and went to my phone to call someone — anyone — and at that exact moment, the screen lit up, without me having touched it.
A message, from an unknown number:
"7:22. Tomorrow morning, you'll wake up and no longer know what day it is. Enjoy, Doctor."
I dropped the phone as if it had burned my hand.
That night, for the first time, I didn't go to bed at all. I sat on a kitchen chair, all night, waiting for morning — waiting to find out whether today, finally, would be a day other than Monday.
---
To be continued in Chapter Ten...