Chapter 9
Alana
Last night, I barely slept. On top of my racing thoughts about Jake, his secret love child, and my upcoming date with Mike, I had a new issue to deal with. I didn’t even know what it was exactly or what it meant. It couldn’t be good, though.
Erebus. The contact was in my phone, but I hadn’t put it there. It was impossible to know if it had been recently added or had been there for a while. I looked at the number and I didn’t recognize it. When I typed it into Google, it didn’t come up with anything. If it was just the messages, I might be able to brush it off as a prank. My first thought was that Jayce was messing with me. Then, I saw the man outside.
I was shaken. He’d been wearing a neon mask with Xs for eyes and a mouth that looked stitched. And he was leaning against my car. Maybe that was a coincidence but given everything else, I didn’t think so.
Who the hell was it? I didn’t even socialize for the most part. It could still be a prank. Fuck, he was going to think I was insane if I was wrong, but I had to try.
Alana: You don’t happen to own a mask, do you?
Jayce: You know I do. Why?
Alana: Is it neon?
The phone rang and I groaned but answered it. “Hey.”
“What’s going on?”
“I… It’s hard to explain.”
“Alana, you know if you don’t tell me, I’ll just come to your place.”
“Jesus. Okay, so I got some weird texts last night.”
“Weird texts?” he repeated. “Tell me what they said.”
“Uh, someone named Erebus was asking me about my book. When I looked outside, there was a guy in a neon mask. He was just staring at me, then he texted me again. It was the same person.”
There were a few beats of silence. “Please tell me you’re playing a prank on me right now.”
“I wish I was. I thought maybe it was you fucking with me.”
“Of course it wasn’t me. I’m coming over.”
“No,” I said quickly. “That’s not necessary. It’s probably just someone I know trying to mess with me.”
“Who would do that? Alana, this doesn’t sound safe. You should call the police.”
“There’s nothing to report at this point. If I see him again, I might.”
“I have a bad feeling about this. You’re keeping everything locked up, right? The front and patio doors, all of the windows. Everything.”
With a sigh, I plopped onto my bed. “I’m not an idiot. Look, I’m sure it’s nothing.”
“Okay.”
He sounded hesitant and I could just imagine him jumping in his truck to race over here.
“Maybe you need cameras,” he went on.
“I don’t need cameras. Just relax, okay? I’ll tell you if anything else happens.”
“Good. Please be careful.”
“Always. I love you.”
“I love you too, Alana.”
After I ended the call, I stared up at the ceiling and focused on my breathing. My heart rate was steady and I didn’t feel as anxious as before. I was still more than a little unnerved by the whole thing, but I wasn’t sure what to do about it right now. I lived in an apartment and there were people all around me. If anything happened, someone would hear me scream, which would’ve been a comfort if I thought anyone would actually try to do something about it. Studies showed that a lot of people wouldn’t call the cops if they heard or saw something suspicious.
Maybe I should’ve made friends with my neighbors over the past six months. They might be more willing to be helpful if they knew who I was. How did one introduce themselves to neighbors? In movies, they baked cookies and brought them by. If someone did that, I would immediately throw them away because they might be poisoned. I also didn’t trust anything cooked by someone I didn’t know. There was no telling what the state of their kitchen- or their body- was. For all I knew, they could be like that woman who made sourdough using her vaginal yeast infection.
Now that I’d triggered a gag first thing in the morning, I got to my feet to make a very strong pot of coffee. Once again, I hadn’t worked on grading midterms yesterday, which meant I couldn’t spend the day sleeping. I was far from in the mood for it, but I didn’t really have a choice. Next week, my students would be doing their presentations, which meant I’d have to focus on that. These tests had to get finished this weekend. No exceptions.
Giant coffee cup in hand, I settled on the couch with a stack of paper in front of me. Five classes times twenty five students in each one gave me one hundred and twenty five tests to grade. That wasn’t horrible, except that each one had a hundred questions on it. That left me with twelve and a half thousand places to put a check or an x.
Fuck me. The school needed to give me a T.A., but that would require a budget, which we never had. The teachers had to pay for most of our supplies. Parents that were able and willing to buy the things on the provided list at the beginning of the year helped a lot, but we were still left with a lot to cover ourselves.
Public school was laughable sometimes.
