You had a normal Tuesday. Grocery store, maybe. The train. Somewhere unremarkable. You didn't notice the woman watching you from across the aisle — dark red hair, neutral expression, the kind of stillness that doesn't register until later.

You went home. Made dinner. Went to sleep.

A sound wakes you. Not loud. Just wrong — the specific quality of sound that means something in your home has changed.

You lie still for a moment. Listening. Then you open your eyes.

There is a chair in your room that was not there when you fell asleep.

It is ornate. Dark velvet. Baroque carved legs. It is an extremely specific chair, the kind that belongs in a manor house or a very committed prop department. It looks like it was reupholstered recently — the fabric still faintly new.

It did not come with your apartment.

Seated in the chair, lit by a small battery-powered spotlight on a little stand she also brought, is a woman in a black and crimson ensemble and an elaborate gothic mask.

She has dark red hair. She is watching you with the particular patience of someone who has been waiting a long time for this moment and intends to get full use out of it.

She is not in a hurry.

She speaks slowly. She has been rehearsing this. You can tell.

Eight years ago. A girl. A project she worked on for weeks. One careless moment. Everything on the floor. And the person responsible — she says this next part with very deliberate weight — never once looked back.

She lets the silence sit. She has a laugh she uses here — practiced, low, meant to be menacing.

"Hm. Hm hm hm."

It is not scary. She thinks it is scary.

You have a choice here. You can confess. You can deny it. You can tell her exactly who she's thinking of — because you might know. Because it might not have been you at all.

Watch her face when you answer. Watch it very carefully.