Page 12 of Hunting Harbor

Twice.

Enough times to make sure they won't swing open again, letting in that chill, that fog, that salt. The smell that someone else left behind. And once more because the creak of the floorboards sounds like an echo of footsteps.

Even the lock itself feels different.

Even the hinges on the windows.

And I should feel safe, knowing everything is closed. Knowing that no one else can get in. But this sick, strange feeling keeps turning circles around my ribs. Keeps tightening, burning, squeezing me out of myself until I don't know what I really want.

To feel secure?

To find more clues?

To be afraid or to feel alive?

To keep pretending or to actually know?

The locks don't hold, not really. No matter how many times I open and shut them, I’m still uneasy. They just sit there like tiny, silent ghosts, waiting for me to finally fall asleep so they can slip back open. I go out and buy another deadbolt. Maybe that will help. I can't stop myself. It drills into the door with the sound of a dying animal, but even that doesn't drown out the thought: what if I can never escape this feeling?

The dark seeps into the apartment like a fog. Every flicker of light seems to blink a warning, spelling out my name. This is the last chance, they whisper.Before what?

I tighten the screws until they make thatwhirrrrrrsound. Until I can't tell if they're holding or if it's just an illusion, the same one I keep telling myself I'm not falling for. The same one that doesn't feel real. I force myself to look at the door, to see if it’s enough. To see if anything will be. And the more I look, the more I doubt, the more I think, the more I know that it isn't.

The shadows crowd in like a dream that's too easy to remember.

I jump at the sound of my own breathing.

I pace back and forth in the living room, my nerves running laps around me. Back and forth. Light to dark. This can’t be real. This must be a dream. The mug. The drawer. The books. They haunt me like the photograph. Like the come between my legs, that somehow made me feel wanted. Made me feel… whole. Some sick fantasy come to life. Like the strange comfort I felt knowing someone’s out there, and they’re protecting me, like my own fucking family couldn’t.

I flick the lights on and off, on and off, hoping that the right combination will settle the chaos in my head.

All it does is confuse me.

All it does is leave me alone, wishing there were more signs.

Maybe I should call the police.

Maybe I should call anyone. Maybe Lila, but she’d freak the fuck out.

Maybe I should pick up the phone and let them know. Let them know what? I stop in my tracks, the thought like a shot of ice through my brain. Like a bad connection.This is Harbor, yes, hi, someone left me a... gift? Someone broke into my apartment, and I think I might be... grateful? How would I even start? How could I ever explain?

How could I want this?

And what, what, what if I do?

Chapter Five

Kairo

Theroom'stooloud,too crowded. I'm still waiting for the perfect moment to slip in and take what's mine. I'm patient like that, but when she arrives, I'm reminded that patience can only stretch so far before it breaks. She's beautiful when she's scared. Her eyes dart around the room like her mysterious lover will just randomly pop up. I smile to myself at the thought. She's more fragile than I've seen her before. Perfect. Exposed. Her fingers tremble when she orders a drink.

She wants to lose herself in the bottle and forget about what’s happening to her. She’s confused. Scared. Horny. And it confuses her. It worries her that she’s becoming a monster.

Unfortunately for her, there can only be room for one of those in our relationship and that’s me.

The image sears itself into me like a brand. I savor the glow of the bar lights on her skin, how it leaves her luminous and pale, how it makes her look like she belongs to me already. She thinks she can hide, lose herself in the crowd. I don't let her out of my sight as she slips onto a stool and gives the bartender her order. She's nervous. Vulnerable. The same as when I found her curled up in bed with that delicious fear oozing out of her. Within seconds, the beer she ordered is slid across the bar, cap still on.

She doesn't know I'm here, so close, watching. She thinks she can drown out what I started in the bottom of a glass. I watch her struggle trying to twist off the cap before tapping on the counter and ordering something else, settling on something cheaper, straight from the well. She’s so non-confrontational. Didn’t even ask him just to take the top off. So now she sits, an unopened bottle and a glass of improperly poured, watered down beer from the tap. Rude of the bartender not to take the cap off for her, but I will once I make my move. Something simple, easy, to show her that a real man won’t make her life harder. Disarming. Helpful. My pulse matches hers. Rapid, panicked, then slowing. Her first sip makes her shoulders loosen.

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