Morning came, but Elena felt as though she had never truly slept. When the first beams of light spilled through her curtains, she blinked against them, her body heavy, her mind knotted with fragments of the night before.
The memory wasn't a dream. She could still feel the ghost of his touch against her cheek, the icy burn of his fingers, and the way her body had leaned toward him even as her mind screamed no.
She shook herself free of the thought and forced her legs over the side of the bed. "It was just fear," she muttered aloud. "Fear and exhaustion. That's all."
But even as she said it, the lie stung her tongue.
Downstairs, the house smelled of coffee. Her mother was at the counter, scrolling through her phone, while the kettle whistled sharply.
"You're up late," her mother said without looking up.
Elena poured herself a mug, her hands trembling slightly as she did. "Couldn't sleep."
"You're always restless around the full moon," her mother mused absently, as if it were a harmless quirk, not an omen. "Too much energy, maybe."
Elena nearly choked on her coffee. If only you knew.
She busied herself with small tasks throughout the morning—folding laundry, helping her younger brother with homework, walking to the market for bread. It was all so normal, so unbearably ordinary, and yet she carried the weight of last night's encounter with her like a shadow clinging to her heels.
Every face she passed seemed too bright, too alive. The sunlight was almost cruel in its cheerfulness, making the terror she'd felt under the moon seem impossible. Unreal. But when she brushed her hair back from her neck, she swore she could still feel his breath lingering there, cool as winter air.
By afternoon, she sat beneath the oak tree in her family's yard, a book open but unread in her lap. The words blurred, replaced by his voice echoing in her mind: "Your heartbeat could wake the dead."
She pressed a hand to her chest, as though she might muffle it. Why had he said that? Why had he known her name?
"Elena!" Her brother's shout startled her. He ran across the grass, grinning, holding a paper plane above his head. "Race you to the porch!"
She forced a smile and stood, chasing after him. For a fleeting moment, she let herself laugh, let the sunlight soak into her skin. But when the shadow of the tree stretched across the grass, dark and long, she shivered.
Daylight dulled the memory, but it couldn't erase it. As the sun dipped lower and the sky began to bruise with twilight, Elena's stomach tightened with dread—and something far more dangerous.
Because she knew, deep down, that if the stranger returned beneath the moonlight, she wouldn't run.