Sarah slammed the closet door and ran, but the upstairs hallway had changed. The runner rug now showed five perfect bloody footprints leading toward the attic pull-down stairs, fresh, steaming. The last print was her shoe tread. She hadn’t walked there yet. Her phone buzzed again: another photo from Mike’s number. It was her own terrified face reflected in the hallway mirror, taken from behind her, right now. She spun. Nothing. Just the attic stairs creaking open by themselves, one step at a time, like something invisible was climbing down. A child’s voice sang from above, sweet and off-key: “One more makes five, then we all come alive…” Sarah’s legs went weak. The next stair creaked under weight that wasn’t there. She smelled birthday cake and formaldehyde.
