Page 7 of The Intruder

There. I’m ready.

Now all there is to do is wait for this allegedly terrible storm to arrive. I’ll do what I do every night, which is read one of my many books. I own several shelves worth, but every few weeks, I drive into town to the local library across the street from the general store, and I swap out about a dozen titles. I can read a book every other day. Back when I had a television, I had forgotten how much I used to love to read. It’s one of the many bonuses to my self-imposed isolation.

I pour myself a glass of cold water from the filter in my refrigerator. (I don’t trust the water out here, which is another reason I can’t live off the grid.) I’m getting ready to head into the living room to pick up my book when something catches my attention:

Movement outside my house.

The fear I managed to tamp down in the bedroom comes rushing back full force. But I remind myself not to panic. This is the woods. It isn’t entirely unusual to see some form of life scampering about, right outside my cabin. There are animals out here after all. Lots of rabbits and deer. On one occasion, I actually saw a rabbit nuzzling with a deer, and I promptly named them Bambi and Thumper, but sadly, I failed to get a photo before they both scurried away. My point is there are lots of animals around, and in theory, there’s nothing alarming about seeing something moving outside my window.

The movement was peripheral to the toolshed at the edge of my property. While I have seen many rabbits scurrying around the shed, this was definitely not a rabbit or even a deer. This was something distinctly human. And after seeing what looked like a face at my bedroom window, it’s especially unsettling.

What’s inside my toolshed? Is it possible that…there’s a person hiding in there?

A cold feeling slides down the back of my neck until all the hairs stand up straight. I lean closer to the window, peering into my darkening yard. It’s hard to see much because of my reflection in the glass, but if I cup my hands around my face, I can make out the shed clearly.

Just in time to see the shed door swing shut.

I jump back from the window, clutching the edge of the sink. Somebody is out there. There’s an intruder hiding in my toolshed, waiting to enter my home as soon as I crawl into bed and drift off into unconsciousness.

My heart is thumping loudly as I peer through the window one more time. I have a good view of the shed from my kitchen, which has a single window, and I don’t see any movement coming from within. The door is rattling in the growing wind—neither closed nor open.

This has got to be my imagination. Maybe it was just a bunch of floating leaves that coincidentally looked like a person. And that face was just the moonlight—I’m sure of it. As for the door to the toolshed, it isn’t surprising it would be opening and closing with the accelerating wind.

There’s nobody out there. There can’t be. They would have to have a death wish.

Just as I’m almost starting to relax, a jarring, pounding noise almost makes me jump out of my skin. I wasn’t sure about the movement by the shed, but that sound is distinctly real and human. There’s somebody here.

And they’re knocking on my door.

6

I turn so quickly, I knock over the glass of water I placed on the edge of the sink. It topples to the floor and, naturally, breaks into a thousand pieces, which is exactly what you want to happen just before the power is about to go out. Good thing I’m still wearing my boots.

I curse under my breath and hurry in the direction of the door. You would think that when you live in the middle of nowhere, visitors would be rare. And for the first few months, they were—I was completely isolated. But when I open the door, I know exactly who I’m going to find standing there.

“Hello, Lee,” I say.

Lee Traynor is my closest neighbor out here. He moved into the cottage down the way about six months ago, and considering he has to fight his way through some serious underbrush to make it from his house to mine, he is here far more than I would expect him to be. At least once a week, he manages to find an excuse to knock on my door. And if I pretend not to be home, he returns later that day.

“Hey, Casey.” He rips off his slightly damp hat to reveal a head full of messy brown hair. He’s got a flashlight in the hand that isn’t gripping his hat. “I just wanted to check on you before the storm.”

My body tenses as I step back to let him inside. “You didn’t have to do that.”

Lee comes inside my living room, but he doesn’t take off his puffy waterproof coat. He does unzip it halfway though.

“It’s going to be a big one.” His blue eyes focus on my face in that concerned way he has, where he gets a deep crease between his eyebrows. “You sure you have everything you need?”

I’m sick of everyone addressing me like I’m helpless. Like I can’t manage to gather appropriate supplies before a major storm. Lee especially always seems so worried about me, even though we’re basically strangers and I can’t figure out why he cares so much.

“I’m good,” I assure him. “I got everything I need.”

Lee looks like he’s about to quiz me on my stockpile, but he stops short of doing so. Good thing, because I’m still buzzing from pushing Rudy’s face into the dirt. It’s a bad time to piss me off.

He studies the array of candles I have lined up, ready to be lit. “You should light them soon. With the wind picking up, the power will probably go within the hour.”

“I will, Lee. Don’t worry about me.”

I’m a little insulted that he seems to feel the need to come out here to check on me. I was living here for a month before he moved in, and I was doing perfectly fine, thank you very much. Well, there was that one incident when my toilet started spouting brown water all over the bathroom and I did lose my cool, but other than that, it was fine.