The Little People

In the Alderwood hallway, Mira heard it - soft as a mouse tiptoeing, but too steady to be a mouse. Scuff, scuff, then a tiny scrape that sounded like someone dragging a spoon along the inside of a wall. The hallway smelled like clean soap and warm wood from the floorboards. Sunlight lay in a pale stripe across the runner rug, and everything looked calm, except for that little sound coming from the wall beside the family portraits.

Mira pressed her ear against the wallpaper edge. It felt cool through her cheek, like the wall was holding onto winter. She could hear the house breathing too - radiator clicks and the gentle hum of the lights - yet the scuffling kept happening in small bursts, as if someone tiny was moving from one secret spot to another.

“Mira?” her mother called from the kitchen, voice bright and ordinary. “Shoes on, please. We’re going to get your Aunt Willa she's coming for a visit.”

Mira lifted her head quickly. The sound stopped the moment she moved, and that made her stomach do a little wobble. She hurried to the hallway bench where her sneakers waited, laces tied in neat bows yesterday. Today, the laces looked… slightly different. Not untied, exactly. Just looser, like they were waiting for a hand.

She sat, reached for one lace, and tugged. The bow slid apart with a whisper. Mira blinked. Her fingers tightened around the ends, and she tied them again, pulling until the knot felt solid.

When she stood, the hallway was still. No scuffing. No scrape.

Then, from inside the wall, came a soft plip, like a drop landing in a tiny puddle. Mira froze so hard she could feel the warmth of her own breath on her nose.

“I’m coming!” she called back, because she didn’t want to worry anyone. Her mother’s footsteps moved away, and the hallway quieted again.

She moved down the hall after her mom. Off to visit her Aunt Willa.

She couldn't wait to get back. - Back to the wallpaper. To listen to the sounds of the wall. And what is inside it.

When they get back home. She doesn't even bother to remove her shoes. Before running over to the wall where she'd heard the before. Where she always hears the soft strange sounds.

Mira stared at the wall. The wallpaper pattern - a small swirl of pale blue - looked the same as always. But now Mira felt as if the wall were watching her, holding its breath. She leaned closer and listened, careful not to bump the wall with her shoulder.

Scuff, scuff. A sound like a fingernail tapping wood, then a little pause, then the scrape again.

“Okay,” Mira whispered, though she wasn’t sure who she meant. “If you’re in there, you can’t keep making sounds like that. I’m going to find out.”

She slid her hand along the wall trim, following the edge where the baseboard met the wallpaper. Her palm brushed something slightly rough, like a hole in the paint. Mira’s skin prickled. She knocked softly with her knuckles.

Tap tap.

The scuffling stopped so suddenly it felt like someone had blinked.

Mira swallowed. “Hello?”

No answer. But after a moment - just a moment - the wallpaper shimmered, not like a trick of light, but like a thin layer of air had rippled. Mira’s breath caught. She pressed her eye close and saw a flash of movement inside the wall: a tiny shape darting behind the hole.

The shape vanished the second Mira tried to focus on it.

Mira jerked back, her heart thumping in her ears. “That - ” she began, then stopped herself. She didn’t want to say it out loud and make it more real than it already was.

She glanced down at her shoes. Both bows were now loose again, as if someone had undone them while she was listening. Mira’s cheeks warmed. She had tied them tight. She knew she had.

Mira sat and tied them again, slower this time, watching the lace ends as she crossed them. She made the knot, then pressed it down with her thumb until it felt flat and sure.

When she stood, the wall made another sound, a soft click, like a small toy snapping into place.

“Are you playing with my shoelaces?” Mira asked, her voice smaller than she meant it to be. She tried to sound polite, the way she did when she asked a neighbor’s dog to sit.

Scuff, scuff.

Mira waited. The hallway stayed bright. Dust motes floated in the sun stripe. Nothing else moved.

Then - right in front of her - one shoelace bow slipped apart again. This time, it didn’t happen slowly like yesterday’s loose bow. It came undone cleanly, and the ends flopped over the tongue of her sneaker.

Mira stared at the knot, then at the wall. She felt a strange mix of feelings: curiosity like a warm lamp, and frustration like a crumpled sock.

“I get it,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady. “You want attention. But you can’t keep doing it.”

The wall answered with a tiny sound, like a giggle swallowed quickly. Mira couldn’t prove it was a giggle. She only knew it sounded delighted, as if someone inside liked the way she looked.

...