3:33

Chapter 4: The Middle of the Night

Mateo couldn't sleep. Not even for a second. He lay sprawled on the living room couch, staring up at the ceiling while the house settled into its nighttime rhythm around him.

Eloise had headed to bed without so much as a goodnight, and Ivy was tucked away in her room—hopefully knocked out after he'd talked her into taking some kid-friendly melatonin.

His phone lit up: 3:32 AM. No texts, no missed calls. The only sounds were the fridge humming away and the occasional car whooshing by outside.

Then at 3:33 AM, he heard it. Scratching.

Coming from upstairs. From Ivy's room.

Before he even knew what he was doing, Mateo shot up from the couch.

He took the stairs three at a time, his heart hammering so hard he thought it might explode. The scratching got louder—wild, frantic. Like something with claws was desperately trying to tear through wood, trying to get out. Or get in.

He threw open Ivy's door.

She was sitting straight up in bed, wide awake, her eyes locked on the wall. The scratching was coming from behind her bookshelf, hidden under that cheery flower wallpaper Eloise had spent all weekend putting up when they'd first moved in.

"Ivy—" he started, his voice tight.

"You hear it too?" she interrupted, her voice weirdly flat. She didn't even glance at him. "It's here. Just like I told you."

Mateo's ears weren't lying. That sound—fingernails on wood, scraping, clawing—was real.

His mind scrambled for normal explanations: old houses make noise, maybe mice in the walls, could be raccoons up in the attic. All perfectly reasonable. But his gut? His gut was screaming that something was very, very wrong.

He crossed to the bookshelf and pressed his ear against the wall. Nothing. Total silence. Then boom—the scratching started up again.

"See?" he said, pulling back, trying to keep his voice steady. "It's probably just..."

But the scratching got louder. Angrier. And underneath it—like someone breathing through a mask—he could hear breathing.

"Daddy," Ivy whispered, her voice shaking. "Please make it stop."

Mateo grabbed the bookshelf—just a basic white IKEA thing stuffed with picture books and teddy bears—and yanked hard.

It stuck at first, so he pulled harder, wincing at the awful scrape of wood on floor.

Then he saw it.

Behind the bookshelf, the wallpaper wasn't torn exactly—more like peeled back, as if something had clawed through from inside the wall.

Under the paper, lit by Ivy's nightlight, he could make out old, dark wood. Weird wood that didn't match anything else in the house. And carved right into it was something that made his blood run cold: a spiral with seven eyes.

The scratching stopped. The breathing stopped. Everything went dead quiet.

Mateo just stood there, staring at that carved symbol. His brain was working overtime—how the hell did this get here? Who'd been in Ivy's room? But here's what really didn't add up: this house was built in '98.

These walls should've been drywall and insulation—not old wood. And carvings? No way.

"Ivy," he managed, his voice tight. "Has anyone been in your room? Anyone you don't know?"

"No," she whispered.

"Any workers? Anyone fixing the walls?"

"No." Her voice was steady, but he could hear the fear underneath.

He paused. Then pointed at the spiral's eyes. "Did someone draw those? Are those eyes... moving?"

And then they blinked.

All seven of them. At the same time.

Mateo stumbled backward, nearly falling over the bookshelf. His logical brain was screaming that carved eyes don't blink. Can't blink. That he must be seeing things. But deep down? He knew what he'd seen.

Those eyes had definitely blinked.

Every single one.

He grabbed Ivy's hand, gripping it tight. "We're leaving. Right now. Get your shoes."

"Where are we going?" Her voice was tiny.

"I don't know. Somewhere else. Anywhere that's not here," Mateo said, already pulling her toward the door.

They'd almost made it out when Eloise appeared in the doorway, her hair a mess, nightgown hanging crooked.

Her face went white when she saw everything—the peeled wallpaper, that carved symbol with its impossible blinking eyes.

"Oh my God," she gasped.

"We're leaving," Mateo said again, his voice rough.

She hesitated. "We can't just—"

"Yes, we can, and we are. Grab a bag. We're going to a hotel. Leave everything else!"

His voice bounced off the walls, shutting down any argument. For a second, nobody moved. Then Eloise nodded quickly and rushed to their bedroom.

Mateo kept hold of Ivy's hand, his eyes locked on that symbol. The eyes—those awful, blinking eyes—stayed still this time. But Mateo could feel them. Watching. Waiting.

Twenty minutes later, they threw their bags in the car and tore off into the dark morning. Mateo drove without thinking, just trying to put as much distance as possible between his family and whatever that thing was back at the house.

At 4:17 AM, his phone rang. Unknown number.

He almost let it go to voicemail. But something made him pick up.

"Dr. Cross?" The voice was calm, professional. "This is Detective Sarah Reeves with Boston PD. Sorry to call so early, but I need to ask you about your daughter—the one named Aurora."