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A nna didn’t even wait for the remote possibility of a response. She just buried her phone beneath her pillow, flung her glasses back on her nightstand, and returned her ear to the divot it had occupied for the past hour.

Holy shit, she’d actually texted him. A complete stranger with a hero complex who had been running laps through her thoughts for the lion’s share of the past five hours. Even her bath, which always helped her fall asleep, apparently decided to pile on the pressure instead of relieving it.

It didn’t matter that she’d tucked herself into bed at nine thirty or made a very intentional choice not to consume any more media, written or watchable, in hopes she’d coax her mind into a pleasantly euphoric state of slumber.

Nope. Instead, she’d had to go and contract a bout of guilty conscience over how rude she’d been to the man who, for some reason that still failed to find her, had taken time out of his evening to ensure she was okay.

When she was still wide awake hours later, she typed out a message before she could call the words back. It was only after she’d realized what she’d done that true embarrassment prickled her cheeks. Before any dots could bubble up under his name in their nonexistent text string and possibly pepper her screen with encouragement, she cut the conversation off real quick.

“A small thank-you. Just a small thank-you. Nothing that needs a rejoinder.”

Of course, these were the words of an irrational woman who had convinced herself that such a text likely wouldn’t be responded to. For one thing, it was late. Far past acceptable communication windows. And surely, if he even felt compelled to respond, it wouldn’t be with anything more than a simple thumbs-up reaction or a smiley face. For most people who were either sleeping or well on their way to getting there, the path of least resistance was often the most desirable. Why tap out a whole sentence when a simple emoji would suffice and get the point across quickly enough for them to both fall back to sleep?

Besides, if he did respond to her, was that even someone she wanted to be talking to in the first place? People who had conversations or intense thought processes this close to midnight were often very bothered people. She had more than enough clients who confessed to late-night snacks and work sessions being a significant part of their dietary undoing to know this.

Good decision-makers kept reasonable hours with reasonable boundaries, something she clearly needed to work on more herself. And no, she was not about to blame it on the pregnancy. After the night she’d had, any sane person would have wanted to show their gratitude. It was an act of goddamn integrity, really, a virtue they’d already established to be an area of concern between them. Doing what was right without the expectation of reciprocity. To volley back against her message would just be inconsiderate. What would he do, after all? Thank her for thanking him? And where would that cycle end? In madness, obviously.

Anna hitched the covers higher up over her shoulder to block out both the chill of the room and the frigid wind pelting the panes of her windows. Only once she settled more snuggly into her cocoon and tried to search out sleep again did a soft vibration tickle her cheek and ear.

Her eyes winged open. She scrambled for her glasses and dove for the phone beneath her pillow. Within the soft pale-blue glow of her screen sat a message, offered up like an oyster presenting its pearl. From Iron.

Iron: Is becoming a ghost a sizable worry for you?

More dots . . .

Iron: And no thanks needed.

Anna settled the pillow behind her head against the wall and tucked her knees close to her chest like she used to as a kid when reading before bed held far more interest than dreaming.

Anna: I wouldn’t have made it this far in life without a healthy amount of worry.

Iron: Worrying borrows more trouble than you need.

Anna: I’m also very good at managing debt, so don’t you *ahem* worry.

Iron: About as good as managing your vehicle’s maintenance schedule?

Anna scoffed, read the words again, then dug her top teeth into her bottom lip and set her thumbs to typing.

Anna: Do not make me take back my gratitude, sir. I don’t give it out lightly.

Iron: Wouldn’t dream of it. Such an action would be outside my integrity.

He’d accented his point with a cartoon wink floating within the small lemon drop circle of an emoji. That little smiley face siphoned up every last bubble of hot air from within her sails, and any venomous retort she’d been readying died a quick and painful death.

Anna: Didn’t figure you for an emoji guy.

Iron: Now, that has me curious. In the five minutes we’ve spent in each other’s company, what did you figure me as?

Anna: Oh, I don’t know. Someone who travels around the country looking for logs to flip at Highland game festivals. Maybe find a hot dog eating competition or two. Oh, I’ve got it! Someone who operates a crusher. You know those machines that compress cars down for recycling? I bet you’d be really great at running one of those.

