Chapter 1 - Mine
The girl in the photo on her wall blinked.
She freezes mid-step, coffee half-poured, eyes locked on the frame above the mantle.
It’s just a photo.
A black-and-white print that was probably picked up from some antique shop in the city—a moody portrait of a woman in lace, half-turned toward the camera, unsmiling.
But now?
That expression has shifted.
Slightly.
Enough to make her blood slither cold beneath her skin.
Her hand, still holding the kettle, trembles. The hiss of boiling water on ceramic breaks the silence before she lowers it.
“You’re losing it,” she whispers. “It’s just a photo.”
She moves closer. Slowly.
The girl in the picture looks familiar, like a slightly younger version of herself. Early twenties. Hair dark and messy, eyes heavy-lidded with shadow. There’s something sensual about the way she stares into the lens—like she knows something you don’t. Like she’s been waiting.
She leans in. Breath fogs the glass.
The girl doesn’t blink again.
Of course not.
Still, she takes the frame down from the wall. Flips it over.
No name. No date. Just a small, handwritten word etched faintly into the paper backing:
“Mine."
She leaves the photo off the wall.
Sets it face-down on the kitchen table, as if that will stop the weight of it pressing against her thoughts.
It doesn’t.
By midnight, she hasn’t touched her wine. The storm outside is louder now—rain hammering the windows in heavy sheets, wind howling like something alive and pissed off.
She lights a second candle. Then a third.
The cabin is supposed to feel peaceful.
Her therapist said so.
“Reconnection,” she’d said. “You need to spend time with yourself. Alone. Quiet.”
Easy to suggest when you’re not the one haunted by your own face.
She moves through the cabin barefoot, glancing at windows like something might be looking back.
And it is.
But not from the outside.
When she passes the hallway mirror, she sees it again—
Not her reflection, but something off.
The expression too smug. The head tilt too slow. The eyes a shade darker, just enough to make her pause.
She steps back. Blinks.
It’s just her. Of course it is.
But her reflection doesn’t blink with her.
Back in the kitchen, she lifts the photo.
This time, she stares. Longer.
There’s a faint smile on the girl’s lips now.
No doubt about it.
And something behind her in the image, deep in the shadowed room the portrait was taken in. A second shape. Taller. Distorted.
She doesn’t remember that being there before.
But then again…
She doesn’t remember taking the photo either.
She tries to tell herself it’s a trick of the light.
A stain on the print.
Maybe even dust on the glass.
But she’s already moving, lifting the edge of the frame with both hands and cracking it open like a coffin.
The photo inside is warm.
Not in the way paper should be.
But like it remembers.
She flips it over. There’s no writing on the back.
No timestamp.
No photographer’s name.
Just the faint, greasy imprint of where her thumb pressed too long.
She looks again.
The girl in the picture is now turned a little more, shoulder angled like she’s twisting to face forward.
And the shape behind her?
It’s closer.
Her skin prickles. She sets the photo down, this time beneath the candlelight, then backs up slowly, breath shallow.
The flames flicker. Dance. Then still, as if something exhaled.
Her chest tightens. She turns toward the hallway.
The mirror at the end of it is empty.
Not her reflection. Not the wrong one.
Nothing at all.
And then…
Knock!
Not on the front door.
Not on the windows.
From inside the walls.
Three deliberate thuds.
And a fourth, softer. Like fingertips.
She runs. Back to the kitchen. To the phone.
No service.
No signal.
No surprise.
