Cam dropped her lantern and took a step back, hoping he was only a pile of clothes and camping gear lined up in the illusion of a human shape. But he wore a deer skull attached to a ski mask over his face, and she didn't own anything like that. The intruder took a slow step toward her.

A series of questions withered on the way from thought to speech: Who are you? How did you get in? What are you doing here? Cam blinked back tears as her hand drifted to her stomping heart. He reached into his pocket, and she asked herself who would be the one to find her body, if it was ever to be found. He pulled out a chef’s knife from her own kitchen. It once belonged to Jim Carlos, three houses down on the left, who had hoped aloud that his purchase of ceramic knives wasn’t too silly as he passed this old steel set along to Cam. Please, she thought, don’t let Jim find out it was his knife.

And Birch. Kind, gentle, wonderful Birch. They would be devastated when she died.

Anger brought Cam to her senses. Her knife was still in her pocket, but he could end her before she even finished reaching for it. She needed to find skin. Get his DNA under her fingernails. In between her teeth, even.

His work boots, canvas pants, leather trucker jacket, and leather gloves— all black— left his neck and wrists the only options. His neck seemed the easier target.

Cam had never so much as pushed a person before. It looked as though she’d have to make the first move, too. He’d been motionlessly staring at her since he drew the knife. This was exactly what he wanted, wasn’t it? He stood at least a foot over her, his build suggesting formidable strength. Her fighting back would probably be funny to him.

He slowly cocked his head to the right, provoking her to act. Even as Cam eyed what little of his bare throat she could find, instinct took over, and she said:

“John.”

Partway through tilting his head the other way, he paused. Cam slid without forethought or reason into her work persona, calm overcoming her, her every sense locked onto him.

“Tell me about John.”

He gave no response.

“I didn’t expect you at this time,” she went on. “Did something happen?”

She kept her eyes on the black sockets of the deer skull. Could he even see her? Perhaps he hadn’t fully taken in her initial reaction of numb terror.

“Why don’t you have a seat?” Cam stepped to the side, giving herself what little distance she could from him without giving away her fear, and held an arm out toward the couch. When he didn’t move, she folded her hands together and looked at him with a kind of sympathetic concern. “Dear, did you think you found the spare key? I left it there for you.”

The window had been locked and intact. The door, too. Her spare key was the most likely explanation for how he could have gotten inside. Still, it was a bigger leap than she would dream of taking with a client.

If she could only get a feel for what he was thinking. See his eyes, his mouth. But then, once she saw his face, it would all be over. He’d kill her for certain.

“I’m sorry,” Cam said. “I thought you knew. What’s happening today isn’t what you think. You’re here at the behest of something beyond the understanding of ordinary people. This is the most important day of your life.”

She had to pause as panic took the form of rage, as she fought the urge to scream at him to just say or do something. Still he stood there, knife in hand. Cam told herself to stop thinking about what she didn’t have— his expression, voice, word choices, gestures— and focus on what she did.

His smell. It might have been the heavy jacket he wore, though she hoped it was nerves. He’d been sweating.

His breathing. He was taking long, slow, measured breaths. The mask likely impeded him to some extent.

His posture. He looked unnatural in his fixed position. She guessed he was standing straighter than normal. The slight awkwardness about him unnerved her; it was grotesque to consider the possibility of being murdered by a man who lacked the confidence to carry himself comfortably.

But she had a baseline to work from now. Cam broke the silence she’d both needed and despised.

“It’s the most important moment of my life, too. You might decide not to listen to a word I say. I honestly don’t know if the forces that brought us together would interfere if you decided to use that knife, but I doubt they would. I think it’s up to you to decide what happens next.” Cam nodded as though he had said something.

She wasn’t following any specific plan yet, only casting out lines and watching for signs of a catch. The main thing, as with every other asshole Cam had known, was to avoid any implication that he wasn’t in complete control of the situation.

“I’ve always believed in a combination of fate and free will, myself. Paths are laid out and presented to us, if we are receptive enough to perceive them, but we retain the right to choose whether or not to follow.”

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She tapped one finger on the back of her hand.

“In a way, this is how you’ve lived your life. You make your own choices, but sometimes, you go with the flow and see where things take you.”

Something happened. Something changed. On the next inhale, he held his breath for a few seconds.

“I would like to invite you to take a moment and consider what I’ve told you so far. Take your time. I’m going to make myself comfortable—“

As she shifted her weight, he raised the knife by a few inches. Cam held up her palms and slipped out of one heeled sneaker. Running, if it came to that, would be easier without them. She waited for any sign of retaliation before kicking off her other shoe. In spite of the threat, she couldn’t help feeling relieved that he’d finally moved.

Her hands automatically folded again.

“We’re here for such a short time. Sometimes the possibilities contained within even a single moment are overwhelming. How can we know what to do at any given opportunity, when we don’t even know what we can do?”

