Some things never wash out.
Tonight, the lobby is empty. Sharon’s reception desk dark. I scan my badge and head for the elevators, my heels echoing in the silence.
The elevator doors ding open.
Dom is already inside, reviewing something on his phone.
“Dylan.” He looks up briefly as I step in. Doesn’t bother with pleasantries. “Patterson discovery. Stacks. Organized and indexed by Monday morning.”
He hands me several folders as the doors close.
I take them like the dutiful employee I am.
“Should have been handled today,” Dom continues, still scrolling through his phone. “Wasn’t. Now it’s your problem.”
The elevator rises. I watch the numbers climb in silence.
Dom doesn’t have to say much. The silence does the work. I find myself standing straighter. Checking my work twice in my head. Making sure I don’t fuck up.
“I’ll be in my office,” he says as we approach the fourth floor. “All night if needed. Come find me when you’re finished.”
The doors open. Dom steps out without looking back.
The elevator begins its descent. Fourth floor. Third. Second. First.
Basement.
The doors open to darkness.
I don’t fear the stacks. But they have to be in the basement—it’s the only spare location in the building and Dom had it temperature controlled.
I flip the switch on the wall just outside the elevator.
A lone light flickers on above me, threatening to die. Then the rest come on one by one.
The stacks: floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in a windowless basement, law books from years past to last year crammed on every surface.
Barely any cell signal. No natural light. Just fluorescent buzz and the smell of old paper and something else—something that reminds me why most people refuse to work down here alone.
Alex hates it down here. Says it’s a liminal space, that the veil is thin, that she can feel things watching. She’d burn sage the moment she left and pull tarot cards about what the basement wants.
Philadelphia is old. But that doesn’t mean it’s haunted.
To me it’s just a basement. What they call creepy, I call focus.
Usually.
Tonight the stacks feel different. Heavier. Like the air itself is holding its breath.
That’s ridiculous. I’m tired. Old buildings make noise. Pipes clank. Wood settles. There’s nothing down here but boxes and files and my own exhaustion.
But I catch myself listening between the sounds. Waiting for something I can’t name.
A feeling coils at the base of my spine—the one Alex calls my gut knowing.
It’s there now. Faint. Like a warning I can almost hear.
I roll my eyes even though she’s not here to see it.
