3AM

02.1

With a groan, she took the glass of juice with her to the bathroom, where she turned on the shower. The water, heated by a boiler that must have been designed by someone with a sadistic streak, came out scalding, fogging up the shower and mirror almost instantly. Taking another sip of juice, she started unbuttoning her flannel pajamas, ready to wash away the day’s sweat and grime—and maybe, just maybe, regain some semblance of humanity. Maybe it was arrogance to think he was aware of her dreams. Perhaps Charles’s true intention was solely to drive her out of there through mind games and tricks that felt like hallucinations. After all, who was she kidding, he had been as clear as day.

Hidden beneath that fabric, a body full of curves was revealed. Anne Walch’s arms were slender and long, with delicate shoulders and prominent collarbones, in an elegant way that highlighted her shoulder blades. Her round, ample breasts complemented her delicate ribs and slender waist, which moved as she walked around the bathroom. She let her hair down, which cascaded down her white back, reaching her lower back in waves of deep brown, a stark contrast to her pale skin.

She untied the drawstring holding her sweatpants, and the garment fell to the floor. Her legs were long and shapely, her muscles not toned, so the delicate, youthful appearance remained. Though alcohol was ravaging her skin and organs over the years, she still appeared, outwardly, to possess some semblance of health.

The writter took another sip of the juice, watching the steam fill the entire bathroom. She was tired. Anne needed that bath to rid herself of the nauseating smell and the pain that had taken hold of her back.

With an exhausted sigh, Anne slipped off the white lace panties, letting them fall to the floor.

Naked, she wandered back to the bedroom, reaching for the brandy stashed in the nightstand drawer. A long, defiant swig followed as she savored the burn, bottle in hand, before heading back to the bathroom. She took three more swigs before stepping into the shower.

In a way, Walch was committing suicide.

The hot water hit her pale skin until it turned red, relaxing her muscles. She washed her hair and body, taking some time to soothe every aching inch and let herself be carried away by the daydreams that, even without admitting it, had motivated her all day.

The fear, the grief, and the drunkenness intensified and, at the same time, blurred everything. A short while later, the writer was focused on combing through her tangled hair as she walked down the hallway toward the attic.

The late afternoon was approaching when she arrived up there and saw how the light hit the bed she had spent the entire day assembling. A warm feeling took over. The hairbrush slid through her strands as her bare feet carried her to the bed. She sat on it, leaving the brush aside to pick up the box from the nightstand.

Anne opened it, revealing an old perfume bottle. It had belonged to her grandmother, then her mother, and now… It was her time to keep it. Collecting dust somewhere, u ntill that day.

Her grandfather, a Turkish perfumer, had crafted the glass of the bottle, the silver clasp, the straw, and the sprayer. A true master of the art of enchanting the woman he loved, he had gifted her with a unique and secret fragrance. Her grandfather had filled that bottle with a scent that said more than anything else about his honest feelings for Zara, her grandmother, until the day of her death.

Arut died first, but Zara passed away three days later. People said her grandmother had died of a broken heart.

The truth? That little bottle had been a solid memory of her bond with Daisy, her mother, since she had passed, and it must have been the same with Zara when Anne’s grandmother died.

She lay down on the bed, thinking of her mother.

Daisy Walch had given birth to three girls and a boy. First came Samantha, then Jordan, Anne, and then Eliza.

Anne’s blue eyes slowly closed, and she was thinking about the real reason she had rented that house when she fell asleep. But Anne didn’t dream of anything. She just rested, a necessary rest that felt cradled by an extremely cozy bed and a delightful warmth that contrasted with the cold outside.

When she opened her eyes, she was lying in the bed she had spent all day assembling. Her breathing suddenly quickened, cutting through the sound of the wind coming through the open windows. Anne sat up in bed, a nervousness taking over her spirit, and she had to stretch her neck and close her eyes, breathing deeply to get up.

She closed the windows. It was night. Her stomach churned.

The damn thirst was coming, sooner or later, crushing.

Anne descended the stairs, turning on all the lights as she moved through the house, and turned on the outside lights as well, swallowing hard. She returned to the kitchen just to grab the first bottle on the counter and drink until she couldn’t stand the burn anymore. She pulled the bottle away with flames shooting out of her nostrils and even teared up as the bitter taste of brandy filled her tongue.

With the fatigue under control, she glanced at the clock, and realizing it was two-forty in the morning, her fingers tightened around that bottle. Her heart raced as Charles’s voice echoed in her mind. Every hair on her body stood on end, and the brunette shook herself off like a wet dog. She mustered the courage to walk to the front door, and when she stepped outside, Anne lit a cigarette and leaned against the doorframe. She would never sleep through the night again. It was as if her brain was being reprogrammed to wake up at three in the morning or close to it.

She couldn’t think too much. If she did, she’d end up in a mental institution. He was a ghost. A fact, not a hallucination. She had made an offer to postpone her murder so she could write one last book, setting aside the fact that that book basically summed up her encounters with Charles.

