Page 91 of If You're Reading This

The feeling had intensified to the point where she’d packed up her equipment and left an hour early.

Her bare feet padded across the cabin’s hardwood floors as she moved to the kitchen, automatically checking the locks on both doors. The ritual had become as routine as brushing her teeth.

The kettle whistled just as her phone buzzed with a text from Logan.

How did the shoot go today? Saw some weather moving in from the west.

Morgan smiled despite her jangled nerves.

His messages always had this practical edge, as if checking on the weather was easier than admitting he worried about her spending so much time alone in remote locations.

She typed back quickly.

Finished early. Spring is stubborn this year. It keeps hiding behind winter’s shadows.

His response came almost immediately.

Sounds like a metaphor.

She continued smiling as she replied.

Everything’s a metaphor to a photographer—especially when you’re trying to make sense of things that don’t quite fit together.

Three dots appeared, then disappeared, then appeared again. Finally, words appeared.

Want to talk about it?

Morgan stared at the screen, her thumb hovering over the keyboard.

How could she explain the growing certainty that something was wrong without sounding paranoid? How could she tell Logan about the man at today’s location who’d been sitting in his truck when she arrived and was still there when she left, never getting out, never doing anything but watching?

Instead, she typed:

Raincheck. Long day.

Of course. Get some rest.

She set the phone aside and prepared her evening tea. But she found herself drawn to the living room window that faced the road.

She saw nothing but darkness and the familiar silhouettes of spruce trees swaying in the wind. Still, she pulled the curtains closed with deliberate care.

Her journal lay open on the coffee table where she’d left it that morning, the blank page seeming to mock her inability to process what she couldn’t quite name.

Morgan settled into her reading chair, mug warming her hands, then picked up her pen. Maybe she couldn’t talk to Logan about her fears, but she could write about them.

April 2

If you’re reading this, I’m probably second-guessing myself again. Dr. Winters would say that uncertainty is normal after loss, that hypervigilance is a common response to grief. But it’s been almost five years since Bobby died, and this feels different. More immediate. More personal.

I keep thinking about what Bobby used to say about trusting your gut. “Instincts don’t lie, Morgie,” he’d tell me when I was a teenager, worried about some boy or friend who seemed off. “People might fool your head, but they can’t fool what you feel in your bones.”

Well, my bones are screaming that something’s wrong.

Today at Earthquake Park, there was a man in a truck who stayed in the parking area the entire time I was shooting.

Three hours.

He never got out, never seemed to be doing anything but sitting there.