The Roommates Who Never Existed

The professor was halfway through the attendance sheet when the ice settled in my chest. He hadnt called Parkers name.

Excuse me, I said, my voice cutting through the hum of the lecture hall. I think you skipped Parker. Parker Ward. Hes in this section.

Professor Miller didn't even look up from his tablet. His brow furrowed, a flicker of genuine annoyance crossing his face. "Please dont disrupt the lesson, Mr. Payne. There is no Parker Ward on the roster for this course. There never has been."

I felt a ripple of confusion move through the room. I looked around, waiting for someone to laugh, for someone to say, Good one, Prof. But my classmates just stared at me with blank, pitying expressions. They nodded along with him.

After class, my two other roommates, Brooks and Beckett, caught up with me in the hallway. They were pale, their eyes darting around like they were looking for an exit from a nightmare.

"The housing list," Brooks whispered, pulling me into a corner. "I checked the digital directory for our suite. Parkers name is gone."

"Everything in his room," Beckett added, his voice trembling. "His clothes, his laptop, that stupid neon sign he boughtits all gone. Its like the room was professionally sanitized. Theres no trace of him anywhere on campus."

The three of us spent the next hour in a frantic, sweating blur, checking the registrar, the library, the student union. Nothing.

But the real horror started the next morning.

I woke up and went to class, my head throbbing. I waited for Brooks to show uphe was always five minutes early to Lit. But the seat next to me stayed empty.

When the professor finished roll call, I stood up, my chair screeching against the floor. "Professor, where is Brooks? Brooks Sullivan?"

The man looked at me with a tired, impatient sneer. "There is no Brooks Sullivan in this class. If you continue this disruptive behavior, you will be removed from the program permanently."

By the third day, the last of them was gone.

I stood in the center of our empty suite, looking at the four identical beds. Only mine had sheets. Only mine had a life. The silence was heavy, pressing against my eardrums.

I knew. I was next.

Parkers disappearance had been surgical.

Just thirty minutes before that first class, I had been shaking him awake, telling him he was going to be late. I could still smell the faint scent of his cologne in the air.

And yet, now, not a single person in our cohort claimed to know him. The university database returned a "No Record Found" error for his student ID.

A cold sweat broke across my skin. I sprinted back to the dorms, ignoring the shouts of the RA. I burst into our suite, heading straight for Parkers bed.

It was bare. The mattress was covered in a thin, plastic film, as if it had just been delivered from a warehouse. The nameplate on the door, which used to have all four of our names printed in Beckett's neat handwriting, now only listed three.

Brooks and Beckett came running in behind me, breathless.

"Go back to class," Brooks said, grabbing my shoulders. He was the steady one, the pre-med student who always had a plan. "Well figure this out. There has to be a logical explanation. A glitch, a pranksomething."

I didn't have a choice. I went back to the lecture hall, my mind a static-filled mess.

Just as I reached the door, Brooks realized hed forgotten his keys in the room. He turned back, disappearing down the dorm hallway.

When he finally walked into the classroom twenty minutes later, he wasn't the Brooks I knew. His eyes were hard, fixed straight ahead. He sat three rows away from me.

I approached him after the lecture. "Brooks, man, did you find anything?"

He turned on me, his fingers digging into my collar, slamming me back against the chalkboard. His face was a mask of pure, unadulterated rage.

"Don't you ever say that name again," he hissed. "There is no Parker Ward. There has never been a Parker Ward. If you keep spreading these delusions, I will make sure you regret it."

The fire in his eyes chilled me to the bone.

Beckett rushed over and pulled him off me. "What is wrong with you? We were supposed to find him together!"

"Enough!" Brookss eyes were bloodshot. "I dont know who the hell youre talking about. Both of youstop this psych-ward bullshit right now."

I caught Becketts eye and gave a small, subtle shake of my head. "Youre right," I said, my voice hollow. "We don't know a Parker."

Brookss breathing slowed. The tension left his shoulders, and he walked away as if nothing had happened. It was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen.

I followed him from a distance for the rest of the day. He went to the dining hall, he studied in the library, he scrolled through his phone. He was perfectly, eerily normal.

The next morning, I rushed to the classroom, my heart hammering against my ribs.

Brooks wasn't there.

