Careful What You Wish For

Chapter Eleven

Sophie towels her hair dry unhurriedly, watching the red strands curl into loose ringlets in the long mirror stretched out behind the sinks in Ithaca Pool change rooms. She is still feeling the thrill of her swim today, her body invigorated and her muscles tight. Happy with herself for returning to the pool after the locker incident, she successfully orchestrated her visit to coincide with one of the busier times at the pool when squad swimming and aero aerobics classes were both running. After swimming 40 laps, she then took her time washing the chlorine out of her hair in the showers and enjoying the busy sounds in the changeroom outside the door. She had also changed lockers, simply for her own piece of mind.

She shoves her wet clothes and towel into her swim bag and wanders back through the facility. Squad training is still going strong, however, the ladies' aero aerobics is long gone. It's also darker than she thought it would be. She hunts through her bag for her phone and checks the time. 6.21 pm. It's much later than she wanted to be here.

There are shadows starting to creep under the grandstand and beneath the evergreens running one length of the pool.

The first flutter of unease escapes in her chest.

She stands in front of the pool entrance and swears softly under her breath. Her car is all the way down the street. In the middle of the afternoon, when she arrived, it felt like a safe walk. Now it suddenly felt very far away.

She blows out a long slow breath. "Get a grip, Sophie. It's not that far."

Sophie almost trips down the steps in her eagerness to get to her car. Hurrying down the path that winds past the skatepark and tennis courts, she tries to ignore the shadows creeping across the path and instead focuses on steadying her breathing. It's very quiet. The crunch of her joggers on the gravel path echoes loudly in her head. She can hear one lone skater in the park to her right, although she can't see them, and an eerie feeling creeps up her spine.

Picking up her pace she draws closer to the tennis court, which is thankfully well-lit and in use. She hears the thwack of a tennis ball and takes an audible sigh of relief.

She takes a short-lived comfort in the presence of light and people before the path twists again and she is back in the shadows.

Then she hears the first footstep behind her. The unmistakable tread of someone else on the gravel path. Her head whips over her shoulder, hoping for a harmless-looking jogger or cyclist. Anything to calm her ridiculously hyped imagination.

But there's no one there. The path is empty.

Had she imagined that?

For a moment she is tempted to backtrack to the court, in the safe pool of light, near the couple playing tennis. But the need to get out of here and back to her car is so much stronger.

Sophie picks up her pace again, power-walking like a lunatic through the park.

Then she hears it again. The crunch of a step, then two steps, then three.

She spins around, her heart pounding now.

But the path is still empty. The footsteps stop.

"Oh my god, this can't be happening," Sophie whispers into the quickly darkening night. She can feel a hysterical scream starting to build. She tightens her grip on her bag and turns and runs. Sophie knows she is a fast runner and for a while all she can hear are her own feet hitting the path. But then she starts to hear the other steps, out of time with her own. She can see the gate out of the park and onto the street where her car is parked, and as she reaches it she risks a glance over her shoulder. Hoping again that she is just imagining it all.

But there is someone behind her.

Someone wearing a dark hoodie and running straight at her.

Sophie is so startled and terrified; she can't even get out a scream.

Instead, she turns and races up the middle of the quiet street as fast as she can.

She is certain she has never run so fast in her life. Her instincts take over and there is very little thought in her head. All she can think about is a hand on her shoulder as he catches her. She doesn't risk another glance behind her. She can hear him anyway. Feet smacking on the bitumen behind her.

She doesn't even have time to really think about what she will do when she gets to her car. There's no time to get her keys out, there is only time to run.

She bursts out of the side street onto a larger street and can finally see her car 30 metres ahead.

This street is not any busier, but it is better lit by real streetlamps and there are much fewer shadows. Sophie doesn't turn to check if he's still chasing her, she just runs up the middle of the street hoping and praying that someone can see her. All she can hear is her own breathing now and a pounding in her head.

There are parked cars along the street at random intervals. She is five cars away from her own blue Toyota. Four. Three. Two. One...

Sophie comes to a very abrupt stop beside her car, heart hammering and a scream ready on her lips. She grabs hold of her bag and readies it to swing at whoever is behind her. He must be on top of her by now.

But she swings at vacant air.

Her bag flicks around and hits her painfully on her other hip.

There is no one there.

Sophie looks frantically up the street. She checks the shadows along the footpath. She spins in a full circle.

He's gone.

Sophie starts to frantically rifle through her bag for her keys, not game to take her eyes off the road for too long. Where did he go? Did he give up? Is he hiding? Maybe he hadn't followed her out of the side street at all...

Finally locating her keys, she unlocks the doors and climbs roughly inside her car, slamming the door shut behind her and locking the doors again. She tries to take a breath but can't relax. She presses the ignition button and attempts to pull out slowly and carefully. Failing that, she instead jolts the car into the street with very little thought about who else could be on the road and flies down the street.

She drives like this for two blocks. Finally, feeling as though she is far enough away, she pulls over, puts her head on the steering wheel, and takes big gulping breaths of air until her racing heart steadies again. She waits there for as long as she can before it doesn't feel safe anymore and pulls back into the traffic with violently shaking hands.

~

By the time Sophie is driving through the familiar streets surrounding the university, her state of mind is only marginally improved. She pulls to the curb in front of their house, puts her head back on the steering wheel and stays there until her legs will move again. Her first instinct was to go to Brianne's, but her hands had driven her home for some reason.

She needs to be alone for a moment.

Sophie drags herself from the car. Did that really just happen? Had there been someone chasing her through the street? Had they been waiting for her? Was it her stalker or some random person? Is there any possibility that she had overreacted to that situation?

Her thoughts won't settle, and there are no answers in any case.

Sophie struggles up the small rise to their front door, her bag and keys clutched too tightly in her hands.

It takes her a long moment to see that there is someone waiting for her.

Sophie feels her exhausted body react the only way it can. By freezing up. She stops mid-step in the middle of the lawn. With one foot in the air, she wonders for a brief second if she is going into immediate shock. Did he beat her here? How had she forgotten that her stalker knew where she lived? What had possessed her to come back here to an empty house?

Then the shadowy shape under the eave steps into the light above the front door and Sophie's body reacts in an entirely different way.

Its Evan.