She didn’t want to speak much louder in case he was here and sleeping, but she could feel the first stirring of panic in her mind, and so she said his name again, speaking in a normal – if strained – voice.

“Larry?”

Still no response.

Even louder now, almost yelling.

“Larry!”

Nothing.

Either he was really out of it – like alcohol-poisoned and unconscious out of it – or he wasn’t here. There was only one way to know for certain. She uncrossed her arms and reached out toward where she thought the wall was, hoping to find one of the switches that turned on the living room’s ceiling light. Her fingers found the wall and slid back and forth across its flat surface, but she couldn’t find the switch. She could’ve sworn there was a light switch somewhere around there. But if there was, she couldn’t find it. Maybe the switch wasn’t there now. Maybe something had happened, maybe her apartment had changed.

Stop it, she told herself. Just.Stop. It.

She took in a slow, deep breath. Held it. Let it out just as slowly.

Okay, so she couldn’t find the switch for the ceiling light. There were other ways to check for Larry’s presence.

She started moving toward the area where she thought the couch was located, half bent over, both hands stretched out before her, ears straining to detect any hint of Larry’s breathing. She walked for what seemed too long a time. Surely she should’ve reached the couch by now, or at least reached something – a wall, the chair next to the couch…. But she continued walking without encountering anything, and a terrible thought occurred to her. What if when she left the hallway, she’d somehow stepped onto an endless dark plain, like the land on either side of the Nightway in her dream? What if the Nightway and the Vermilion Tower were real, and her apartment – her entire life on Earth – was the dream? Was she lost in the lands beyond the Nightway, doomed to wander aimlessly until some deadly predator caught wind of her scent and decided to approach her in order to satisfy both its curiosity and hunger?

She felt a sudden sharp pain in her shins, and she let out a squeal of fright. It took her an instant to realize she’d walked into the glass coffee table in front of the couch.

“Fuck,” she muttered beneath her breath. But despite the pain, she was relieved to have struck the coffee table. The pain told her that she was in her apartment and that everything was normal. Probably going to have a of couple bruises tomorrow. That was a small price to pay for a little reassurance, though.

She crouched and searched with her fingers until she felt the edge of the coffee table’s surface. Keeping one hand on the table to guide her, she walked around it until her left leg bumped into the couch. She stretched out her right hand and felt the cushions. No Larry. She kept her hand on the couch as she made her way around to the floor lamp sitting next to it. She found the switch and turned on the light. She forgot to look away and bright illumination stabbed into her eyes. She squeezed them shut and turned her head away from the lamp. Her eyes watered and tears slid down her cheeks. She felt a spike of pain behind her eyes, and she feared she might be on the verge of triggering another goddamn migraine.

Don’t borrow trouble, her mother always said. It was good advice, and she told herself not to worry about her head. Either she’d get a migraine or she wouldn’t.

She opened her eyes slowly to give them a chance to adjust to the light. She had to blink several times to clear the tears from her vision, but once she’d done this, she was able to see well enough. What she didn’t see was any sign of Larry. The front door was closed and locked, and that was a relief.

Whatever had caused those thumps, she hadn’t heard any more of them since leaving her bedroom. The noises had most likely been caused by one of the building’s other residents – as she’d suspected – and it seemed they’d stopped doing whatever it was they’d been up to. She was just on edge after everything that had happened tonight, that’s all. Best to forget about the mess, go back to bed, and try to return to sleep. She had work in the morning.

She glanced at the door once again. She was tempted to engage the chain lock for an extra measure of security, small though it might be. But if she did that, Larry wouldn’t be able to get in when he finally made it home. He might figure fuck it and go sleep in his car. It wouldn’t be the first time. But there was an equally likely chance he’d pound his fist on the door and call her name until she woke and came out to let him in. She didn’t want to deal with a loud, drunk, and angry Larry tonight. She’d leave the chain off.

She turned back to the lamp, intending to turn the light off, but she changed her mind. What would it hurt to leave the light on out here for the rest of the night? Maybe she’d sleep with her nightstand lamp on, too. She hadn’t done so since she’d been a little girl, but if having a light on in her bedroom helped her get through the rest of the night, she’d do it. Hell, she’d install a fucking spotlight in her room if it would—

Her thoughts were interrupted by a soft clattering.

Her gaze was instantly drawn toward the sound, and she saw the vertical blinds over her patio door undulate slowly, stirred by a breeze.

She felt a fresh jolt of fear. A breeze meant the patio door was open. Had Larry left it like that when he’d departed for his gig? She hadn’t checked the patio door to make sure it was locked before she’d gone to bed, had she? She couldn’t remember, but she didn’t think so. If the patio door was open, that meant that someone else could be in her apartment right now. Maybe multiple someones.

She stood there, frozen, unable to decide what she should do next. She could call nine-one-one, but she’d left her phone on her nightstand, and she’d have to return to her bedroom for it. And if she did call for help, what could she say? I heard a couple thumps, and when I checked, I discovered my patio door was open. I’m scared. Can you send someone to check if the Boogeyman snuck in? She’d feel ridiculous if the police showed up, checked her entire apartment, and found nothing.

There’s no sign of an intruder, ma’am. You’re perfectly safe.

She imagined the officer saying these words with a slight sneer, as if he or she was angry with the overly nervous woman who’d wasted their time because she thought she’d heard something scary – upon awakening from a nightmare, no less. Then again, she’d be an idiot to continue investigating on her own, going into the small kitchen, stepping out onto the patio. That was the kind of dumb move people in films made, and more often than not, their stupidity resulted in their deaths. Better to be embarrassed than dead, she decided.

