?Everything since she got home felt like an annoying dream. Not a bad one—a bad dream implied emotional consequences. This annoying dream was filled with characters like her mother and this Jill person chirping at her as if she should care. She just ignored whatever lecture they were pushing out and went to her room.

  ?They both made attempts to get to her through the door. Kim just ignored them. In her room, she removed her itchy clothes and just lay down. Her blankets made her equally uncomfortable, but she was finally able to rest when she spread out her leather jacket and curled up on it in a ball. She fell asleep when the chirping stopped.

  ?As night came, Kim's instincts came alive. The moon would be full soon. Maybe one or two more days. How she knew this she wasn't sure, but she crawled out of her window with her leather jacket to sit on the roof and bathe in the moonlight. It felt warm on her body. Like its very presence filled her with life.

  ?Suddenly, her mind turned to Sam. Or the creature that appeared to be her. Because her brain wouldn't let her believe she was human. Or even really Sam.

  ?Kim tried to repress the image, but it stuck with her for a while, her mind confidently asserting that Sam was a thing. And there was a certain pull to find her. To kill her.

  ?Kim wasn't generally given to thoughts of homicide. She should've found them disturbing, but ultimately, Kim didn't care. She watched the thoughts like a TV show you have on for background noise while you scroll your phone. Eventually, they passed.

  ?Reaching in her jacket pocket, she found her phone. It had been among her possessions when she left the hospital. Someone had charged it for her—probably one of the chirping ladies from her annoying dream. She had put it in her pocket when she came up to the roof, but she didn't have the strength, or frankly the interest, to look through it. The weird lights and noises it made all felt unnatural. But the worst part was the three hundred-plus unread messages. And those were just text messages; that didn't count Snapchat and Instagram. She was a girl who would never have characterized herself as "chronically online," but in the light of the moon, it looked almost like a leash that people could use to yank her attention to them on their terms. She wanted none of it. She ended up just tossing it nonchalantly off the roof.

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  ?As she did, a foul scent rose from the far side of the house. Intrigued, she walked over to the part of the roof where she could smell it most clearly.

  ?From her perch, she could hear Jill's voice coming through the roof.

  ?"It's three in the morning," Jill hissed.

  ?"Of course it's three in the morning!" an annoyed female voice responded. Strangely it didn't sound mechanical. More like someone was in the room with her. "This is the only time I had the power to reach out."

  ?"You don't have email where you are?"

  ?"Quite," the voice said dryly. "Is your room warded?"

  ?"No. Why would it be? It's three in the damn morning!" Jill cursed.

  ?"Ward your room. We need to talk, and we can't take any chances."

  ?"It's not even the first full moon. She’s asleep." Something happened to cause the smell of fear to reach Kim. Then silence. "Fine!" was the last thing she could hear Jill say.

  ?When Kim looked up at the moon again, the realization hit her. She was standing naked on her roof. Listening to calls from the inside. And smelling things. Everything.

  ?"What's happening to me?" she muttered to herself as she slumped down onto her jacket. Was she hearing voices? Was she going insane? Or had she always been insane and was only now going sane? It was hard to tell.

  ?"God… Jesus… Mary… somebody…" she prayed, mustering up whatever holy-sounding language she could call on from her pseudo-Catholic upbringing. "Please help me. I don’t know what I did to deserve this. I tried to be good." Tears started to flow. "I try to do the right things. And now I’m… this. Please deliver me from evil, okay? Or whatever it is you do. I can’t do this alone. Amen… or whatever."

  ?She cried a bit before curling back onto her leather jacket to sleep.