Chapter 2
Two
“That’s not what happened.”
The words echo in my head as I wake—not my voice, someone else’s—and fear zings through me, hot and sharp. Electric.
I don’t remember the dream. Can’t recall a single image, a single moment. Just those words, ringing in my skull like someone spoke them directly into my brain.
That’s not what happened.
A woman’s voice. Angry. Insistent. Desperate.
Not my voice.
I’m not sure there are words for what I just felt. Terror doesn’t cover it. Panic is too small. Maybe there’s a German word for it—something compound and efficient that captures the specific sensation of waking up with someone else’s thoughts in your head.
Or maybe it’s just schizophrenia.
But no—is that even how that works? Can you just suddenly develop schizophrenia at twenty-seven? Is hearing voices in your sleep a symptom or am I just losing my entire mind in the most dramatic way possible?
I should google it.
I’m not going to google it.
I exhale slowly, trying to ground myself. Become aware of my surroundings.
My room. My bed. My apartment. I’m home.
So why do I feel like I’m not home?
The air feels wrong. Too thick. Too cold. Like someone left a window open except all the windows are closed. I can see them from here—closed, locked, curtains drawn against the night.
That’s when it hits me. Settles into my bones like ice water.
I’m not alone.
My heart thuds once in my chest. Hard. Fast. Breath-stealing.
My body freezes.
Not the normal kind of freeze—not the I’m scared so I’m holding still freeze.
The kind where I cannot move. My arms won’t lift. My mouth won’t open to scream.
Sleep paralysis, that’s what this is. Has to be.
I’ve read about it. Your brain wakes up but your body doesn’t and you’re trapped in yourself and sometimes you see things, hallucinate, your mind filling in the blanks with nightmare fuel because it doesn’t understand why you can’t move—
The only thing I can still control are my eyes.
And I want to close them. Need to close them. Every instinct is screaming close your eyes, don’t look, if you don’t see it it’s not real—
But I can’t.
All I can do is see.
I stare into the darkness. Into shadows that feel like they’re stretching. Growing. Reaching across my room like fingers.
There’s nothing there.
Nothing.
Just darkness and shadows and my own terror making shapes out of nothing.
Inch by inevitable inch, my body comes online. A slow tingle starting in my toes. Pins and needles working their way up my calves, my thighs, my stomach. Like blood flow returning after you’ve sat on your foot too long.
I wiggle my toes. They move.
My fingers. They curl into the sheets.
My lungs. They expand. Contract. I’m breathing again without thinking about it.
I can move.
I look around my room. See nothing. Absolutely nothing out of place.
But the weight of someone watching presses down on my chest. The air shifts like someone just moved past, creating a cold wind.
My mouth goes dry. Cotton dry. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth.
A shiver crawls up my spine—that serpent-spine thing, vertebra by vertebra—until it reaches my scalp and spreads.
I try to speak. Can’t. The words won’t come.
I’m not alone.
Someone—something—is in this room with me.
Slowly—so slowly—I push myself up from my prone position. Slide backward on the bed until my back hits the headboard.
My throat closes. Tightens. Like hands wrapping around it. Like the hands that strangled—
No. Don’t think about that.
I look around the room. Slow. Methodical. Cataloging every shadow. Every shape. Everything that could be innocent and isn’t.
My closet door—closed.
My desk—empty.
My dresser—nothing.
The bathroom door—
A black shape rushes through my peripheral vision.
Fast. Human-sized. Moving from my closet toward the bathroom.
Not a shadow. Not a trick of light.
Something solid. Something there.
“Nope. Nope nope nope. Hell to the no.”
I shoot up—body finally obeying—and launch myself off the bed. Not walking. Not tiptoeing. Full-on launching like the bed is lava and the ghost is fire and I need to get OUT.
I stumble immediately. My foot catches on the sheets and I nearly face-plant into my nightstand. Catch myself on the doorframe. Ricochet off the wall.
The bathroom tile is cold under my feet and slippery and I’m running too fast. My feet slide out from under me like I’m in a cartoon. I windmill my arms, somehow stay upright, and slam shoulder-first into Alex’s door.
The thud is catastrophic.
I don’t care.
I fling the door open—no knocking, no warning, no time—and launch myself onto her bed like I’m diving into a pool.
I land half on top of her. Knees in her ribs. Elbow in her face. All grace and dignity.
Alex shoots up like I’ve electrocuted her.
“What—what—who—” She’s flailing, disoriented, one eye still closed. “No. Parmesan cheese.”
“What?” I pant, still trying to catch my breath.
“Parmesan cheese,” she repeats, like this makes sense. “I was dreaming about... never mind.” She blinks, focuses on me. Actually sees me. “Dylan? What the fuck?”