Feeling the cold of the early morning embrace her body, she inhaled the air that smelled of wet earth, grass, moss, and wood. Life in the countryside wasn’t just silence. It was a storm of sensations, aromas, and visions.

Anne held the cigarette between her teeth and took a deep breath. Even if she clung to a single and probably very weak thread of lucidity, it was the only thing she had. The vague feeling that she still had some control over her own life. But the truth was that she had been in a spiral of fire and defeat for so long that she no longer knew how to distinguish the bad from the worse.

She smoked that entire cigarette as the drinks she had taken earlier were absorbed by her system and closed the door, going back inside. She felt her muscles tensing again as she climbed the stairs to the second floor.

Was this what they called a haunting? Charles was haunting her.

Manipulating.

Those dreams haunted her—the faceless man who always remained just out of sight, his presence a blend of searing heat and bone-chilling cold. The scents lingered, intoxicating and dangerous, never letting her glimpse his eyes. Yet, deep down, she knew. It was him. The same man she found herself waiting for now, heart pounding in anticipation and dread. A terrifying shiver ran down her spine, so intense that when the alarm clock blared through the house, its sound felt like a bolt of lightning striking her.

Anne stopped in the hallway leading to the attic as the shrill sound overwhelmed the house. Her heart now beat in a morbid rhythm.

Was it fear?

Nothing happened. He didn’t come as she thought he would, appearing in the air like a mirage, a hallucination. Maybe that was it.

Maybe there was nothing.

After all, physical hallucinations were just that. Seeing what didn’t exist. Feeling what didn’t exist. Hearing what didn’t exist.

Maybe she was going crazy.

The writer swallowed hard, taking slow steps down the hallway until she reached the silent staircase leading to the attic. The sound of the clock echoed in the distance, and nothing else could be heard by the woman’s keen ears as she placed her left foot on the first step, unsure if she had the courage to take the next.

The wood groaned beneath her feet, echoing the haunting memory of the dream she had in the very room she now approached. As she reached the second step, a cold dread clawed at her, but with a sudden surge of reckless courage, Anne skipped the third, leaping from the fourth to the sixth. Fear had no place here; she had to confront it, to understand it… to apologize before it was too late.

“Stop apologizing.”

A faint wave of tranquility washed over Anne as the door creaked open. The moment she stepped into the attic, a gust of wind tousled her hair, sending goosebumps racing across her skin. The scent of lavender hung in the air—a smell that hadn’t been there before. The wind, too, was new, despite her clear memory of shutting the windows.

The room was noticeably colder. Her gaze landed on the empty bed, but it took less than a second to spot him, standing by the last window, where the horizon had held her gaze just the day before.

The tall figure stared out into the night, and as soon as he was noticed, Charles turned, his black eyes catching the moonlight filtering through the glass. Goosebumps prickled her skin, an uneasy silence filling the space between them, tension thick enough to choke on.

“What you’ve done to this place… is unforgivable.”

The words froze Anne in place. His voice, so different—cold, hollow, void of life—sent a sharp pain twisting in her stomach.

Eyes wide, fear trembling through her, she tried to mask it with a stammered, “I… thought you’d like having a bed.”

“I only have an hour in this world; do you think I’ll spend it sleeping? Are you out of your mind?” His words, icy and sharp, cut through the air like the bitterest English winter. Lips tightened into a thin line, disappointment biting at her.

“Sorry,” was all she could manage, but before another breath could be drawn, Charles materialized inches away, forcing a startled step back. The cold clung to him like a shadow, seeping into her bones and leaving her breathless. Let’s adjust that first part:

Her heart pounded in her chest, each beat echoing the rising tension, but she refused to let fear win, to let him see the panic creeping into her every move.

“I told you to stop apologizing.” Charles’s voice was a menacing growl, more a threat than a request.

The chill of his presence was unbearable, but she couldn’t help but mutter, "You could at least show some gratitude..."

It was always like this. Ever since she was young, she’d been known for not letting anything go, for never backing down from a fight. Sure, the drink had turned her into someone who avoided people and conflict, even if it meant apologizing when she wasn’t wrong. But old habits die hard.

“Gratitude?” His voice dripped with sarcasm. “For cramming this place with furniture? As if I were some bug trapped in a matchbox!”

The ridiculousness of it all was almost too much. "Well, excuse me for not knowing your interior design preferences, Mr. ‘I Only Have an Hour to Haunt’! Next time, I’ll just leave the bed out for the raccoons. And, guess what, I did that because you also live here!” she growled back, stamping her foot. She was drunk, and unlike all the other times, suddenly, looking for a fight.

Her blue eyes glared into his black ones, and they locked in a battle of stares for a full minute until Anne’s teeth began chattering uncontrollably. She would need a lot more brandy to kill the cold. It felt like standing naked in a freezer, counting the seconds until she froze solid.