After I turned on some music, I got to work. It didn’t take long for me to get into the groove of things. My head bobbed to the beat and I found myself singing badly along with the lyrics. I’d made it through about half of the stack when my neck felt prickly. I looked up, then turned to the living room window, but there was nothing out of the ordinary.
Shaking my head, I got to my feet and headed into the kitchen for more coffee. Once my cup was full, I started back toward the living room but came to an abrupt halt when there was movement outside the sliding glass door in the dining room.
My heart hammered in my chest. The caffeine probably didn’t help the anxiety I felt right now, but god could pry it out of my hands in hell. I took a cautious step forward and when I didn’t see anything, I moved closer.
The deck was empty, aside from my little barbecue and the chest with my random gardening supplies that I couldn’t use here. Blowing out a breath, I brought the cup to my lips.
Neon blue appeared at the window and I screamed. The cup fell to the floor, shattering on impact. I was frozen with my eyes locked on that mask. It was at the top of the window and it was… upside down. Was this fucker on the roof?
We stayed like that, as if in a stare off, for an indeterminable amount of time. I wanted to run, but I didn’t know where I’d go. I was afraid that if I left the door, he’d break in. If I ran through the front door, I could be at his mercy since he was prowling around on top of the building like a cat.
My chest ached with how hard my heart was pumping. I swallowed and took a step back, then nearly dropped to my knees when I stepped on a piece of ceramic. When I looked down, I found that it was all around me, leaving me in a minefield of sorts.
Looking back up, I felt something lodge in my throat. He was gone. I didn’t know if that made me feel better or worse.
I rushed to the closet and pulled out a broom. After unscrewing the brush, I returned to the back door and wedged the stick into the track so that the door couldn’t open. He’d have to break the glass if he wanted to get inside. I didn’t think the lock on the front door could be fucked with since it was coded. It did have an emergency spot for a key, but you couldn’t slide that part open if you didn’t have the fob.
It was safe here. He couldn’t get in.
Even though I wouldn’t be able to focus now, I moved back to the couch. I still felt like I was being watched, so I craned my neck to peer out the front window.
Oh, god. He was standing by my car again. His hands were in his pockets and he was just staring up at me, directly into this window as if he knew where I’d be.
Who the hell was he and why had he set his sights on me?
Last night was the first time I’d seen him. I didn’t know who would be interested in scaring me. Or was he stalking me?
No, no, no. I hadn’t earned a stalker. Nobody really earned a stalker but I figured in most cases, you had to catch their attention somehow, even if it was just a conversation that got them interested in you. I didn’t talk to anybody.
Maybe he’d seen me at the party last night. I did have passing conversations with a few people but nobody who seemed weird enough to do this. I guess that was sort of the thing, right? A serial killer’s neighbors and coworkers often said they were the most normal person. Spoiler alert: they weren’t fucking normal.
Taking out my phone, I kept my eyes on him while I hit redial. I brought it to my ear and the man cocked his head.
“Hey,” Jayce answered.
“He’s back,” I whispered. It was pointless, but it felt right.
“Who? The guy in the mask?”
“Yeah. He’s outside right now.”
“What’s he doing?” he asked, sounding a little panicked.
“Just standing there. Watching me. He was on my balcony, Jayce. On the roof.”
“The roof? Hold on. Don’t fucking move. I’m coming over.”
“Hurry please. I’m so scared.”
“Stay on the phone, okay?”
The man looked down and I saw him doing something on his phone. A moment later, mine buzzed.
Erebus: Your boyfriend can’t help you.
I’m a shadow, Alana. I can make him vanish into the darkness too if you want. Think about it. He and his brother could be twin shadows.
“Alana?”
“I’m here. Maybe… Maybe you shouldn’t come.”
“Fuck that. Why would you say that?”
“What if he hurts you?” My voice cracked and my eyes welled with tears that I wouldn’t let fall.
“I’m worried about you . Just stay put. I’ll be there soon.”
“Shit. He’s leaving.”
The man turned and slowly began to walk toward the street. I thought about going outside to see which direction he went, but that would be really stupid. It felt like I should be doing something, but my fight or flight instincts were apparently broken. I went into fainting goat mode.
“Five minutes,” Jayce said. “I’m almost there.”
“He’s gone.”
“I’ll fucking find him. Don’t you dare move, okay?”
“Okay.”
I probably couldn’t move even if I wanted to.