🕰️ Urban Legends of Hollow Creek: The Midnight Maintenance Man

“Some stains can’t be cleaned — they just sink deeper.”

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🎭 Monologue — The Nightly Storyteller

Hollow Creek is breathing again.

The ash has been swept from the library steps, and the blackened bookshelves stand like ribs beneath the faint light of new bulbs. The townsfolk hammer and paint and plant as if rebuilding can silence memory. I help where I can — lifting beams, patching walls, pretending that the world is normal again.

But normal doesn’t come easy when you’ve seen what I have.

Sometimes, in the quiet between hammer strikes, I hear the faint flutter of pages — the Bookworm’s whisper, maybe, or something worse. The nights feel heavier here. Even the fog doesn’t move right; it clings instead of drifts.

Still, I stay.

Because rebuilding gives my hands something to do when my mind can’t rest.

And because Hollow Creek isn’t done with me yet.

The townsfolk talk in low voices about the old high school on Elm Street — the one boarded up since the storm two years ago. They say at night, the gym lights flicker on, and someone hums an old song while sweeping the floors. Some say it’s the wind tripping the sensors. Others say it’s him.

The Midnight Maintenance Man.

I didn’t believe it at first. Then again, I’ve learned that disbelief is a luxury you lose after the first curse takes root.

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🧹 The Urban Legend: The Midnight Maintenance Man

Long before the town began to rot, there was a custodian named Harold Kellerman who took pride in keeping Hollow Creek High spotless. He was the first to arrive and the last to leave — always seen pushing his squeaky mop down the halls, keys jangling like a wind chime of ghosts.

When the school board shut the place down, Kellerman refused to leave. “The kids made a mess,” he told the superintendent. “Someone’s gotta clean it up.”

No one saw him after that final night. The next morning, the front doors were padlocked from the inside.

Weeks passed. The power bills spiked even though the grid to the school was cut. Neighbors reported faint light bleeding through the gym windows after midnight, and a low tune echoing from within — a man humming an old melody, off-key but steady.

Teenagers dared each other to sneak in. One boy, Eli Morrison, went alone. He live-streamed it, of course — shaky flashlight, forced laughter, “Hey guys, look — still smells like bleach in here.” The stream ended suddenly with the sound of a mop handle clattering to the floor and Eli shouting, “Wait, who’s—”

They found his phone two days later, the last frame showing a pair of worn work boots and a puddle reflecting the gym lights.

Every year since, when the anniversary storm rolls through Hollow Creek, the lights in the high school come alive again. People say you can hear the mop gliding across tile — that slow, rhythmic squeak — followed by the sound of dripping water, even when it hasn’t rained.

The air turns cold, thick with the metallic tang of cleaning solution and something sour underneath. And if you linger too long, you might catch the faint scent of sweat and old uniforms… and a whisper behind you:

> “Can’t leave a mess behind.”

They say Kellerman’s still there, trapped in the endless loop of cleaning what can’t be cleaned — polishing away the stains that keep bleeding through time.

Some stains never dry.

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📜 The Storyteller Chronicles

I’m trying to rebuild a life that feels mine again.

Early mornings, quiet evenings, simple meals. I tell myself that the curse is dormant, that the hum in my blood is just exhaustion. But every few nights, my phone rings.

The same number. No name. Always the same voice — distorted, patient, almost kind.

> “You’re fading,” it says. “You need to get stronger. You need to learn to use Rewind.”

I don’t answer anymore. I just listen, the static crawling under my skin.

Rewind.

The word keeps repeating in my head like a skipping record.

This afternoon, the rain started early — soft at first, then steady, drumming against the tin roof above my rented room. The air smells like wet paper and cedar. I was sitting at the table, sorting through my notes on the Hollow Creek legends, when a knock echoed through the apartment.

Three times. Slow. Intentional.

When I opened the door, Nyra stood there. Her hair was damp, curling around her face; her eyes sharp and tired, like she’d come straight from a sleepless night.

“Can we talk?” she asked quietly. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

Something in her tone made me step aside before I even thought to ask what. She moved past me — her coat brushing against my arm, cold and heavy with rain — and stood by the window, watching the downpour blur the streetlights.

Then my phone buzzed.

A single text from the mysterious number:

> LISTEN TO HER.

The message pulsed once, then vanished from my screen — deleted before I could screenshot it.

The smell of rain mixed with the faint ozone hum that comes right before lightning strikes. My heart started to race, that same static crawling up my arms.

Nyra turned to me, eyes glassy.

“What if Hollow Creek isn’t the only town that needs rebuilding?” she whispered.

“What if it’s us?”

Outside, thunder rolled — distant but closing in.

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And if you dare… drop a comment and tell me your favorite scary movie, urban legend, or horror memory.

We’re just getting started—and things are about to get dark.

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