“I tried to glue the pieces of the flasks I found, but I couldn’t,” the tone was one of pure defeat, and at the same time, absolute rage, “So, I left the damn perfume bottle that belonged to my grandmother…. my mother gave it to me after my first overdose. Why the hell do you have to be such a monumental prick? I mean, a bastard. No, scratch that, a real f*****g asshole! I mean… You get it, right?!”

Anne swallowed hard in the funereal silence. He was staring at her so intently, and even so, she couldn’t decipher even a sliver of what was going through Charles’s mind. He gave no hints, no expression other than a naturally menacing demeanor.

With her breath caught in her throat as the seconds dragged on and began to cover her with invisible shovelfuls of dirt, she decided to start that conversation over.

“I’m trying to make this f****d-up situation work, trying to share a goddamn roof with you, which is already insane, and you’re not making it any easier, are you?” she hissed, the frustration and booze making her bolder than she’d ever be sober. “I’m freezing my ass off, pissed as hell, and if you keep this s**t up, I swear I’ll drag in a priest or whatever the hell it takes to exorcize your sorry ass and send you straight out of MY house!” The words tumbled out, reckless and fueled by the alcohol coursing through her veins. She hated being bossed around, and right now, Charles was looking at her like he owned not just the house, but her too. His presence was suffocating. “If you think I’m some scared little girl, you’re dead f*****g wrong!” And after two seconds of facing that same stare, she saw her own courage begin to vanish. Walch held her breath, as the absolute silence stoked her fears and every sensation that seemed to surface in his restricted presence.

For a split second, Anne felt an overwhelming sense of self-loathing. She was brave, but to what extent? How far was it safe to be fearless? She couldn’t shake the growing certainty that Charles harbored a deep disdain for her, as if every glance he cast her way was laced with contempt.

It wasn’t just that he didn’t like her; it was the unsettling realization that whatever humanity he might possess was overshadowed by a darkness far more potent than any flicker of kindness. His soul, if he had one at all, seemed to be a battleground where malevolence held the upper hand, leaving little room for anything but the cold, calculating edge of his nature. Her breath turned to vapor, but his didn’t.

“Because Charles is cold inside too”, was the thought that crossed her mind.

“My chin is trembling,” she whispered, her movements paralyzed by the icy atmosphere.

"That's because you're dangerously close... to me." Charles's lips barely moved, the words slipping out with a chilling detachment. He watched with a burning intensity as the fine hairs on Anne’s arms slowly rose, reacting to his presence like a whisper against her skin. It was a sight so simple, yet so profoundly captivating that it nearly stopped him in his tracks. The way her body responded, so instinctively, so vulnerably, sent a shiver through him that he hadn’t anticipated. His black eyes traced the path from her trembling arms back to her gaze, and in that moment, it was as if the world around him dissolved into nothing.

This wasn’t just tension—it was a raw, electric current that crackled between them, igniting something deep within him that he had never felt before. Every breath she took seemed to pull him closer, each flutter of her pulse was like a drumbeat in the silence. For the first time, he was acutely aware of the space between them, a fragile boundary that could be crossed with the slightest move, a boundary that both thrilled and terrified him.

Her skin, so close, seemed to radiate a warmth that he could almost feel, despite the coldness that usually enveloped him. The delicate rise of the hairs on her arms was like a beacon, drawing him in, making him question everything he thought he knew about himself. He had seen fear before, had thrived on it, but this was different. This was something he couldn’t quite grasp—an inexplicable pull, an undeniable desire to close the distance, to feel that warmth against him, to see if her body would respond the same way when he touched her.

He suppressed an overwhelming urge to play tricks on her.

Scare her as he had done with all the previous occupants before Anne.

The memory of his mouth pressed against hers wouldn’t leave his mind.

“You’re close to me,” came the nervous reply. The woman took a step back, drunk, stumbling but unable to tear her eyes away from the man before her. “You’re the one intruding on my house… And threatening me!” She stomped one foot on the ground, suddenly determined to make Charles understand exactly who was in charge here. “All I did was apologize for breaking your home.” She was struggling to keep her tone calm, but she couldn’t help it; before she knew it, her lips were trembling, and it wasn’t from the cold anymore. “I spent the entire day dismantling a bed, piece by piece, dragging those damned things up here like I was in some kind of twisted home improvement show. I actually thought this was the perfect way to get along with the ghost—yes, the ghost—who’s decided to make himself at home in my house! But oh, silly me!” Anne’s voice was sharp, each word dripping with the kind of biting sarcasm that could cut glass.

She fixed Charles with a glare that could wither flowers. “You, instead of, I don’t know, saying 'thanks' or maybe, just maybe, realizing that I’m going out of my way to make this insane situation work, decide to tell me that what I did was unforgivable. Un-for-giv-able! Like I just violated some sacred ghost code or something.”