When I woke to hear Molly scratching at my bedroom door, the clock said 3:00 a.m. Molly didn’t ordinarily fuss to go outside in the middle of the night; but when she did, there was a reason, and I hoped it wasn’t a skunk that she wanted to harass.

I reached out to nudge Jep so he would go down and I wouldn’t have to face the literally rude awakening of the first raw blast of winter dawn, then remembered he had gone on another overnight trip. I got up, wrapped myself in my old robe, shoved my feet into slippers and followed the dog downstairs, ruefully waking myself with every step. I let her out through the patio door, leaving it cracked so she could come back in when she’d done her stuff, and shuffled into the kitchen to put the electric kettle on for a cup of chamomile tea.

The kettle boiled and I turned it off. Molly whined at the door, somehow having managed to close it. She followed at my heels, whimpering a little, the way she did sometimes. Back in the kitchen, I turned on the countertop light, got out a mug and a tea bag, filled my mug and flipped Molly a freeze-dried chicken treat, which she let fall at her feet. She ignored it. Molly wouldn’t let a rabid raccoon stand between her and a chicken treat. I should have known then.

When I looked up, the figure was standing in the corner of the room, ten feet from me. His hoodie was drawn down over his slender face, and his hands were jammed in the pockets of his sweatpants.

You wonder all your life what you’ll do if something like this ever happens, and you try to prepare. You talk to yourself about the pros and cons of running or fighting. You ask, will I open my mouth to scream and nothing will come out except a whistle of air? Will I advance, rage lending me unwonted strength, or submit to the inevitable, like a goat in the tiger’s jaws? I roared, grabbing up my electric kettle and throwing it at him, sending boiling water across his chest. He was the one who keened, some sort of strangled syllable, and took off out of the room, falling in the kitchen over a chair, rolling to his knees, as Molly growled and barked wildly and I heard Stefan come pounding down the stairs, just as the man burst through the patio door to the yard.

“Don’t, don’t, don’t!” I shouted at Stefan, as he shoved his feet into his shoes and bounded after him. “Just let him go! What if he has a gun or a knife?”