The dread became a physical weight, crushing my lungs. After the professor finished the list, I raised my hand, my fingers shaking.

"Professor... Brooks Sullivan isn't here."

The entire class turned to look at me. It was the same lookthe blank stare of people watching a car crash.

"Who?" someone whispered.

"Who is Brooks Sullivan? I've never heard that name," the professor said, his voice flat.

I couldn't take the gaslighting anymore. I screamed.

"What are you doing? How can you not know him? He was literally sitting right there yesterday! I'm calling him right now!"

I pulled out my phone, scrolling frantically through my contacts.

The names were gone. Parker, Brooksboth gone. I checked Instagram, my call logs, my texts. All the threads were deleted. When I manually typed in Brooks's number, the automated voice told me the line had been disconnected for years.

I stood there, paralyzed, the phone slipping from my numb fingers.

"Mr. Payne," the professor barked, his face flushed with anger. "I warned you yesterday. This ends now. Leave this room and do not come back until youve seen a specialist."

Beckett caught me in the hall, dragging me toward the stairwell.

"Chester, listen to me," he whispered, his eyes wide with terror. "Don't lose it. Well find them. Theyre real. I know theyre real. Two grown men don't just evaporate. Well look together."

I sat down on the steps, burying my face in my hands, trying to catch my breath.

A moment later, Beckett stood up abruptly. "Damn it, I forgot my thumb drive. I have that presentation in ten minutes. I have to run back to the room."

The memory of Brooks turning back for his keys flashed through my mind like a warning light. I grabbed Becketts wrist, my grip desperate.

"Don't go back there," I begged. "Something happens in that room. Stay here. Stay with me."

Beckett pulled his hand away, offering a weak, sad smile. "Its just a USB, Chester. Ill be right back. I'm not going anywhere, I promise. We're in this together."

I sat in the hallway, counting the seconds. Ten minutes. Twenty. The class ended, and students poured out of the room. Beckett didn't come back until the very end of the period.

"Did you get it?" I asked, standing up. "Are we going to the campus security office now?"

Beckett looked at me with a strange, distant expression. "Go where? And who are 'they'? Look, Chester, you need to get a grip. Its just been the two of us in that suite since move-in day. Stop trying to make up people."

The world tilted. I felt like I was falling upward.

"Beckett, stop it! What did you see in that room? Who talked to you?"

"I said drop it!" Becketts teeth ground together. He balled his hands into fists.

"You promised me! You said you wouldn't leave me alone in this!"

Beckett lunged. He didn't just push me; he swung, his fist connecting with my jaw. I hit the floor, the copper taste of blood filling my mouth.

When I looked up, his face was a twitching mess of anger andwas that fear? Deep, primal terror masked by violence?

"I said there is nobody else!" he roared. "Mention them again, and Ill do more than hit you!"

I scrambled to my feet, backing away. "Fine. You don't want to look? Ill do it myself."

For a split second, the anger in Becketts eyes vanished, replaced by a devastating, haunting look of pity. He grabbed my arm, his grip bruising.

"Don't go back there," he whispered, his voice cracking. "Youll regret it. Just... just stay here."

I shoved him off and ran.

From that moment on, Beckett became my shadow. He followed me everywhereto the cafeteria, to the library, even standing outside the bathroom stalls. He was like a jailer, his eyes never leaving me.

I walked back into our dorm, and the nameplate on the door now had only two names: Beckett & Chester.

A cold shiver crawled up my spine. Three days ago, four of us lived here. Now, two were ghosts, and the third was a hollowed-out version of a friend.

Was I losing my mind? Was this some elaborate psychological experiment?

The next morning, the silence in the room was deafening.

I sat up in bed. Becketts bunk was empty. He must have gone to wash up.

I knew I was running out of time. I moved quickly. I set up my DSLR camera on my desk, hidden behind a stack of textbooks, its lens pointed directly at the doorway and the empty beds. I hit Record.

I had to know what happened in the silence.

I slipped out of the room just as Beckett was coming back, his towel over his shoulder. He glared at me, his eyes dark. "Trying to sneak off?"

"Just going to breakfast," I said, my voice steady.

In class, Beckett sat behind me, his eyes boring into the back of my head. I felt like a prisoner being led to the gallows.