Her exuberance once again got the better of her, and as she stared back at the term-paper-sized text she just fired off, her face pinched with embarrassment. Words were her thing, had always been. Clear communication was a hill she’d happily die on and was why she often let her nutrition appointments rattle on for an extra fifteen nonbillable minutes when she wanted to make sure the directions she was imparting were sinking in with the client the way they needed to. And yes, in her mostly solitary lifestyle, she’d learn to perfect the conveyance of her true self through written mediums, with perhaps an unhealthy reliance on adjectives.

But these were texts. Short-form messages. The realm of Ks, brBs, and OMGs.

And she’d just lapsed into purple prose with a total stranger.

Her fingers flew fast and furious over the keys. I didn’t mean to type that much. I know texts are for ? —

Iron interrupted her, answering her paragraph bubble with an impressively sized one of his own.

Iron: First, it’s called the caber toss, and contrary to what you’ve assumed about my physique, I don’t quite have calves athletic enough to pull off a kilt. Second, hot dogs give me indigestion. I’m more of an espresso and biscotti guy. And third, don’t really care for hard hats.

Anna: Because of helmet hair?

She smiled, remembering that his hair had been long enough to pull back into a hair tie, and then immensely relieved that he was playing along with her profuse chats.

Iron: Because hard hats aren’t foolproof, and I like to look at the margins.

Anna: What the heck does that even mean?

Iron: It means that even the safest bets come with risk, and I’m risk averse.

Anna: Ah. Is that why you’re so offended by my car’s lack of brake pad thickness?

She’d meant it as a quip, a light shot across the bow that would keep this surprisingly buoyant conversation from swapping places with the mildly mounting worry over what she would do when this tête-à-tête eventually ended. Of the sleep that would ultimately claim her and spit her out into a dawn full of snow and uncertainty. But when Iron didn’t immediately respond, a new concern shot ice water through her veins, shocking the vibrant enjoyment the universe had seen fit to give her into just another memory.

When his words returned, they forced her lungs to hold back her breath of relief.

Iron: Do you have anyone to help you?

The question cast a shadow of promises that had seemed as out of place in her cheerful bedroom as the man’s presence.

Anna: I won’t answer that.

Iron: Why not?

Anna: Safety.

She may have been slightly orgasm-addled from her earlier tub escapades, but that didn’t mean her awareness of what it meant to live life as a thirty-four-year-old single pregnant woman just went by the wayside. And if the man didn’t know that, he wasn’t as?—

Iron: Good.

Her thoughts spun to a complete stop.

Anna: Good?

More dots wiggled across the screen while she waited for an explanation. She’d stared at the damn things so intensely that the little ellipses had begun skewering the corners of her vision. After she’d gnawed off the cuticle of one finger and had gotten to work on a second, she threw the covers off, wrapped them around her shoulders, and padded over to the window in search of something to fill the wait.

Outside, the snow had begun to pick up, falling to the mostly forested ground around her cabin in an even coating of winter’s final regards. Three years ago, nestled among the blanket of blue spruce, sugar maple, and mighty American elm, at the end of a private road that could barely be called such, sat the two-bedroom cabin that had claimed Anna’s heart and dreams. The charming structure, built in 1940, had just enough of its original wood-plank charm preserved, while leaving a reasonable number of starter-home renovations for her to sink her teeth into and make this place her own.

Far enough from nosy neighbors but no more than fifteen minutes away from anything she might need, and with the perfect dappling sunrise poking through verdant evergreens, the cabin had been a secure balm to the turbulent turnstiles of her childhood homes—plural. In the end, she’d begged, and Travis had caved, largely due to his indifference at the time about where he slept, since the Internet buttered their communal bread anyway.

Slowly, over those three years, Travis had had no choice but to acquiesce to her indulgences: butcher block counters, specially mounted shelves to display her cast-iron cookware, and a large picture window overlooking the sloping mountainside that spat her out into civilization whenever she needed it.

A civilization that lately, not to put too fine a point on it, had required far too much of her participation and nowhere near enough grace in return.

