Page 9 of Bonetide

Though I’d never heard that name before, there was something familiar about it. It was also very poetic and mysterious and suited him immensely.

“Alasdair what?” I pry.

A pause. “Just Alasdair tonight.”

Tonight? Now I laugh. “That’s not how introductions usually go.”

“I’m aware. But it’s the name I would prefer to give you, if you don’t mind.”

I mean, I did kind of mind this stranger outside my door not giving me his full name, but something told me I shouldn’t push it. There’s something about the way he’s talking that feels surreal, let alone the fact that we’re having a whole conversation through a closed door.

Don’t let him in.

“You said you live at the castle.” I redirected, trying to ground myself against the peculiar feeling.

“I’m staying there.”

“Someone told me it has been empty for years.”

“Who told you that?”

“The shopkeeper.”

“Mhairi?”

Ah, well at least he seems to know her.

“Yeah.”

“She was not wrong.”

“Okaaaay. Then how⁠—”

“Listen,” he interrupts softly, in a way that makes my breath hitch. “You don’t have to fear me. I’m not going to ask you to open the door. I came over to say that I was sorry I startled you on the road, and that if you ever needed anything, I’m right there as your new neighbor. I’d advise against swimming, but you can always drive or walk over.”

That strange feeling from earlier starts tugging at my ankles as if a heady fog is coming in from under the doorframe and wrapping around me. I’m starting to feel as if I’m not entirely sober and I’m moments away from opening the door and getting a good look at the guy I’m talking to. Probably a bad idea since he just said, you don’t have to fear me unprompted. Because who the hell does that?

I lean against the door, giving into the fatigue. I’m about to take a step back when I hear the sound of his weight shifting. He has not been against the door. He has been a foot or so back from it, with the considerate distance of someone who does not want to seem to be looming, someone who knocks politely and steps back to give someone room to answer.

But now, now, he comes closer. I hear him, the small soft sound of fabric and breath against the wood, and I freeze where I am.

“Goodnight, Iris,” he murmurs.

His voice is very quiet, and very close.

Then he is gone.

I hear his footsteps on the stone path and on the gravel where the path meets the moor, and then I expect to hear a car door slamming shut or the crunch of tires on the shoddy driveway, but I don’t hear any of that.

I don’t hear anything at all.

And I don’t want to open my door to check.

So, I stand in my front hall.

I put my back against the door, and slide down it slowly, because my body refuses to do things any other way, until I am sitting on the floor with my legs out in front of me.

I realize I never told him my name but, somehow, he knew it anyway.