Jonathan worked about a twenty-minute walk from where he was renting a one-bedroom apartment over a pottery store owned by his landlord. By bike, it was usually closer to ten minutes, but when he wasn’t trying to push it too much, it could be more.

That night he made it back in six, trying to focus purely on the road and not the shadows that seemed to leap out at him as he rode under the streetlights. If he looked too closely at the side streets he passed, his mind tried to find pale faces in the dark, staring back at him.

He was out of breath when he finally got home and up the stairs with his bicycle over his shoulder. He had to lean against the door to hold it shut as he locked it, the cheap door not quite aligned with the lock.

Jonathan slumped there, for a second, with the rest of the world shut out behind the door. Once he got his breath back, he felt quite silly. The whole thing, in fact, felt beneath him. One weird customer and he ran from work?

What had gotten into him?

He let out a half-hearted “ha!” to the empty apartment, and grimaced, thinking about what he’d have to tell his boss. He was lucky his message had gone to voicemail, he realized. Jonathan knew that Vic would have been able to convince him to finish the shift if he had answered.

He stood up straight and sighed. A short hallway led to the open-plan kitchen and living room. Jonathan had gotten lucky finding this place. Truthfully, the owner wasn’t too bad. Her main goal was just making use of the space above her store, not collecting huge profits from rent.

With slightly shaky steps, still a little worn from his quick ride, he made his way to the couch that separated the little dining area from the living room, facing the hall and away from the windows. The store was close to San

Luis’s square, on the corner of a street a block from the city library, and he could see the trees of the little park from his windows.

Van Gannison ran busses to the square during the school year, so that students could get away from campus and participate in local events. A lot of the students - and Jonathan had to admit he used to be one of them - had spent a lot of time trying to act too cool for things like that. In his junior year, he had gone to their Halloween event and, surprisingly, he’d had a lot of fun. He’d actually gone to Ghouls ‘n’ Brews for the first time that night, and gotten a part-time job there the next semester.

During his senior year, he had spent a lot of time in this apartment, working on a thesis proposal that hadn’t gone anywhere. That was probably part of why he’d insisted on staying and trying to get in again. All those late hours he’d spent doing preliminary research, scouring the internet for potential sources would be wasted otherwise.

He leaned forward, elbows on knees and head in hands, and stared at the reflection in his blank TV screen. Now what? Was this just going to be more wasted time? Working long hours in a job he didn’t care about, coming home to try and get another couple of pages in on a thesis no one wanted to read? Getting scared by weirdo customers when he was alone?

His reflection shrugged back at him. He looked tired. He looked worn out. His hair was a mess, grown out longer than he’d ever let it. The bags under his eyes told him it wasn’t just today that had him on edge. “This sucks,”

Jonathan said out loud, to no one.

He stood up again, not able to bear looking at himself like that. He crossed to his refrigerator and poured himself a glass of water from his water filter. He looked out the window, down the street towards the square as he drank a little.

The streetlights were brighter around the square, and some string lights were up in the branches of the trees. It stood out as a bright spot in his view, with two of the larger trees even peeking out over the tops of some of the buildings in front of him.

The night sky was dark, the cloud cover showing no starlight and the moon only a silver-white blur. The light of the streetlamp opposite his apartment flickered and drew his attention closer, to the one person in view, standing on the street under the lamp.

Staring back, up into his window.

A pale face with dark hair.

“Sh*t!” Jonathan exclaimed. The glass he was holding slipped from his hand and broke on the tile below. He took two steps back and bumped the kitchen table, which loudly scraped against the floor as he held himself steady against it.

He peered into the darkness where he had seen the man, only there was nothing there but an old newspaper stand.

His heart was pounding in his ears, he could feel it almost coming out of his chest. A vice was tightening around his ribs, and he couldn’t hold his breath right. He spun, then, and ran to the door.

The locks were still locked, the deadbolt drawn. Jonathan turned off all the lights in the house, and, stepping around the puddle of water and glass, grabbed a knife, the biggest he had and the one he used the least. Then, he went to his bedroom.

There were no windows in his bedroom, he reasoned, heart still pounding. He looked around his room and settled on pushing his dresser against the door. After this, he sat on the floor in the corner furthest from the door.

Knife in hand, shaking, the tears began. Ragged sobbing would keep him awake every time sleep nearly came, and he had a feeling it wouldn't slow any time soon.