My finger hovered over Nuha's name.

  It didn't dare press it for a long moment.

  'What was she doing under my desk?'

  I wondered if I was overthinking it.

  Maybe she had simply cleaned my room while I was in the hospital.

  That would explain how my room had remained so spotless despite my absence.

  A sting of guilt pricked me.

  I stayed there, hesitating—

  Should I be suspicious of the new family member?

  Or should I trust her?

  …Until the phone screen went dark.

  My face reflected on the black screen.

  It took me a moment to realize that it was mine.

  Three years older than I remembered.

  Marked with a new shade of madness—the very one I feared.

  'Let's search again…'

  I didn't look at my reflection for long.

  It didn't feel like me.

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  I stood up and checked under the desk again.

  Maybe I had missed another piece of evidence here or there.

  …Something inside me still wasn't at ease.

  Shadows occupied the space beneath the desk, where light couldn't reach.

  So I turned on the flashlight of my new phone and searched carefully in every corner.

  And just as I expected…

  I found nothing.

  …Knock.

  "Haaah—the door again!"

  I was about to get up to open it.

  …No.

  That wasn't the door.

  The knock was—

  Closer.

  …Knock.

  My body froze.

  The sound was directly above my head—on the surface of the desk.

  'Don't turn around. Don't turn around. Don't turn around.'

  Every horror movie I had ever watched flashed through my mind at that exact moment.

  Like an unspoken rule—

  If you turn around, you're dead.

  …Knock.

  The blood drained from my body.

  I remained frozen in place until the synchronized knocks stopped after the third one.

  …There were no more knocks.

  The flashlight trembled in my hand.

  No—

  It wasn't the light that was shaking.

  I lifted it upward, toward where the sound had come from.

  "What… is that?"

  There—

  A few black strands, absorbing the beam of light, hanging down from the underside of the desk—torn, stuck there.

  "Mariam."

  My head hit the underside of the desk again.

  I crawled out from beneath it.

  The voice was familiar.

  It was my mother.

  "Are you okay? You look pale!"

  "I'm… fine."

  "I didn't mean to scare you. I knocked on the door many times, but you didn't answer."

  "…?"

  Which one was real?

  And which one was fake?

  'Could those have been the door knocks? Impossible… they were too close.'

  Maybe because I was under the desk, the sound had been amplified?

  Yes… yes.

  But when my brother earlier—no. No…

  "Mariam?"

  I stopped shaking my head when I saw the worry in my mother's eyes.

  "Mother… may I ask you something?"

  "Of course."

  "Can I sleep with you tonight?"

  "…."

  A gentle dimple appeared on her cheek, like Zain's—but softer.

  She hugged me like a little child.

  For a moment, I felt as if I had awakened from a nightmare.

  I had had enough of this room for today.

  I didn't think I would wake up again if I slept here alone tonight.

  'Should I tell her?

  Or will she call me crazy again?'

  "How about Huda sleeps with you? It'll be a wonderful chance for the two of you to get to know each other better."

  "…."

  My body stiffened in my mother's warm embrace.

  Suddenly, the warmth of her embrace soured. It no longer felt like a sanctuary; it felt like the closing jaws of a trap. The air grew thin, and the name 'Huda' echoed in my mind like the groan of a rusted hinge on a door that should have stayed locked.

  The name "Huda" rang in my ears like the creaking hinge of an old door in an abandoned house.

  I felt the black strand in my pocket—

  As if it had begun to move.

  As if it were laughing at me.