She started walking back toward the bedroom, moving slowly and quietly, continually gazing back at the patio door as she went. Another gust of wind stirred the blinds, this one stronger than the first, causing them to ripple and rattle more loudly than last time. The sound made her jump and she stopped walking and stared at the patio door.

That’s when she saw the first hand reach through the blinds. It was shadow-black, with long, multijointed fingers that ended in sharp, curving claws. It was the same sort of hand the shadow thing she’d glimpsed in the parking lot of FoodSaver had possessed. Was it the same creature? Had the thing somehow followed her home? She thought of the thumps she’d heard, and now she realized she knew what the sounds had been someone – or something – pounding on the glass of the patio doors from the outside. The door had been closed, and maybe the shadow creature had been trying to force it open, perhaps pounding the glass in frustration until it finally succeeded.

A second hand emerged from between the blinds, identical to the first. Then came a third, a fourth, a fifth…. Six, seven, eight, nine…. She lost count after that as hands continued thrusting through the blinds. Within seconds the rectangular space that marked the patio door’s opening was filled with ebon-clawed hands, all of them reaching toward her, fingers flexing, claws softly scratching against one another, as if the creatures were attempting to sharpen them before attacking. She’d been right about something blocking the light from the lamps behind the building, and now she knew what that something was.

She heard whispering then, a sound that might have been an autumnal wind, but which might also have been a chorus of voices speaking words that she couldn’t quite make out. Then one of the shadow creatures entered the apartment, seeming to slide between the blinds’ slats as if it were momentarily two-dimensional. But once it was inside the room, standing between the patio door and the dining table, it regained mass, like a black balloon inflating itself. This creature looked exactly like the one she’d seen at FoodSaver, might even have been the same one. It was impossible to tell. The thing had no apparent sensory organs, but its featureless face was pointed at her, and she had the impression that it was well aware of her presence. It stood for a moment, regarding her, and then it gripped the edge of the small round table with its clawed hands and flipped it over. The sound of the table hitting the floor shocked her out of her paralysis, and she turned to flee. In her peripheral vision she caught sight of the shadow creature heading toward her, claws upraised, as others of its kind entered the room, knocking the dining table’s two chairs over as they came.

She ran.

Her bare feet pounded on the carpet of the short hallway as she dashed toward her bedroom. She heard no sounds of pursuit coming from behind her, but she didn’t know if the shadow creatures made any noise as they moved – the one at FoodSaver hadn’t. But she wasn’t dumb enough to believe the things weren’t chasing after her, and she was damn sure she wasn’t going to look back over her shoulder to check. When she reached her bedroom, she dashed inside, slammed the door shut behind her, and locked it. She then hurried to her nightstand to snatch up her phone. Before she could start to input numbers, one of the creatures crashed into her bedroom door, hitting it so hard she heard wood crack. The creatures might look like shadows and move just as silently, but it seemed they could pack a wallop when they wanted to.

More pounding at the door now. She pictured a mass of shadowy forms filling the hallway, clawed hands curled into fists, all of them pounding on her bedroom door, desperate to get at her. It wouldn’t take the things long to break down the door and flood into the room. She preferred not to be there when it happened.

She darted toward her bathroom and reached it at the exact instant that the bedroom door burst open. She spun around, shut the bathroom door, locked it, then plopped down on her ass in front of it. She turned, braced her bare feet on the toilet bowl’s cold porcelain, and pushed her back against the door. She didn’t know how long she’d be able to keep the shadow creatures from reaching her, but she hoped it would be long enough.

Heart pounding, head throbbing, breath coming in ragged gasps, she pressed nine-one-one on her phone’s screen and then held the device up to her head with a shaking hand. For an instant she feared that the call wouldn’t go through, that the shadow creatures possessed some kind of ability to block her phone’s signal, and she was relieved when she heard the sound of ringing as her phone tried to connect.

Before the dispatcher on the other end could answer, dozens of hands began pounding on the bathroom door, striking so hard that she could feel the impacts juddering through her bones and teeth. She experienced a draining sensation then, a sudden weariness, as if her strength was deserting her. Her legs began to tremble, and she feared she wouldn’t be able to keep the door closed much longer.

“No,” she said. “Please, no….”

And just like that, the pounding stopped. It didn’t taper off, one pair of hands stopping, followed by another and so on. All the hands discontinued striking the door at the exact same instant, as if the shadow things had received some kind of signal to break off their attack.

“Nine-one-one. What’s your emergency?”

Lori was so relieved she started crying, and when the dispatcher once again asked what her emergency was, she almost couldn’t speak.

“Someone’s broken into my apartment,” she said, voice soft and breathy. “I’ve locked myself in the bathroom and I’m hiding from them.”

“Hold on. Someone will be there soon. Give me your address.”

Lori did, and the dispatcher told her to remain on the line while she contacted officers closest to her location. Lori said she would, and while she waited, she listened, trying to hear if the shadow creatures were still gathered outside the bathroom, perhaps hoping to trick her into thinking they were gone so she’d open the door and they could get at her. She heard nothing, though. Maybe they were gone.

A soft rapping sounded on the door, and she screamed.

“Lori? Are you okay?”

It was Larry.

In an instant, she was on her feet. Still holding on to her phone with her left hand, she unlocked the door with her right, opened it, and threw herself into Larry’s arms. She hit him so hard, he staggered back a step before hesitantly bringing up his arms to hold on to her.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

She tried to speak, but all that came out was a sob, which was swiftly followed by more tears. She began trembling then, and Larry held her tighter as she cried.

* * *

Lori and Larry were sitting on the couch when someone knocked on the door. Lori held a mug of tea in her hands – Larry had made it for her – and while she’d drunk very little of it, she found the mug’s warmth comforting. She turned her head toward the door, but before she could start to get up, Larry gave her hand a gentle squeeze, then rose from the couch and headed to the door.