Lena didn’t like mornings, but her cat didn’t care. A paw to the cheek and the shrill meow were her daily alarms—far more consistent than any phone app. She rolled out of bed, fed the beast, and opened her laptop like she always did.

Her world lived on that screen.

Art commissions. Emails. Social DMs. The glow of it greeted her more warmly than most people ever had. She liked it that way. Safe. Predictable.

Until today.

Among the usual likes and follows was a new message:

@Kai.Shadows started following you.

The username was odd. The profile was beautiful. Stark black-and-white street shots, moody portraits, little poems in the captions. Not flashy. Real. Uncomfortably real.

She clicked Follow Back before she could talk herself out of it.

Five minutes later, a message arrived.

Kai:

Your last piece feels like loneliness with a heartbeat. I haven’t seen anything like it.

Her heart did a small, stupid flip.

She typed back. Erased it. Typed again.

Lena:

Thanks. That’s kind of the goal.

She hit send.

Somewhere in her gut, something shifted. Not quite excitement. Not quite fear.

Something like gravity.

---

Days blurred into nights, and Lena found herself waiting for Kai’s messages the way she used to wait for paint to dry—restless, focused, a little anxious.

He always sent something after midnight.

Sometimes just words.

> “Do you ever feel like you’re two people? The one you show, and the one who watches from inside?”

Other times, photos.

A cracked mirror. A subway station at 3 a.m. A shadow falling across pavement. Nothing fancy, but they carried a mood—his mood. She couldn’t explain it, but it pulled her in.

They talked about art. Fear. Loneliness. Silence. He never asked her too much, never pushed, just listened. And when she did open up, it felt… safe.

Until one night:

> “I dreamt of you last night. You were standing at the edge of a rooftop. But you weren’t scared. You jumped. You flew.”

She didn’t know what to say. No one had ever spoken about her like that—not in real life.

She stared at the message long after the screen dimmed. Part of her felt like she was falling too.

She stopped posting publicly. Her friends noticed. One messaged:

“You okay? Haven’t seen you in a while.”

She lied. Said she was working on something big.

In truth, her biggest canvas sat untouched in the corner. The only thing growing was her private chat with a man she still hadn’t seen without a camera in front of his face.

But it didn’t matter.

He saw her.

Or so she thought.

---

Days blurred into nights, and Lena found herself waiting for Kai’s messages the way she used to wait for paint to dry—restless, focused, a little anxious.

He always sent something after midnight.

Sometimes just words.

> “Do you ever feel like you’re two people? The one you show, and the one who watches from inside?”

Other times, photos.

A cracked mirror. A subway station at 3 a.m. A shadow falling across pavement. Nothing fancy, but they carried a mood—his mood. She couldn’t explain it, but it pulled her in.

They talked about art. Fear. Loneliness. Silence. He never asked her too much, never pushed, just listened. And when she did open up, it felt… safe.

Until one night:

> “I dreamt of you last night. You were standing at the edge of a rooftop. But you weren’t scared. You jumped. You flew.”

She didn’t know what to say. No one had ever spoken about her like that—not in real life.

She stared at the message long after the screen dimmed. Part of her felt like she was falling too.

She stopped posting publicly. Her friends noticed. One messaged:

“You okay? Haven’t seen you in a while.”

She lied. Said she was working on something big.

In truth, her biggest canvas sat untouched in the corner. The only thing growing was her private chat with a man she still hadn’t seen without a camera in front of his face.

But it didn’t matter.

He saw her.

Or so she thought.

---

Lena hadn’t painted in days.

Her brushes sat stiff in cloudy water, like wilted flowers long forgotten. The big canvas in the corner leaned against the wall with quiet judgment, still untouched. Every time she looked at it, she felt the pressure to create, to express—but all her inspiration had narrowed into one thing. One person.

Kai.

Their conversations had become ritual. Morning greetings, midnight thoughts. He sent voice notes now—low, almost whispering, as if afraid the world might overhear what was meant only for her. His voice had a strange gravity to it—deep, slow, full of something heavy and warm. She played them over and over in the dark, the hum of his breath filling the silence between her own.

“When I close my eyes,” he said in one, “your work burns behind my eyelids. It’s like I’ve seen it before. Or maybe I dreamed it. Either way, I can’t forget it.”

