I blinked in the darkness of my silent bedroom. I’d fallen asleep at a reasonable hour and saw it was well into early morning now. Close to two a.m. I held perfectly still, waiting for any follow-up to the sound that had called me from sleep.
When I heard nothing—no footsteps, no creaking doors, nothing louder than my own heart pulsing in my ears—I slipped from bed. The plush carpet greeted my bare feet. I considered flipping on my bedside light to chase away shadows but instead crept to the windowsill to peek out into the dark. I pulled back the curtain slowly, with my pulse in my throat, ready to duck or call the police.
I let out an exasperated sigh when I located the source of the sound.
Bray’s camera had come unstuck from the wall and landed with an innocentthunkon the windowsill.
“Seriously?” I muttered and picked it up. I pointed it at myself and gave it the finger with a frown for good measure, just in case he was watching. Then I pressed its sticky little pedestal to the sill and reached for my phone on the nightstand.
When I went to text him something rude for rudely waking me in the middle of the night, my phone slipped from my hand. I sucked in a sharp breath.
A man stood in the street outside my window, gazing in at me.
The streetlight bathed him in a ghoulish pale glow. His short hair was fair enough to look like he didn’t have any at all.
I stumbled backward and smashed into the bed. My knees buckled. I fell to the floor and scrambled for my phone. My breath came hard and fast.
I’d just seen a ghost.
My fingers trembled as I brought up Bray’s number. Without hesitation or consideration that it was two a.m., I hit dial. As the call went out, I cursed under my speeding breath and crawled toward the window, keeping myself hidden.
“Hello?” he answered after several rings. His voice was thick with sleep.
“Bray! There’s someone outside my window. I need you to check the camera feed.” I spewed commands at him, only halfway realizing what I’d seen was impossible. The fear in my gut and shooting through my every nerve blinded me to that fact.
“What? What time is it?” He was groggy and clearly, I’d woken him.
“It doesn’t matter!” I snapped. “Wake up and look at the feed from my bedroom! Now!”
“Okay! Stop yelling! Just …” He trailed off. I heard rustling sounds and wondered what he slept in; maybe pajamapants, maybe boxers, maybe nothing at all. He came back after what sounded like a yawn. “Give me a second.”
I rolled my eyes even though he couldn’t see. “For the record,youwokemeup, and that’s why I’m calling right now.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Your camera came unstuck and fell. The sound woke me up, and when I got up to fix it, I saw someone in the street. He was staring at my window.”
He paused and then sounded much more awake. “Oh shit. Seriously?”
“Yes, seriously!” I hissed. “I don’t know if he’s still out there, but I need you to look at the feed from the last few minutes.”
“Yeah, yeah for sure. Hang on a sec.”
I heard him rustling around. The thought of him in pajamas put an odd warmth in my belly despite being on the edge of panic. I inched my way closer to the window but could not bring myself to peek over the sill. I did not want to see him again.
“Bedroom camera?” Bray asked.
“Yes. Go back like five minutes and watch.”
I heard a keyboard tapping in the background and imagined him propping his laptop up in bed.
He stayed silent for long enough to put me on an even sharper edge.
“Do you see anything?”
“So far, just the street.”
I ground my teeth to dust while I waited.
