Andika was a college student who had just moved to Jakarta to be closer to his campus.
He rented a boarding house that was quite unique. The price was cheap, but not too cheap—just reasonable. For a whole year, he only needed to pay Rp300,000.
That morning, he had just gotten off the train station and ordered a Go-Jek to pick him up.
Around 5 a.m., he carried a heavy backpack on his back, enough to cover his daily needs.
A few minutes later, the Go-Jek arrived and began driving Andika to his boarding house.
Andika arrived in an area that was quite deserted for early morning. The Go-Jek dropped him off at a mosque that looked very dark and neglected.
"According to the app, Sir," said the Go-Jek driver.
Andika nodded, then handed him Rp30,000 from his pocket. The driver took it and left.
Andika took out his phone and opened WhatsApp. There were a few contacts there. His mother had texted him to be careful and wished him all the best.
There were also a few unknown contacts. Andika scrolled through the list, then tapped one contact saved as the landlady.
Andika checked his chat with the landlady. She had told him that the boarding house was right next to the left side of the mosque, if he faced the mosque.
Andika turned to his left and there he saw a building with a clear sign that read "Kos Putra" (Men's Boarding House).
Seeing that, Andika began walking towards it.
He stood in front of the gate of the boarding house. "Assalamualaikum," Andika called out, but there was no answer at all.
He then noticed that the gate wasn't locked. Taking the initiative, Andika opened it himself.
The boarding house had two floors and formed a U shape. On the right and left sides were rows of rooms, and at the front end was just an ordinary white wall.
Then Andika felt a vibration in his right hand. It was his phone receiving a message.
He opened it—it was from the landlady. She said: [Your room is at 5D, first floor, at the end on the right when you enter.] Andika read that and thought the landlady seemed quite attentive and meticulous.
However, all this time, Andika felt a rather unsettling atmosphere. This place had many rooms and was very affordable, but for some reason it felt empty. There was only one motorcycle parked there.
The atmosphere felt strange too: quiet, silent, and almost vanished.
But he pushed away all those negative feelings and started walking towards his designated room.
Andika arrived at room 5D, right in front of him. But when he grabbed the handle and tried to turn the knob, the door was locked. Only the squeak of the handle could be heard.
Andika was puzzled. The landlady had never given him a key. But when he looked down by his feet, he saw a doormat. Curiously, Andika crouched down, lifted the mat, and sure enough, there was a key hidden there.
"Ah, here it is. Good thing I watch too many movies," he muttered to himself to break the silence.
Andika took the key, stood up again, and inserted it into the door's keyhole. It fit perfectly, and he turned it. He heard the mechanism click, signaling that the door was now unlocked.
Andika pulled the key out and put it in his pocket, then opened the door.
He was now inside his boarding room. He closed the door behind him and began looking around his new space. For a boarding room, it was quite decent. Fresh yellow paint, a wardrobe, a table and chair, a mattress without a bedframe, a drawer, and some cleaning tools.
But among all he saw, Andika's eyes were drawn to a crack big enough to peek through. Curiosity got the better of him, and he went over to the crack. From the outside, it looked pitch black. But when Andika tried to peek through it, he saw nothing —just darkness. It confused him, but he didn't think much of it.
Andika began unpacking his belongings—clothes, cleaning supplies, and other necessities.
It took quite a while. At least a few hours to arrange everything properly.
When everything was done and boredom started to creep in, he turned back and looked again at the crack. His curiosity returned.
Andika stepped closer to the crack again, trying to peek inside, but it was the same— pitch black. He tried inserting a finger, and sure enough, it was a hole.
He took out his phone from his pants pocket, turned on the flashlight, and aimed it at the hole. But still, it was just darkness, as if the darkness had no end.
This is pretty strange, thought Andika. The problem was, this hole didn't lead to another boarding room—it should have faced the wall that connected to the mosque next door.
But because Andika's curiosity was too strong, he took a photo of the hole and sent it to the landlady along with a message: [Sorry Ma'am, but what is this hole for?] he asked her via WhatsApp chat.
While waiting for her reply, Andika put his phone back into his pocket and stood still in his room.
He didn't really know what to do, or how to spend his time.
He had no work at the moment since he had just arrived in this area. College assignments? None yet. A job? Not yet either.
His main activity was writing song lyrics and singing his amateur songs, recording them and uploading them to YouTube.
His main source of income came from YouTube monetization. Depending on how well his content performed, he would receive a bonus from YouTube, which was quite decent for him.
Maybe that was the only thing to kill time for now: writing more song lyrics, again and again, going through dozens of revisions for the same song.
But in the end, Andika spent most of his days outside the boarding house, wandering around the neighborhood to get himself familiar with this new environment.
When the clock showed five in the evening, Andika finally returned to his boarding room, feeling the fatigue settle in his body.
