3:17

At 3:17 in the morning, I buried the man I had killed seven years ago.

The problem was that I knew he had died before I killed him.

The shovel broke through the wet ground with a sound that seemed too loud for the cemetery.

I stopped.

For a few seconds, I listened.

Nothing.

No footsteps.

No car on the road beyond the trees.

Only rainwater dripping from the branches and the slow movement of my own breathing.

I looked down at the hole.

It wasn't deep enough yet.

That was the first problem.

The second was the body.

It was wrapped in black plastic, tied at both ends, and heavy enough that I had needed both hands to drag it from the car.

I had not checked the face.

I didn't need to.

I knew who it was.

I had known before I opened the trunk.

Seven years ago, I watched him die.

Tonight, I had put him in the ground.

Both things were true.

I rested my hands on the shovel.

There was blood beneath my fingernails.

Not much.

A thin dark line along my right thumb.

I stared at it.

Then I remembered the first time I had seen his blood.

Seven years earlier.

Different room.

Different night.

Same smell.

Metal.

Disinfectant.

Something sweet beneath it.

I looked back at the body.

"Why are you here?"

The question sounded ridiculous.

The dead don't answer questions.

But I wasn't asking him.

I was asking myself.

I had spent seven years believing I killed him.

That belief had shaped everything that came afterward.

Where I lived.

Who I trusted.

Why I never returned to the hospital.

Why I never asked my mother what happened that night.

Why I never opened the box my father left behind.

Why I stopped dreaming about Room Four.

Or tried to.

I had never been good at forgetting.

That was the irony.

The man had taught me how.

At least, that's what I had believed.

A car passed on the road.

Its headlights moved through the trees.

I crouched beside the grave and pulled the plastic tighter around the body.

My hand touched something hard beneath the wrapping.

A watch.

I froze.

I knew that watch.

Black strap.

Silver face.

A small crack across the glass.

He had been wearing it the night I saw him die.

I pulled my hand away.

For a moment, I couldn't breathe.

The cemetery disappeared.

I was seven years younger.

Standing in a hospital corridor.

A boy.

A locked door.

A man kneeling in front of me.

His hand on my shoulder.

His voice low.

"Don't look behind you."

I looked anyway.

I always did.

That was the problem.

I stood again.

The shovel slipped from my hand.

It landed in the mud.

I heard a sound behind me.

A footstep.

I turned.

Nothing.

Just the trees.

I reached for the flashlight in my pocket.

The beam moved across the cemetery.

Graves.

Stone.

Wet grass.

Nothing else.

Then the light stopped.

There was someone standing between two graves.

A man.

Too far away to see his face.

I raised the flashlight.

He didn't move.

"Who's there?"

No answer.

I took one step forward.

The man turned.

And disappeared behind the trees.

I stood still.

My first instinct was to run.

My second was worse.

I wanted to follow him.

Because there was something about the way he stood.

Something I remembered.

The angle of his shoulders.

The slight tilt of his head.

The way he kept his hands at his sides.

I knew that posture.

I had seen it before.

In Room Four.

I picked up the shovel.

I filled the grave as quickly as I could.

I didn't stop to make it neat.

I didn't place flowers.

I didn't say goodbye.

When the hole was full, I pressed the soil down with the back of the shovel.

Then I stood over it.

The name on the stone behind me belonged to someone else.

That was why I had chosen this place.

No connection.

No record.

No reason for anyone to look here.

I had thought that was enough.

It wasn't.

My phone vibrated.

I nearly dropped it.

Unknown number.

One message.

You buried the wrong man.

I stared at the screen.

Another message appeared.

He died seven years ago.

I felt the blood leave my face.

A third message.

You know that.

I didn't reply.

The screen went dark.

Then lit again.

One final message.

So who did you bury tonight?

I looked down at the fresh earth.

For seven years, I had believed the worst thing that happened to me was that I killed a man.

Standing there at 3:17 in the morning, I realized I had been wrong.

The worst thing was that someone knew I had been wrong.

And they had waited seven years to prove it.