Maybe a shadow. Maybe not.
The air feels heavier when I turn toward the house. The porch boards creak under my feet, the sound swallowed by the quiet.
Inside, I close the door and press my palm against it, my pulse still racing. I tell myself it’s fine. That I’m safe. That I’m not crazy.
But the feeling doesn’t leave.
It just settles deeper—like something in the valley has started breathing with me.
By late afternoon,the house feels too quiet again.
The kind of quiet that doesn’t mean peace—just absence.
Owen’s truck has been gone for hours, but his warning keeps echoing in my head.“The Blackwells don’t like surprises.”
I try to shake it off by throwing myself into work. Scrubbing old countertops. Wiping down cabinets. Writing a to-do list in a half-dried marker across the calendar I hung on the fridge door because my planner’s already a mess.
Replace porch rail.
Call electrician.
Order tasting room signage.
But no matter how long the list gets, that restless feeling doesn’t go away. It’s like something is pressing against the windows, watching me.
I tell myself it’s nerves. The adjustment to this house. The sudden weight of running something on my own.
Still, I find myself double-checking every latch as the light starts to fade.
The estate feels bigger at night—every creak in the floorboards, every sigh in the pipes amplified until I can’t tell what’s real.
I flip on the old radio by the sink, hoping for noise. The signal crackles, sputters, then clears.
A familiar voice filters through the static, low and smooth. It’s that same damn song again—"Every Breath You Take.”Like I’m cursed by the Police or something, doomed to hear it whenever I turn on the radio.
I snort softly. “Great. Just freaking great.”
It should be funny. But it creeps me out. The hair on the back of my neck stands up in warning.
I turn the dial a little louder, drowning the silence with the rhythm of the song as I move through the kitchen, trying to focus on something mundane. Dinner. Washing dishes. Anything.
When the song ends, the static returns—a low hum that almost sounds like breathing. I glance at the radio, frowning.
“Seriously?”
I reach to turn it off, but before I touch the knob, the static shifts—a faint pop, then quiet.