Then, an idea struck him—a song inspired by his new surroundings.
He grabbed a piece of paper, a pencil, and an eraser, ready to write with his creative passion still burning.
Minutes passed, and the call to prayer for Maghrib began to echo through the area, signaling prayer time. But Andika, although a Muslim, ignored the call to prayer.
Whatever he was thinking, he was still absorbed in the lyrics scribbled on the paper—just two stanzas of four lines each. He kept searching in his mind, but it felt difficult to find new words or lines to express.
Suddenly, a rumbling sound snapped his focus. The sound came from his right—at the wardrobe—where a small drawer had opened by itself.
Andika was confused by the drawer suddenly sliding open. He dragged himself closer and peeked inside. There, he found a pile of jewelry made of gold, gleaming brightly.
But there was also a note inside that read: "Please do not take."
Andika glanced around—there was no one there, nor any security camera—but his eyes were drawn back to the hole in the wall, which made him uneasy.
In a rush, Andika grabbed all the jewelry from the drawer and stuffed it into a plastic bag, which he hid deep inside his suitcase, thinking it would be safe there.
But for some reason, goosebumps rose along his arms, his heart began pounding rapidly. He felt something was terribly wrong, something he couldn't see—and the fear of finding out what it was paralyzed him.
He spun around quickly, his expression frozen in sheer terror.
Sure enough, someone was peeking through that hole.
"Who are you!?" Andika yelled, frightened and panicking.
Sweat dripped down his face. There was no answer—only an eyelid-less eye staring rigidly at him, yet so hollow at the same time.
Andika grabbed his pillow and threw it hard at the hole—but when the pillow fell to the floor, the eye was still there, watching him.
For some reason, the longer Andika stared at that eye, the stranger he felt—dizziness swirling in his head, his vision spinning.
He quickly shook his head, trying to clear out all the strange sensations clouding his mind.
He stepped closer. The eye was still staring at him, unmoving, and there was nothing else behind it—just that eye, watching.
Now Andika was just centimeters away from the hole where the eye peeked through. He clenched his right fist so tightly his knuckles turned white, then punched the wall with all his strength.
But when he pulled his hand back, the eye was still there. No reaction. Just that unblinking stare.
Andika lifted his right hand again, extending his index finger slowly, intending to poke the eye.
Slowly but surely, his finger got closer and closer. And in just a split second, Andika's fingertip touched the eye—wet, slimy, and eerily organic.
He jerked his hand back immediately, stumbling backward several steps. His heart raced—the eye felt real, yet it didn't flinch or blink at all.
Even though fear gnawed at him, Andika forced himself not to think too deeply about it. He grabbed a wall calendar and pinned it over the hole to cover that dreadful gaze.
He let out a long sigh, though his hands still trembled.
Finally, he went outside to get some dinner and pass the time.
He threw on his denim jacket and left the room without a second glance, leaving behind the curiosity gnawing at him in that cramped boarding room.
Andika spent his evening eating out, wandering aimlessly, and strolling around the neighborhood until he finally came back at midnight.
He returned home exhausted, eyelids heavy, no longer thinking about that hole or the eye behind it.
He collapsed onto his mattress and fell asleep instantly.
The next morning, Andika woke up at four a.m., startled awake by the loud call to prayer echoing from the mosque next door.
He opened his eyes, still looking drained. He sat up, rubbing his dry eyes.
As he stood, his gaze fell on the thick stack of papers piled up on his desk—his endlessly revised song lyrics.
But his expression turned serious and then shocked. He rushed to the desk. On every single sheet was the same phrase, scribbled over and over: "Humans can see too."
Simple, but terrifying. All the pages that should have been filled with lyrics now showed nothing else.
Andika gasped, fear and panic rising in his chest. Was this the work of that eye from yesterday? But that seemed impossible.
He hurried to the wall with the hole—still covered by the calendar. He ripped the calendar away, only to find the hole empty now. The eye was gone. Just a hollow gap remained.
His confusion deepened. Andika turned to the door, moving quickly toward it. He grabbed the doorknob and tried to open it, but it was locked. Andika couldn't even remember whether he had locked it himself or not.
His head throbbed painfully, but he froze when he realized he was clutching his room key in his left hand. He let out a shaky breath, unlocked the door, and left the key dangling from the doorknob.
Then he walked back to the desk, staring at the pile of papers. The phrase "Humans can see too" was still there—not an illusion, not a hallucination, but disturbingly real.
Andika's mind replayed everything: the eye that had watched him after he took the gold from the drawer in the wardrobe.
Without wasting another second, he gathered all the gold jewelry and returned it to the drawer where he'd found it. On top of the pile, he left a note: "Humans can see too." He shut the drawer firmly, hoping this would put an end to everything.