A shadow hunched near the tree line.
Rain slid through the shape instead of around it, rivulets tracing the outline of a small boy whose features refused to settle. The figure leaned out from behind a trunk with quiet curiosity, testing whether anyone watched from the open path.
Cole felt eyes on him long before he reached the pavilion.
Stormlight washed across the Alexandria skyline, colors bleeding over the water in drifting reds, blues, and yellows—wet watercolor dragged by the Potomac's slow pull. Light fought the darkness while the river swallowed each reflected glow.
Pressure gathered between his shoulders. A watcher followed his steps. The sensation crept across his neck as he moved along the gravel path toward the pavilion.
Regret joined him on the walk. He carried no jacket, no umbrella, only the need to say goodbye before dawn uprooted the life he built here.
Jones Point Park had carried him through harder nights. Childhood memories lived in the wet grass and scattered stones along the shore. Alex and he once begged their mother to bring them after school. They raced barefoot until their legs burned, hid beneath the lighthouse, and skipped rocks until their fingers stiffened from cold.
Their mother waited on a bench with a thermos tucked between steady hands, smile soft, eyes worn, posture tight with readiness. She kept herself positioned to rise fast—prepared to gather them and walk them home in a heartbeat.
The pavilion roof rose ahead while rain hammered the metal in relentless rhythm. He stepped beneath the shelter, boots splashing through a shallow puddle before concrete steadied him. Storm-noise swallowed the hum of highway traffic and the distant rattle of trains cutting through the night.
Air cooled around him. Sound bounced off steel supports and folded into dense layers beneath the roof.
His hand swept water from his face. Curls sprang across his forehead, stubborn under the rain's weight. His neck prickled again.
Someone waited here.
This presence carried sharper intent than normal awareness. Focus pressed into the base of his neck with pinpoint precision, as if a small hand rested there.
"You can stop hiding," he said. His voice shrank under the storm. "I feel you."
Stillness held.
The river slapped against the dock with slow force, boards groaning as currents shifted beneath them. Wet leaves offered sweet rot beneath the storm's churn. A branch snapped deeper in the trees, brittle under wind.
Cole moved farther under the roof and eased down a support beam until he sat on cold concrete. His knees rose. His fingers locked together until knuckles paled.
Silence settled between thunderbeats.
He listened.
A dim pressure brushed the edge of his awareness. The sensation matched the feeling he carried when stepping into a room that others viewed as ordinary—yet he sensed the story hiding beneath everything. Air tilted. Space tightened.
Exhaustion left no room for disbelief. Too many sleepless months and too many grieving faces eroded his skepticism.
He wasn't afraid. Loneliness had left him with nothing left to fear.
The pavilion held a breath. Even the storm softened for a beat.
A soft glide whispered from the beam behind him—something slight brushing wood. Small fingertips traced the post with patient curiosity.
Cold tightened across his back.
Cole ran his thumb along his damp jaw and forced his shoulders to release tension. Morning waited to pull him away from all of this. Movers would arrive early. His landlord in Purgatory expected punctuality. Small towns rejected surprises, and this one tolerated even fewer.
The name always nudged out a humorless laugh. Purgatory. A setting stolen from the opening scene of a low-budget horror film—yet his friend's brochure described a quiet mountain hamlet with fewer than two thousand residents, anchored by a lone stoplight and a main street frozen in the late eighties.
Alexandria delivered the opposite—hundreds of thousands of people living inside a chorus of sirens and traffic.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. He ignored it. Spam or Alex waited on the screen, and neither belonged with him under the storm or within this strange company.
His hand drifted toward the phone before discipline redirected it. He reached for the ring instead.
Years of wear warmed the silver to his skin, though the metal carried a colder bite tonight. The band slid off his knuckle with slight resistance, as though his body tried to keep it.
Celtic knots etched along the surface caught faint city light. Lightning skittered across the pattern and sent a pale streak along the grooves. Cole balanced the ring between his thumb and forefinger, letting it turn once.
Shane's face rose instantly. Sun-bleached strands tumbled across her eyes as she argued with him on their blue tartan blanket. One hand carved punctuation through the air. The other wrapped around his wrist and held him in place.
Failures drifted across their marriage like accumulating snowfall. Missed calls built into silence while he crossed another state line. Anniversaries surrendered to hotel rooms when aides finally agreed to talk. Holiday dinners cooled beside empty chairs while he chased truth through the night.
Fault never belonged entirely to one partner. Shane drifted too. Admitting that carried its own weight.
"Ever been married?" he asked the surrounding shelter.
Ridiculous question. Yet the presence behind him sharpened, attention narrowing.
His mouth opened to ask more. Words choked off. A sound broke the quiet instead—soft, delighted, unmistakable.
A child's giggle brushed the inside of his mind.
Cole froze.
The ring nearly slipped from his grasp. His hand closed around it reflexively. Breath stalled in his chest. His heartbeat hammered loudly enough to drown out the storm.
"That's new," he whispered.
The giggle faded like a signal sliding out of range.
Cole waited. Breath steadied. Trembling eased in his hands.
"I'm not afraid," he said again. "I'm just tired."
Confession softened the pressure in the air. Something leaned nearer—curious, gentle, uncertain.
His eyes stayed fixed forward. Instinct warned him that any sudden turn would snap the fragile connection.