The wind howled an echo of loneliness through the trees that mirrored her own, even as she stared down at the phone clenched tightly in her hands. Still no response.

Anna’s teeth met with the snap of every twig succumbing to the storm. It was even more jarring of a hit to realize that her conversation had distracted her entirely from what was happening outside her window. Now that she was in a holding cell, waiting for clarification on a single word from a man she’d barely talked to for five minutes, she was beginning to question her earlier notion of safety.

A booming thud shook the forest around her, shaking free the loose snowfall that had already begun to collect on some of the thicker branches. Anna’s heart leaped into her throat, and her uterus’s tiny tenant performed its own symbiotic dance.

“Crap.”

Anna adjusted her glasses and tapped out what her very cells needed another living organism to hear.

Anna: Something just happened.

The three dots disappeared, and Iron’s response flared hot on the heels of her own.

Iron: Explain. You okay?

Anna: Yeah. I mean, just jittery. A really loud bang sounded outside my property. Shook a bunch of trees around my house. Wind’s picking up. Got a little spooked.

Another pause, and just when she thought he was going to ghost her response again, more of his words filled her small screen.

Iron: If someone, a male who you don’t know well, for instance, but who, so far, has a perfect track record for inquiring after your well-being, would like to inquire further, how might he do that so as not to appear . . .

She smiled, instantly seeing where his thoughts were going.

Anna: Like a multiconvicted felon on his way to his fifth parole hearing for charges of repeated sexual assaults and that one time he tried to fuck a cored pineapple at a Fourth of July barbecue in front of the kiddos?

Iron: That was . . . oddly specific.

Anna: What can I say? I have a very vivid imagination. I’m also pretty sure I’m the only millennial who still watches Dateline.

Iron: A woman who loves her murder shows. Noted.

That and home shopping. I like to keep it on when— Another crack farther down the mountain sent a shudder through the cabin, stalling her response. The small night-light she kept plugged into her hallway outlet dipped before reigniting with the more muted glow from the thing’s puny battery backup. Around her, the dinosaur oil heat furnace wound down, churning to a standstill and taking the heat along with it.

Anna: Shit. Power just went out.

Her text screen vanished, then was filled with Iron’s name, practically amplifying the force of her phone’s meager vibrating ringtone.

She answered before the first ring had ended. “Hi.”

“Tree went down?”

“I guess so. I lose power a bunch where I am. I have a generator. Once the sun’s up, I’ll head back to the . . .”

The string of curses flitted through Anna’s mind as she realized just where the hell her generator was stored and how her very pregnant and sciatica-prone body would not be able to safely drag that thing from the shed to her house where she could connect it to the transfer switch, let alone hobble back in the snow to get the can of gasoline.

Crap. She was supposed to check the oil levels in the generator after the last storm they had. That was . . . mid-February? Was that when one of her neighbors much farther down the mountain had helped her haul the thing to her house and set it up? No, there had been a storm since then, right? But then why didn’t she remember when she filled up the gas can last?

“You okay? Anna?”

“Yeah, I just had to readjust some things in my head, that’s all.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means that, given the snow, I don’t think it’ll really be worth it to lug the generator out. Besides, Aurora’s so well-prepared. I’m sure the power will be back on by the morning anyway. I could just?—”

“Where’s your generator?”

“It’s . . . on property.”

“This isn’t fucking Disney World, Anna. The storm’s about to get a shit ton worse before it gets better. Can you access your generator or not?”

“At the moment? Not.”

A long hard pause plunged their conversation into a fathomless silence. Finally, Iron said, “Please, tell me where you are. I can get to you, get you hooked up and comfortable before things get really bad.”

“I’m not sure that’s such a good?—”

“Please, Anna.” A painful angst hardened the edges of his words, and it caught her off guard, but then the lightness she imagined coating his earlier texts returned. “Hey, perfect track record, remember?”

Oh, she remembered.

Anna shook her head and looked to the stormy sky for answers, but the damn thing was too busy causing problems.

With a shaky sigh that did a piss-poor job of hiding her trepidation, she told him where she lived.

And hoped like hell she hadn’t just made the biggest mistake of her life.