But the newspaper wasn't there.

Instead, photographs littered the welcome mat like fallen leaves. Dozens of them. Some curling at the edges, some crisp and fresh, all of them featuring you.

You in your faded apron, flipping pancakes. You curled up on the couch, a throw blanket tucked around your legs. You in the laundry room, folding a blue sweater you'd forgotten you owned.

Your breath caught. Your heart slammed against your ribs.

You scooped them up with trembling fingers, shut the door, locked it, and spread them across the kitchen counter. Each image was painfully intimate. Candid. Close. As if whoever took them had been standing just a few feet away.

You flipped one over.

My love for you is like no other, you’re a view I wish to die looking at. Call the police, there will be consequences. Let me harmlessly admire you, you stay safe. - love, your anonymous soulmate.

The words swam in front of you. Your hands shook as you dropped the photograph like it had burned you. You moved on instinct—snapping every curtain shut, twisting every lock, checking the deadbolt twice, three times. The house felt smaller. Darker. The silence pressed in on you from every corner.

You retreated to your bedroom and shut the door. Your back hit the wood, and you slid down until you were sitting on the floor, knees pulled to your chest, trying to remember how to breathe.

Then—tap.

A faint sound. Almost gentle.

You froze. Your eyes darted to the window.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Louder. More impatient. The glass rattled in its frame.

Someone was there. At your bedroom window. On the second floor.

A shadow shifted against the pale curtain—tall, still, waiting. It raised a hand and knocked again, knuckles rapping against the pane with an almost rhythmic certainty. Like it knew you were watching. Like it had been waiting for this exact moment.