"Tomorrow I'm gone," he said. "A different town and a quieter job. A new direction."
His editor labeled him reckless for resigning from the Alexandria Times. Reporters never abandoned national scoops. Standard career paths demanded book deals, syndicates, momentum.
Cole signed the deals. Nights still refused him sleep. Three empty months marked the cost.
Exposing a presidential candidate for sleeping with teenagers delivered truth at the moment it mattered. Consequences surged afterward—interviews, praise, threats, demands, attention, relentless noise.
Everyone reached for him.
Everyone except Shane. She watched from the couch, mouth locked in that tight line he grew to dread.
"I'm proud of you," she said eventually. "You did the right thing. I just wish doing the right thing didn't always mean losing you."
He promised he would slow down.
Time proved the promise hollow.
A quiet hum traced his spine—the ghost-boy sampling memories he couldn't contain. Cole swallowed, blinked rain from his lashes, and pushed himself to his feet. Concrete chilled the back of his jeans.
"If you're tied to this place," he said, "you chose well. I'll miss it too."
Movement flickered at the pavilion's entrance. A small shape hunched there, darker than the surrounding shadows, fingers curled around the wood without touching it.
"Walk with me," he said.
Rain struck him immediately once he stepped outside. Cold soaked through his sweater and settled along his spine with an unyielding grip.
The river's voice strengthened as he neared the pier. The wooden walkway glistened under the storm, boards shifting with each step like a creature breathing beneath him. Mud, algae, metal, and faint gasoline braided together in the river's scent.
Presence followed.
It hovered just behind his left shoulder, close enough that he sensed small fingers testing the texture of his sweater. Light brushes drifted along the knit every few strides, each touch carrying cautious bravery.
Cole kept his gaze forward.
At the end of the pier, he lifted the ring. Lightning flickered through low clouds, and silver gleamed in his palm like a caught star.
"You were a good thing," he whispered. "Until we weren't."
Tears gathered. Rain carried them away before they fell. His fingers opened. The ring slipped into the river with a soft splash, lost beneath the storm's voice.
"May we both find peace," he said. "May you laugh again, Shane. Truly laugh."
Interest sharpened behind him.
A feather-light touch grazed his shoulder—a child peering over the edge, following the ring's descent.
Contact vanished.
His Fitbit buzzed against his wrist. The vibration cut through the moment and reminded him of closing time. Alex didn't need a midnight call about her brother wandering storm-soaked docks.
Cole stepped back from the pier and moved toward the path.
Mud clung to his shoes. Jeans gripped his legs. Stormwater dripped from his sweater with each stride.
His thoughts drifted.
The presence circled him, slipping ahead and falling behind with the restless pattern of a child pacing around a parent during a long walk.
"Alex will tear into me if she hears about this," he said. "Officer Alexandra Constantine, model public servant, saddled with the ghost of her brother's poor decisions."
A thin laugh leaked out.
Blue light flickered through the trees ahead.
A cruiser eased down the lane, tires whispering across wet pavement. Wipers cut a steady arc through the rain while red and blue fractured across the storm.
The car slowed. The passenger window dropped.
"Evening, sir," the officer said, voice polished by repetition. "Park's closed. We're escorting everyone out."
Cole nodded while his teeth chattered. "Sorry. Lost track of time."
The cruiser guided him toward the lot. One officer walked behind him, boots splashing through shallow puddles. The driver returned to his seat.
Tension pressed inward. The ghost-boy drew closer, trembling fear radiating through Cole's awareness.
"What is it?" Cole murmured. "You stayed calm a minute ago."
Emotion answered—thin, focused, sharp. No words. Something inside the cruiser pulled the fear toward it.
Brake lights glowed through the rain as the vehicle stopped near the lot's entrance.
Cole lifted his gaze toward the backseat.
A small shape waited there.
At first glance, the figure resembled a soaked child riding out punishment. The illusion fractured the moment the figure raised its head.
A face refused to settle—soft one moment, hollow the next, as if half-built from water and shadow. Darkness folded through emptiness. Suggestions of eyes, a nose, and a mouth drifted beneath the unstable surface—reflections sliding across rippling water.
One hand pressed against the window.
Glass softened beneath the touch, bending inward. Red light warped across the pane in twisted patterns. Waves radiated outward from the pressure point. The figure dragged its hand downward in a slow smear.
Breath left Cole.
Rain streaked his sight. Sound thinned to nothing. A giggle spiraled through his mind again with bright, impossible clarity.
Cole stumbled back.
"Sir?" the officer behind him called. "You all right?"
Speech caught in his throat.
The cruiser's interior pulsed with shadow. The figure tilted its head.
Fingers lifted. Distortion clung to the glass for a breath before smoothing across the pane like water settling after a stone vanished beneath the surface.
The edge of the figure unraveled. Darkness peeled away and dissolved into the deeper shadows inside the cruiser.
Presence vanished.
Cole swayed. The officer steadied him with a firm grip on his elbow.
"Long night?" the man asked.
"You have no idea," Cole said.
His voice rasped as he followed the officer toward the gate.
Home held him for one last night.
His gaze drifted back to the empty seat. No warped glass. No child-shaped shadow. Only rain, red light, and his own pale reflection stared through the window.
The ghost had followed him out of the pavilion, and it had not finished with him.