Rose lets out a sigh of relief and sends up a nondenominational prayer that she and the rain gutter have enough strength remaining to get her back to solid footing.

A sharp snap, like the breaking of a twig, is followed by the gutter moving outward. Rose slides down a few inches, fingernails raking the shingles. Metal straps holding the guttering to the eave groan and screech in protest.

The gravel crunching ceases abruptly.

Rose no longer breathes. She squeezes her eyes shut. Her muscles are reaching exhaustion, thighs twitching as if touched by a cattle prod, fingers losing sensation.

Silence from below.

And silence.

And such a long silence, Rose begins to hope the monster has slunk quietly away while she was busy being scared out of her mind.

“Huh!” whuffs up from below like the snort of an interested grizzly. Crunching recommences. The intruder is trotting back toward the rear of the house. He thumps up the wooden steps to the deck. Broken glass creaks in the metal slide as he yanks open the door.

The time for silence and hiding is at an end. As quickly as she dares, Rose shuffles one foot, then the other, in the failing gutter, moving herself farther from the porch roof. With each shift of weight the gutter wrenches away from the eave.

Rose fixes her eyes on the bedroom skylight where it bulges through the dark roof, a rectangular plastic bubble four feet long and fourteen inches wide. Rose knows this because the skylight was one of the few features of the house she had liked.

With a whine, the gutter separates from the eave, the loosed portion levering the rest free. Screws squeal as they pull from the wood. Rose uses the last of her footing to propel herself sideways over the skylight. It’s not a big leap; still, it taxes Rose’s depleted strength.

Spread-eagled on the plastic, hands firmly clamped over its upper edge, she gasps for breath. Sweat drenches her tunic, the wet fabric dragging on the plastic as she wriggles into a more secure position.

Face mashed against the skylight, she looks into the bedroom. The furniture is broken. On top of the pieces, the mattress leans against the closet doors in a tangle of sheets and blankets. Splinters of wood as long as her arm stick like knives from the ruined doorframe.