I was in that barely lucid state, halfway between sleep and being awake, where I knew that I was in bed, knew I was sleeping or dreaming, but couldn’t bring myself to break out of it. My grandmother always said that moment, that feeling of being trapped, awake, in a sleeping body, only happened when there was another spirit in the room with you, holding you down. She also still displays all her children’s baby teeth in glass jars on her mantel. I wasn’t sure what I believed, but as I lay there, I could hear Shelby moving around in the living room, and I knew I needed to get up and make sure she was okay.

But I was just so tired…

Shelby made another noise, this one much louder than the rest, and I knew she needed to go to the bathroom. I finally broke through the sleep and pulled myself up onto one arm, coughing as I plunged face-first into a pile of fur.

Shelby.

She’d moved in the middle of the night and was no longer on the side of the bed where she’d leapt up earlier. She was on the other side, sprawled out asleep where Keith usually lay. As I sat up, she sat up too, and we both blinked in the moonlight.

Shelby was still here…

Wait. Shelby is still here?

I heard another crashing sound out in the living room, which made my heart nearly fall out of my chest, and Shelby jump straight up on the bed, her teeth bared and eyes alert as she breathed heavily into the dark.

Chapter 26

The fear that flooded through my body was unlike anything I’d ever felt before, and I lurched up in the bed, scrambling back against the headboard. I’m not sure why that was my first reaction, but it was the most distance I could put between myself and the bedroom door.

There was someone—or something—out there.

I thought about calling out to see if it was Keith—maybe he’d come home for some reason—but I knew it couldn’t be him. He’d left hours ago.

I could hear the person moving around, but there was another noise drowning it out.

The ceiling fan.

With shaking legs, I pulled myself up and reached high, my fingers connecting with the cord that would turn it off. I pulled it twice, and the fan began to slow down. Once it was off, the silence seemed to be magnified, every creak clattering loudly in my head. I waited, my throat dry, and I suddenly tasted blood. It took me a moment to realize that I’d bitten my tongue.