Billionaire Lives with His Gateman for 10 Year , But Never Knew He Was a Ghost!”

EPISODE 5

The night in the attic felt endless. The broken mirror glistened, Sarah’s old letter lay open, and the silence pressed on Mark and Helen like a heavy stone.

Mark’s hands shook as he tried to steady the paper. His eyes kept returning to the words Sarah had written, but his mind was stuck on something else—something that didn’t add up. Why had John chosen him? Out of all the people in Emberwood, why had John’s spirit stood at his gate for ten years? Why guard him? Why speak to him as if he had been waiting all along?

Helen wiped her tears and spoke softly. “Mark… do you see it now? He wasn’t just any man. He gave his life for that child. He gave his peace for this truth.”

Mark looked at her, his jaw tight. “But why me, Helen? Why has he stayed with me all this time? I didn’t even know him. I never met him before Emberwood. Yet he chose to stand at my gate.”

Helen lowered her head. “Maybe you remind him of something… or someone.”

The air grew colder. A sound creaked from the corner of the attic. The chest they had opened began to move on its own. Mark and Helen froze as a photograph slid out from between the old files and fell to the floor.

Mark bent slowly to pick it up. It was a black-and-white photograph. Two young boys, identical in face, smiling side by side.

Mark’s eyes widened. His lips parted, but no words came.

Helen leaned forward. “Who are they?”

Mark’s voice cracked. “One of them… is me.”

Helen’s eyes grew wide. “And the other?”

Mark’s heart raced as he stared at the second boy in the picture. The same sharp jaw, the same deep eyes… but softer. Kinder. “John,” Mark whispered. His knees felt weak. “It’s John.”

—

Tears stung his eyes as memories he thought he had forgotten began to rise. He remembered being very young, maybe four or five, holding the hand of another boy. Running in the rain. Laughing. Sharing bread in the backyard of a small house. But then… the memories faded into blankness. A car. A move. A new life.

Mark dropped to the floor, clutching the photo. His voice was full of pain. “He was my brother… my blood. All these years, I never knew. My parents, why didn’t they tell me?”

Helen covered her mouth, her face pale. “So that’s it. That’s why John stayed. That’s why Lilly’s ghost spoke about you. Because it was never about you dying, Mark… it was about you remembering. About you knowing who he really was.”

—

Suddenly, the attic air grew heavier, colder. The cracked mirror on the wall began to shimmer. And then he was there. John. Standing in the broken reflection. His uniform neat, his face calm, but his eyes burning with something deeper—grief.

Mark stood shakily, holding the photograph in his hand. Tears rolled down his cheeks. “John… Brother. Why? Why didn’t you tell me? Ten years you stood at my gate. Ten years, I greeted you like a stranger… and you never said it.”

John’s ghostly form didn’t move, but his voice filled the room, steady and sorrowful. “Because you had forgotten me, Mark. And I couldn’t forgive you… not yet. You left me in suffering. You left me in silence. While you grew rich and powerful, I was buried in a shallow grave of lies.”

Mark’s whole body shook. He dropped to his knees, clutching the photo against his chest. “I didn’t know… I swear I didn’t know. They never told me I had a brother. They never told me you died here.”

John’s voice broke for the first time. “And yet, even without knowing… every day, I stood guard at your gate. Not because you were my master, Mark. But because you were my blood.”

Tears streamed down Mark’s face. His chest felt like it would burst from the weight of regret. “I’m sorry, John. I’m so sorry. I never asked who you were. I never looked at you closely. I treated you like just another worker. My own brother… and I didn’t see you.”

The attic was silent except for Mark’s sobs. Helen turned her face away, unable to stop her own tears.

—

Then John’s eyes softened. His voice lowered, heavy with pain but also love. “You were blind, Mark. But not wicked. What hurt me wasn’t that you didn’t know… but that you never asked. Not once in ten years did you ask who I was, or where I came from.”

Mark nodded, his head bowed low to the dusty floor. “You’re right. I was proud, arrogant. I only cared about my wealth, my pain, my betrayals. I never looked at the man who stood by me every morning. If I could turn back time, John… I would have hugged you. I would have told you _ thank you, brother. Thank you for never leaving me.”

For the first time in ten years, John’s ghost stepped forward. The air warmed slightly, and his face softened into something almost human. “You can’t turn back time, Mark. But you can honor it. Tell the world who I was. Tell them I wasn’t just your gateman; I was your brother. Let them remember my name.”

Mark clutched the photo tighter. His voice was a whisper through tears. “I will. I swear, I will.”

—

Helen spoke through her sobs. “John… what about Lilly? She said she wanted peace.”

John turned toward her, his eyes deep and heavy. “When truth is spoken, peace will come. The child’s voice will rest. And maybe… so will mine.”

Slowly, his image began to fade from the mirror, like smoke leaving a dying fire. “Goodbye, Mark,” he whispered. “This time… don’t forget me.”

And then he was gone.

—

Mark stayed kneeling on the floor, his body shaking, his tears dropping onto the old photo. The boy he had forgotten… the man he had ignored… the brother who had guarded him in silence. His blood. And now, finally, he knew. But knowing came with pain. A pain he would carry forever.

Just then, Helen gasped. She had picked up another file from the chest. A birth record. Her lips trembled as she read the name. “Mark… this can’t be. It says… there was a third child.”

Mark’s head shot up, his eyes burning with shock. “A third?”

Before Helen could answer, the cracked mirror on the wall shook violently and a faint child’s voice whispered from the glass: “I’m still here.”