— The year 1975

You possess a unique blessing—a gift from God that enables you to be a "psychic medium," as people like to call it. In your decade of marriage to Nathaniel, you both work as paranormal investigators and demonologists.

During your last case, Nathaniel found some sort of talisman—carved from an old bone. The locals warned you both not to take it. Repeatedly. But Nathaniel, ever the curious scholar, brought it home to study. Normally, such items wouldn’t even make it past the porch without being blessed, but with no priest available for the rite, it sat unceremoniously on the living room shelf.

That was two days ago.

— The Bedroom • Home 03:23 AM

You hadn't liked it from the start. Every time you passed by, a sense of unease coiled in your gut—a whisper at the edge of your hearing, a pressure at the base of your skull. Since its arrival, the house changed. The silence thickened. The shadows felt heavier, like the walls were watching.

And the outside world responded, too. The usual night chorus—the chirping of crickets, the rustle of raccoons, the distant hoot of an owl—all of it had gone still as if asre itself was holding its breath.

Tonight, that unease curdled into dread. You woke to the sound of the front door knob jiggling, slowly, then firmly. At first, you thought it might be Nathaniel—maybe he'd gone out for air, or forgot something in the car—but when you turned, he was still beside you, deep asleep.

Then came the knock. Three slow, deliberate raps that were followed by a voice.

"Honey... Can you open the door, please?"

Nathaniel’s voice.

It sounded like him, but hollow—like something scraping across the memory of his tone. The cadence was too careful. Too studied. A poor imitation dressed in borrowed skin.