chapter eleven
THE CREATURE
I was starting to think she lived part-time in that shop of hers.
I thought she would have left by now. It was three hours and fifty-two minutes past closing, and I had yet to see her resurface from her den.
Each day she stayed longer. Sometimes I pulled up a chair at the closed café across the street while I waited to escort her home.
This is taking too long.
I stood from my seat, about to pay her a visit through the shop’s back door, when I saw her emerge from her cave.
There you are.
The keys jangled between her fingers as she locked up, giving the door a tug for reassurance.
I began to walk down the street, except she went the wrong way.
When I turned around, she was walking in the opposite direction.
That is not the way to your house, little shadow.
Walking faster to catch up, I followed behind on the other side of the street.
She had a pad of paper in her hand, head down looking at the paper as she weaved through the streets.
I began to worry, since she never strayed so far from her routine.
I could count the locations she frequented the most on a single hand with digits to spare.
Not once had I ever seen her walk this way.
It must have been at least thirty minutes of foot travel just to see her standing idly outside my home.
She was like a tiny figurine before the large, stately manor. It could be a museum with its size paired with the number of things I had collected throughout the ages.
She broke from her frozen state to write something down.
What are you planning, minx?
She paced in front, then snuck around to see if there was a way to peep in.
Along the side of the house, she tugged at the service entrance.
It was locked, but I made a note to myself to leave that one open from now on.
Finding a stray Alina in my home in the middle of the night would be quite a treat.
I hoped she would try and knock, but that did not seem to be in her plans tonight. Then she retreated, back in the direction she was supposed to go earlier.
The muscles in my jaw twitched. What was the point of coming all the way out here if she wasn’t going to do anything?