As we walked into the lecture hall, Beckett gave me a sharp shove. "Get in there. Don't try anything stupid."

I stumbled forward, caught my balance, and turned around to snap something back at him.

But the doorway was empty. Beckett was gone.

My heart dropped into my stomach.

I didn't think. I sprinted back into the hallway.

"Beckett!" I screamed.

The corridor was empty. I ran to the stairwell, then down to the lobby. Nothing. He had been right behind me. He hadn't had time to go anywhere.

I saw a guy from our hall walking toward the elevators. I grabbed his arm, nearly shaking him. "Did you see Beckett? Beckett Simon? He was just here!"

The guy looked at me like I was a rabid dog. "Who? I don't know any Beckett. You okay, man? You look like youre having a stroke."

The buzzing in my ears turned into a roar.

I knew. I knew exactly what I would find.

I ran all the way back to the dorms, my lungs burning. I burst through the door of our suite, and the chill hit me like a physical wall.

Becketts side of the room was bare. His bedding, his posters, his shoesgone. The mattress was wrapped in that same sterile plastic. It looked like nobody had lived there in years.

I turned to my camera. My hands were shaking so hard I could barely press the playback button.

The video started. It showed the empty room, the sunlight shifting across the floor.

Then, the door was kicked open.

Suddenly, the screen went black. Static hissed and popped. I tried to fast-forward, to rewind, but the footage was corrupted. All I could see in the final frames, before the sensor failed entirely, was a shadow on the floor.

A shadow of someone standing in the doorway.

I walked to the door. The nameplate had changed again.

Chester.

Just me. My final deadline.

I was staring at the name when the door swung open again. A guy I didn't recognize stood there, holding a duffel bag.

"Who the hell are you?" he asked, sounding annoyed. "What are you doing in my room?"

I stared at him, my brain refusing to process the words. "Your room? This is my suite. I live here with"

"Look, I don't know what you're on," he snapped, stepping inside and dropping his bag on Becketts old bed. "But I just moved in. Get your stuff and get out. This is a single-occupancy unit now."

"No," I whispered. "You're lying. You're all lying!"

I lost it. I shoved past him and sprinted toward the academic building. I didn't care about the consequences anymore. I burst into the lecture hall in the middle of a senior seminar.

"I know what's happening!" I screamed, my voice raw. "My roommates didn't just leave! Someone is erasing them! Theres an intruder in my room right nowhes the one! If you help me catch him, we can find them!"

The room was silent. Fifty pairs of eyes stared at me, but none of them held recognition.

The professor walked down from the podium, his face tight with concern. "Son, you need to go back to your own department. You don't belong in this class."

I felt my knees give out. I hit the floor. "I was here yesterday. I sat right there. We talked about the midterm."

"I've never seen you before in my life," the professor said softly.

I grabbed the attendance sheet from his hand. I scanned the names, my eyes blurred with tears.

My name wasn't there.

I pulled out my phone and logged into the university portal. Invalid User.

I wasn't a student. I wasn't a resident. I didn't exist.

I ran out of the building, heading for the dorms one last time. I had to get back into that room. But the security guard at the front desk stepped into my path.

"No ID, no entry," he said, his voice like gravel.

"I live here! Room 402!"

"Kid, I've been on this shift for three years. I've never seen your face. Move along before I call the cops."

I tried to push past him, but he grabbed my arm, his fingers like iron. I fought him, kicking and screaming, fueled by a frantic, jagged energy.

"Let me in! Theyre in there! My friends are in there!"

A crowd began to gather.

"Who is that?" someone asked.

"Never seen him."

I looked around at the circle of strangers, and then my eyes snagged on something in the corner of the lobby. A small, familiar stack of papers on the security desk.

I started to laugh. It was a jagged, ugly sound.

"You can stop the act now," I said, breathing hard. "I see it. I finally see the truth."

The guard let out a heavy sigh, looking at me with pure disdain. "Look, kid. Youre clearly having a breakdown. You cant get past the turnstile. Your face isn't in the system. Just go."

He let go of my arm and stepped back, gesturing toward the scanner. I stepped up to it. The red light flashed. Access Denied.

"See?" he said. "Nothing."

I didn't back down. I pointed toward the desk, at the wastepaper basket tucked underneath. "If you're not lying, then explain those."

