Chapter 3 — What Lives Above

By the third night, Nora had a theory.The theory was: raccoons. Large ones, possibly a family. The scratching and the slow footsteps were consistent with a medium-to-large animal. The attic door was locked — had been locked from the outside, she'd noticed, with the latch dropped — and nothing could get out.The theory was reasonable. She believed it during the day.At night, alone with the sounds, she believed it less.It was the pattern that troubled her. Animals were erratic. They moved when startled, when hungry, when restless. What moved above her in the dark was none of those things. It moved the same way every night — the slow back-and-forth beginning between 1 and 2 AM, continuing for exactly the same interval, stopping at the same point. Like something with a schedule.Like something that knew she was listening.On Wednesday, she called an exterminator. He came Thursday, a round-faced man named Phil who smelled of coffee and had the unhurried confidence of someone who had seen everything twice.She showed him upstairs.He stood in front of the attic door and frowned."You sure you want me opening this?" he said.Nora had been sure of this all week. "Yes," she said.He lifted the latch.The door opened.The smell came first — cold and old and deep, like the bottom of a well that hadn't been touched in years. Then the dark, the narrow staircase going up, the rectangle of grey light at the top where a small attic window let in the flat winter afternoon.Phil went up. Nora stayed at the bottom of the stairs.She heard him moving around above — boards creaking under his weight, the sweep of his flashlight visible through the open trapdoor at the top."Huh," he said, after a minute."What?""Come look at this."She went up.