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My mother needs me in her darkest hour and that’s more important than anything else.
Sorry, Grant. Guess I broke my promise to stay away forever, you huge jerkwad.
When I pull myself up from dreary thoughts I can’t believe how late it is.
I totally lost track of time unpacking, but my growling stomach reminds me it’s past midnight and I haven’t eaten since I grabbed a burrito from the taco truck next to Mort’s while he looked over my car and told me he wasn’t letting me spend a penny on repairs when it was the rental company’s problem and he’d bill them.
A little hometown hospitality, I guess.
But all I could hear were the whispers any time someone passed by.
Hey, isn’t that...?
Oh my God, it is. Hasn’t she been gone for ten years?
After the—you know. Do you think that’s why she’s back?
Oh, didn’t you hear? Her poor mother...
I grind my teeth as I head downstairs to raid the kitchen.
Yeah, yeah. My poor mother.
Who doesn’t want your pity any more than I do.
I throw together a quick turkey and provolone sandwich from what I can scavenge from the fridge, then wander into the living room to see what’s on the late-night channels. But as I settle in and reach for the remote—
Creak.
The noise is way too loud when it’s just me in the house. The silence of an empty space cracking with the sound of the front porch boards straining.
I tense, swallow, and fight back goose bumps as I crane my head toward the door.
Creak. Creak. Creak.
Deliberate, measured footsteps on the porch. Almost stealthy.
Oh, God.
I hold my breath.
A long shadow stretches under the thin gap beneath the door, the one my mother has been promising to fix with weather stripping for over a decade but never has.
My heart pounds wildly.
Silently, I squirm around until I can reach my phone buried in a cushion, struggling not to make a sound.
The steps stop, but that shadow stays, dark and ominous.
With shaking fingers, I unlock the phone and tap in 9-1, then pause, my thumb perched over the last number.
Creak.
And the shadow retreats, the light sound of those footsteps moving away.
What the actual hell? Did they see me somehow?
Was it a burglar who changed their mind?
