As if maybe I were dreaming.

And isn’t that, honestly, the most possible thing?

I glance down at my watch. 3:23 a.m.

Let’s just think about Occam’s razor for a second here. Is it more likely that a noncorporeal malevolent spirit fixated on me from inside the house? Or that in my current wretched state I thought I felt something there that clearly wasn’t?

Occam’s razor says the latter.

What happened was something from my imagination.

A daydream.

A thing that could never actually exist.

This is what you would tell yourself if you had a job that you couldn’t leave and had to be here, in this place, by yourself, for the rest of the summer.

This is what you would have to tell yourself.

And if you were reeeeeeeally good at fooling yourself . . . say, if you were the kind of person who could spend her life not thinking about certain things . . . it would work.

So, this is when you would sigh, put that moment in a box, shut it tight, tell yourself none of it really happened, turn, and walk back inside.

Quickly, up the stairs, to your attic bedroom, under the sheets—and back to sleep without a care in the world.

And it would almost work.

Chapter 9

This morning I have an important meeting. I have to come across as entirely professional. No fidgeting. No awkward silences. I am a professional girl in full control of her faculties who is here to organize things. A pragmatic girl. A logical girl.

After all, this is what I’m here for. This is the job. Or part of it anyway. The note in the kitchen explains the timeline of construction, the first set of meetings, and a basic outline of the project. It occurs to me that they’ve really entrusted me with quite a lot. They have confidence in me! (I’m not sure why.)

Nevertheless, I am here to organize the entire thing.

The grand renovation.

Yes, the kindly professor and his wife had in mind that whoever would stay here, in this exquisite place, would also oversee the extensive renovation of said place. This is what they are paying the big bucks for.

Oh, you thought they just wanted me to exist here in this clearly not haunted place? No, no. I am here to work. Or to oversee the work. Which is also work.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I am awkward with guys. Not any guys. Not older guys, like the professor. And not guys my age or younger than me. They are fine. No problem there. No. I am awkward with guys who fall between the ages of, say, twenty-five to fifty. Guys in baseball caps. Guys who watch sports. Guys who high-five each other.

It’s not that I don’t like them, exactly. Or that I feel superior to them in some way. It’s that they make me nervous. Like they are just about to snicker behind my back and tell a lewd joke about my body. Like they are secretly all part of some bro club where whenever a girl walks out of the room, they all look at each other and share a laugh of some kind at her expense. Yes, I know I sound paranoid. Or weird. And that, statistically, this would be impossible for all guys between twenty-five to fifty to be that way.