“Ghost.” The word comes out strangled. Panicked. “We are haunted. The loft is haunted. We need to burn it to the ground. Salt the earth. Move to a different city. Possibly a different dimension.”
Alex blinks at me. Processes this. Her expression doesn’t change.
“I feel like that would only escalate the situation to more haunted,” she says. Way too calmly.
“How would burning it down make it MORE haunted?”
“Because then you’d have an angry ghost AND property damage. That’s just bad decision-making.”
“Alex, I’m serious—”
“So am I. You can’t just arson your way out of a haunting. That’s not how this works.”
“How do you know how this works?”
“I don’t. But I’m pretty sure set everything on fire isn’t the professional paranormal protocol.”
Despite my terror, a strangled laugh escapes. “Professional paranormal protocol?”
“Someone has to think logically here.” She rubs her cheek where my elbow smashed into her. “And clearly it’s not going to be you.”
“I just saw a ghost in my room—”
“Allegedly.”
“ALEX.”
“Okay, okay.” She holds up her hands. “Tell me what happened.”
“Seriously, Alex.” I turn to face her fully, my hands still gripping her shoulders.
“I woke up with words in my head. Someone else’s words.
A woman’s voice saying That’s not what happened and I don’t remember the dream but I remember the voice and—” My voice is climbing.
Getting higher. More panicked. “Am I crazy? Would you even know? Would you tell me if I was losing my mind or would you just... let me?”
She grabs my shoulders. Forces me to look at her. “Breathe. Dylan. Breathe.”
I try. It comes out shaky. Broken.
“You aren’t crazy,” she says firmly. “I promise you. You’re not crazy.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if you were crazy, you’d think the ghost was telling you to reorganize your closet by color. Not investigate a murder.”
“That’s not—that doesn’t even make sense.”
“Exactly. Your hallucinations would be way more boring if you were actually losing it. You’d be hearing elevator music, not cryptic warnings from dead women.”
A sob-laugh hybrid escapes me. “That’s the worst logic I’ve ever heard.”
“And yet it worked. You’re breathing again.”
She’s right. I am.
“That makes it worse.” The sob rips out of me.
All my emotions—the fear, the exhaustion, the weeks of pretending everything is fine, the impending meeting with Marcus, the Instagram follow, the murder board, the ring around my neck, all of it—building to a release that explodes out of me in the most dramatic sob ever.
It’s not a good look for me.
Snot everywhere. Ugly crying. The works.
Alex laughs. Can’t help herself. And honestly, I would too. I really don’t blame her.
“Let me check.” She says it softly. Gently. Like she’s talking to a scared animal.
Which, fair.
She leans over to turn on her lamp—not the overhead, but the salt lamp on her nightstand. Warm pink light spills across the room. Himalayan salt, she told me once. Cleanses negative energy. I thought she was being ridiculous.
I’m not thinking that anymore.
“I swear, Alex—” I start.
“Stay here. I’ll be right back.” She stands, grabs her glasses from the nightstand—black frames, slightly crooked—and slides them on.
“Wait—you’re just going to walk in there? Alone?”
“Would you prefer we both walk in there?”
“I would prefer we call an exorcist.”
“Pretty sure exorcists don’t make house calls at—” she checks her phone, “—3:47 a.m. Not even in Philly, where you can get a cheesesteak at 4 a.m. but apparently not a priest.”
“We could google it.”
“We’re not googling exorcists, Dylan.”
“Why not? We googled murder clubs. This feels like a natural progression.”
She pauses. Looks at me. “That’s actually a fair point.”
“Right?”
“Still not googling exorcists.” She heads toward the bathroom. “If I’m not back in five minutes, assume I’ve been possessed and salt the doorway.”
“ALEX.”
“Kidding!” She calls back. “Mostly.”
I dive under her covers. Because I am not going back to my room. No. I do not think so. Not tonight and maybe perhaps never again. We will have to trade rooms. That’s the only answer here. She can have the haunted room. She’s better equipped.
Without an ounce of hesitation, she walks toward the bathroom. Just walks. Like there isn’t possibly a ghost in there. Like this is normal.
She flicks on the bathroom light. The fluorescent buzz fills the silence.
Then she walks into my room.
I can’t watch. I want to be brave. Want to be the kind of person who faces their fears.
But I’m not that person.
So like the chickenshit I am, I dive under the covers.
“Seriously, Dylan,” I mutter to myself from under the blanket. “You’re a grown-ass woman. The least you can do is come out.”
I flip the blanket down.
And see a shadow in the bathroom doorway.
Human-shaped. Dark. Distinctly not Alex-shaped because Alex is—
I scream.
The shadow moves. Steps forward into the light.
It’s Alex.