She hadn’t shown him much. A few older pieces online. Nothing new. But he spoke about her art like he had stood in her studio, touched her canvas, breathed her thoughts.

No one else ever did that. Not her professors. Not her friends. Not even the gallery curator who once praised her style but called her work “emotionally reserved.”

But Kai? He saw her.

That’s what made it feel real.

Even if she hadn’t seen his full face yet—he never turned his camera on. Always said the lighting was bad, or that he looked a mess. Still, Lena felt connected. Addicted, even.

Until one night.

The city outside was muted, fog pressing against her windows. She was lying on her couch, wrapped in her blanket, when the message came.

“Why haven’t you shown me your face?”

The question was simple. Innocent, even. But it hit her like a needle.

She stared at her screen, thumb hovering over the keyboard. She could almost hear his voice asking it—soft, curious. But something in her spine stiffened.

She typed back:

“I like the mystery.”

A pause. Then a reply.

Just a single emoji:

Eyes. Watching.

Her skin prickled.

That night, something tugged at the back of her mind. A thought she couldn’t shake. So she did what she hadn’t done in weeks—she went back through his profile. Scrolling past the moody street photos, the abstract colors, the blurry self-portraits.

And there it was.

An image posted early on—months before he ever followed her. A strange composition of red and grey, abstract and raw. It struck her with a jolt.

She had drawn that.

Not exactly, but close—eerily close. Her version sat in her sketchbook. She flipped through it, fingers trembling slightly, until she found the page. Dated. Signed. Quiet proof.

She had never posted it. Never shared it.

Her chest tightened.

She stared at his image again. Her fingers hovered over her screen.

Was it coincidence? Inspiration? Or something else?

She didn’t message him that night. For the first time, she left him on read.

And when her phone buzzed an hour later—his name lighting up the screen—she didn’t feel excitement.

She felt watched.

She felt hunted.

She felt known in a way that suddenly didn’t feel like love at all.

Lena didn’t answer Kai’s message the next day.

Or the one after that.

She told herself she was just busy. That she needed to paint again, breathe again, get back to her routine. But the truth was quieter—and heavier. She was afraid.

Not of him. Not exactly.

Afraid of what she might find if she kept looking.

Kai had messaged twice the following evening.

“Missed your voice last night.”

“Did I say something wrong?”

She stared at the words, thumb hovering over her keyboard, but said nothing

Instead, she closed her curtains, turned off her phone, and lit a candle in the corner of her studio. She hadn't been in there for a while. The air smelled stale. Her canvas waited—still blank, still patient.

She stared at it for a long time.

When she finally picked up a brush, her hand hesitated. What was she even trying to say anymore?

Her art had always been her voice. But now, it felt like Kai had already spoken over it. Worse—like he had been speaking through it all along.

She painted anyway.

Slow strokes, dark colors. Red bled into gray, then black. A figure began to form—tall, faceless, arms outstretched like it wanted to embrace her, or devour her.

When she finished, she stepped back. The room felt colder.

She didn’t name the piece.

She didn’t post it online.

Instead, she left her studio and walked for the first time in days. Just around the block, to breathe, to remember the world beyond a screen. Her boots echoed against the sidewalk. Cars passed. A couple laughed across the street.

Normal life.

But when she got back to her apartment, her phone was buzzing. Five new messages.

All from Kai.

> “You disappeared.”

“I get it. You’re scared.”

“But you don’t need to be.”

“I would never hurt you.”

“You know me better than anyone.”

Her chest tightened. The first few messages were soft. Concerned. But the last one—it read like a warning. A reminder.

You know me better than anyone.

She didn’t reply.

She turned her phone off again.

But sleep didn’t come easy. Her mind spun in circles, chasing every message, every photo, every call. She thought of that old sketch. Of the image he had posted. Too similar. Too soon.

Coincidence? Maybe.

But she no longer trusted coincidence.

At 3:11 a.m., she got up and flipped the lock on her door. Then she moved a chair in front of it. It felt silly. Dramatic. But her heart slowed just a little.

As she settled back into bed, something occurred to her:

She had told Kai her building’s name in passing, weeks ago. She’d joked about the elevator never working. He’d replied with a laughing emoji and said, “Good thing I don’t mind stairs.”

Back then, it was charming.

Now?

Now it felt like glass cracking under pressure.

---

Want you know what happened next?