Why do both families coordinate their activities so precisely despite claiming they barely know each other, and what's behind that shared basement space that neither household will discuss? Which side of the duplex receives mail for residents who don't officially live there, and why do both units have identical modifications that don't appear on building permits? What connects these homes through walls that are thicker than standard construction requires?
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“It is easier for a man to burn down his own house than to get rid of his prejudices.”
― Roger Bacon
As dusk fell over the quiet suburban street, I walked past rows of semi-detached houses looking identical from the outside. Behind drawn curtains, anything could lurk hidden from view.
Pausing outside one, muffled sounds drifted from within - whispers just past hearing, hints of movement beyond the threshold. Peering through a gap in heavy drapes, shifting shadows held alien geometry in flickering half-light.
Further down, a gangly figure huddled in another home’s garden shed, muttering and scribbling frenzied equations by candlelight. Wild eyes darted up at my passing, lock clicking ominously behind.
One attached home’s interior seemed recently rearranged, walls angled impossibly awry as if to deny intrusion. An attic window flickered with dancing light as giggles echoed from within, rising to unnatural pitches that chilled the soul.
Late into the night, strange chanting began emerging from neighboring houses, blending with the hum of unidentified machinery. Behind curtains, silhouettes swayed and twitched in an eldritch rhythm.
Dawn light revealed lawns littered with strange debris - moldering tomes, alien machinery parts, tools stained dark beyond explanation. Front doors stood open on empty-seeming homes as an unnatural hush fell.
That evening, muffled pleas rose from somewhere down the row before cutting abruptly. An oily mist began seeping through cracks as scratching sounded from within the walls, where the true nature of this neighborhood now emerges nightly from its mundane façade.