I reached over and grabbed a handful of discarded papers. They were the old housing liststhe ones that had been posted on our door every day.

"My name is right here! Chester Payne! Room 402!"

I held the papers up like a shield. "I knew it. Every time one of them disappeared, you switched the list. You deleted them from the system, then you moved on to me. Youre trying to make me believe Im a ghost!"

The guards face went from annoyed to genuinely angry. "You little prick. You're the one whos been doing it! You've been coming in here every night, taping your own fake lists over the official ones. I've had to tear down a new one every morning."

He turned his monitor around and pulled up the security footage from the hallway.

The video played. It showed the hallway outside Room 402. But in the video, I was always alone. I was the one walking in and out. I was the one taping the names to the door. I was the one talking to thin air in the cafeteria.

The guy who had "moved into my room" stepped forward from the crowd. "Ive been home on family leave for three weeks. I just got back today and found you sleeping in my bed. Youre a freak, man."

The world began to spin. A nauseating vertigo took hold.

Was I the one? Was my memory a fractured, beautiful lie?

The crowd pushed me toward the exit. I stumbled out onto the sidewalk, the cold autumn air biting at my skin.

I stood there, staring at the brick facade of the university. Was everythingthe late-night study sessions, the jokes, the brotherhoodjust a dream?

I turned to walk away, to disappear into the city, but then I heard it. A faint, electronic beep.

The security gate behind me had cycled. A student was walking out. As the gate swung shut, the facial recognition camera caught me in its periphery.

Verified.

The gate clicked open again.

My heart nearly stopped. The system recognized me. I was a student.

They were lying. All of them. The video was a deepfake, the housing lists were a distraction. They were trying to break me.

I didn't think. I ran.

I spent the entire day scouring the campus like a ghost. I checked every bathroom stall, every locker, every dusty corner of the library. I was looking for a footprint, a forgotten pen, anything.

I found nothing. No records in the clubs we joined. No names in the registers of the coffee shops we frequented.

I was ready to give up. I sat down in a patch of dirt behind the dorms, my head in my hands. And then, something caught the light.

Hidden in the overgrown weeds of the landscaping, I saw a flash of plastic.

I reached down and pulled out three student ID cards.

Parker Ward.

Brooks Sullivan.

Beckett Simon.

My heart hammered against my ribs. I screamed with a mix of terror and triumph. "They exist! Theyre real!"

The IDs were dusty, but the faces were unmistakable. This was proof.

I knew I couldn't go to the policenot yet. The school had too much power. I did the only thing a twenty-year-old in 2026 knows how to do.

I started a livestream.

My hands were shaking so hard the camera was a blur. "Please, if anyone is watching, help me! My roommates have been taken. The university is covering it up. Theyre telling me these people never existed!"

I held the three IDs up to the lens. "Look! I found these hidden on campus! Theyre in danger! A-State University is erasing its students!"

The viewer count exploded. The comments began scrolling so fast I couldn't read them.

Is this a prank?

Look at those IDs, they look legit.

Someone call the cops on that school!

Within twenty minutes, campus security descended on me. They didn't even try to be gentle. They tackled me, pinned my face into the dirt, and dragged me toward the administration building.

I was shoved into the Deans office. He was red-faced, trembling with fury.

"You have no idea the damage you've done," he hissed, pointing a finger at me. "Spreading these lies, manufacturing evidence"

"Lies?" I spat, throwing the IDs onto his mahogany desk. "Explain those. Explain why their faces are on your school's IDs if they don't exist!"

The Dean stared at the cards. His expression shifted from anger to a cold, hard pity.

"Chester," he said quietly. "Look at the dates on those cards."

I picked one up. I looked at the issue date.

September 2018.

I froze. "That's... that's a typo."

"No," the Dean said. "Its 2026, Chester. Those men would have graduated years ago. They haven't been students here in a very long time."

I backed away, my wrist hitting the edge of the desk. My watchthe heavy, silver watch the guys had given me for my 19th birthdaycaught the light.

"No," I whispered. "They gave me this. Last month. For my birthday."

"Chester," the Dean said, stepping around the desk. "You aren't a student here anymore. You haven't been for years."

I turned to run, but the door opened before I could reach it.