Under_The_Whispering_Door_by_TJ_Klune

He’d never been much of a runner, much less a jogger of any kind. He had
a treadmill in his office, often walking long distances on it while on
conference calls. He had time for little else, but at least it was something.
He was surprised, then, to find that his breath didn’t catch in his chest, that
no stitch formed in his side. Even wearing flip-flops didn’t seem to slow him
down much. The air was strangely stagnant, thick and oppressive, but he was
running, running faster than he ever had in his life. He glanced down in
shock at his own legs. They were almost a blur as his feet met the pavement
of the road that led to the village. He laughed despite himself, a wild cackle
that he’d never heard himself make before, sounding as if he were half out of
his mind.
He looked back over his shoulder again.
Nothing there, no one chasing after him, no one shouting his name, only the
empty, dark road that led to destinations unknown.
It should have made him feel better.
It didn’t.
He ran as fast as he could toward a gas station ahead, the sodium arc
lights lit up like a beacon, moths fluttering around them. An old van sat
parked next to one of the pumps, and he could see people moving around
inside. He ran toward it, only stopping when he reached the automatic doors.
They didn’t open.
He jumped up and down in front of them, waving his arms.
Nothing.
He shouted, “Open the doors!”
The man behind the counter continued to look bored, tapping on his phone.
A woman toward the back of the store stood in front of a drink cooler,
scratching her chin as she yawned.
He growled under his breath before reaching out to pry the doors open.
His hands went right through them.
“Oh, right,” he said. “Dead. Goddammit.”
He walked through the doors.
The moment he entered, the fluorescent lights in the store above him flared
and buzzed. The man behind the counter—a kid with enormous eyebrows and
a face dotted with dozens of freckles—frowned as he looked up. He
shrugged before going back to his phone.
Wallace smacked it out of his hands.