Cam tapped her hand again.

“You have an advantage here, of course. You know there’s something more to you than most people. Sometimes it seems like others can sense it, too. That knowledge alone opens doors to you that no one else can so much as perceive.”

With minimal, imperceptible movement, Cam cracked the knuckle of her left big toe twice. His hand twitched.

“They want to open communication with you. Will you answer?”

She had to strain to hear his breathing. Likely he was doing the same— listening intently, quieting his breath to better hear. She cracked her toe twice more. The knife sank at his side.

Cam considered her options. He was distracted now, far more vulnerable to attack. She could try to get the knife. Her odds of surviving a direct physical confrontation would never climb high enough for comfort, but how long could she keep this up?

When a fresh wave of panic crested, Cam put to work a coping mechanism she’d learned from Birch. She moved through each of her senses to observe, but not react to, what she was experiencing.

Sight: a flicker of movement in the deer skull eye socket that might have been a blink.

Smell: his sweat had faded to the background, though she had not gone noseblind to it yet.

Touch: the weight of her phone still in her pocket.

Sound: her refrigerator working its way up from a buzz to a groan.

Taste: nothing now, and perhaps nothing ever again, unless she ended up with his blood in her mouth.

Cam gave him a thoughtful look. “While you’re deciding, do you mind if I get something to eat?”

She side-stepped toward the bag of food Spencer bought for her. Toward the front door. No response. Cam turned so that she faced him, put her hands in her sweater pocket, took another step back. And another.

He took one step forward and raised the knife in one motion, then plunged it into the arm of her sofa.

Jaw clenched, Cam raised her head defiantly. She let her rage slip into her expression. It was likely what he wanted, but she couldn’t help herself. Cam switched her gaze over to her windowsill hammock.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Cam spoke to the empty space. “He isn’t listening.” She shook her head at unheard words. “Give him more time. Better yet, give him a reason to believe me.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him pull the knife from the sofa.

“I already asked him about John. I don’t think he knows the significance yet.”

Having collected herself, Cam met eyes with the deer skull again. “I never introduced myself properly. My name is Cameron, and my friends call me Cam. Like you, I’ve always been different from other people. In my case, I have a certain sense for the unknown. I’ve spent my whole life opening myself to what’s beyond human understanding, and in turn, I have become receptive to the will of the universe. I’ve given myself over to this will so completely that I did not hesitate to let you into my home.”

She took a step toward him.

“Into my life.”

With a steadying breath, she took one hand from her pocket and held it out to him. Her other hand gripped her phone.

“I have woven my life together with yours, and the two are inextricable now. You made that same choice when you came through my door, didn’t you?”

Cam paused as though considering this question herself rather than waiting for an answer.

“We’re rational people. But we know that there’s something a little more to this world than meets the eye.”

Bobbing her outstretched hand in a renewed offer to him, Cam slipped the headphone jack from her phone in her pocket. The bluetooth speaker took over, and Kablevsky’s Cello Concerto No. 1 startled him into looking behind himself; Cam took the split second opportunity to move her knife from her shorts to her sweater pocket.

As he turned to her again, Cam cracked her toe knuckle twice more. It was just loud enough to hear over the music.

With an air of frustration, he walked backwards to her dresser and grabbed the bluetooth speaker. Cam withdrew her hand, placing it into her pocket, feeling out the little pocketknife as much for comfort as to plan. Her spool of fishing line was still in there, too. She began to work a length of thread around the pocketknife, careful not to clack it against her phone.

He found the power button, turned the speaker off, and dropped it. It rolled to the back paw of the bear skin rug. He was challenging her.

Cam smiled sweetly. Whether he realized it or not, he was playing her game now. Ignoring her would have snuffed out the scheme altogether. In acknowledging Cam’s claims— and a rebuttal was just that, acknowledgement— he’d granted her space to reply.

“This is what the spirits love about you. It’s why you were chosen. You aren’t made of the same fearful, meek material as the rest of us. Or maybe you were, once. Maybe you took your human shape into your own hands and remade it into something else. Is it any surprise that you should be recognized and rewarded?”

The line was secure around the pocketknife. She’d unwound plenty of the spool- she hoped. Cam took the pocketknife out and dropped it on the ground between them. She said, “Not that it would have done me any good. But as a show of faith, I disarm myself.”

He stared her down for the entirety of a minute. Ninety beats of Cam’s heart, eighteen breaths, and one prayer to a god she didn’t believe in. At last, he made a move to pick up the pocketknife, and Cam tugged the line back.

It leapt a few inches into the air and landed with a thunk that might as well have been a peel of thunder in the silence of the room. Cam said, “It looks as though the forces that brought us together are even more invested in your participation than I had realized. You’re a very special case, it would seem.”

“What the fuck is going on?” He straightened and stepped back, huffing; he appeared as surprised to have spoken as Cam was to have heard him speak.