Isla Veyra had always wanted life to make sense. 

Some people got that naturally. She didn’t.

As a kid, she felt things she couldn’t explain: a weight in her chest when the wind shifted, a static charge in the air before storms, a deep unease in certain places even when everything looked normal. It wasn’t fear, exactly. It was like standing on the edge of a sentence the world was trying to say, but never quite finishing. And it marked her as different.

When she finally told her grandmother, she expected to be laughed off or sent to a therapist. Instead, her grandmother had turned from the stove, wiped her hands on a dish towel, and pulled her close at the kitchen table. Candles flickered behind jars of dried herbs and bundled sage.

"You’re not broken," her grandmother had whispered. "You’re just listening better than most."

Isla remembered that night like a cornerstone. Her grandmother had taken her seriously, had poured her a cup of chamomile tea and said the world was full of currents other people ignored. That some people noticed the way the wind changed before something important happened, or the way animals went silent before a shift.

"We come from a line of watchers," she said. "We feel things because we’re supposed to."

The only other person who ever believed her was Lila. Always Lila.

They were opposites in almost every way. Isla was practical, sharp-edged, a girl who carried an extra pen and backup charger. Lila was wild and dreamy, all mismatched socks and paint under her nails. But somehow, they fit. On the playground Isla would whisper about that strange pull in her chest, and Lila would grin like it was the best kind of mystery.

"It means something," she’d say. "You’re tuned in. Like a compass that only points to weird."

Isla had wanted to roll her eyes, but she never did. Deep down, she was grateful she didn’t have to carry it alone.

School gave Isla an escape hatch. Facts, charts, equations, answers that lined up neatly. Where the world felt messy, science was steady. She wasn’t the fastest in class, but she was relentless: late nights bent over textbooks, flashcards fanned out like a tarot spread, stubbornly pushing until the knowledge stuck. Where other kids chased fun, she chased clarity.

She needed to be normal. More than anything.

That drive carried her into medicine. The ER was chaos, but it was the kind she could measure. Symptoms, diagnoses, step-by-step protocols. People came in broken, and she put them back together. She could trust that process. Unlike the hum that haunted the edges of her life.

Work had kept it away. Inside the hospital, under fluorescent lights and buried in the noise of monitors and codes, there was no room for the uncanny. 

But tonight, the moment she stepped outside, it hit her.

The hum.

It surged through her chest so suddenly she stopped short, breath catching like someone had pressed a hand against her sternum. It wasn’t faint, like before. It was a wave. 

A pull.

She tightened her grip on the strap of her bag and forced her legs to move, heading toward her apartment. Every step made the ache sharper, as if the ground itself was humming beneath her shoes. Ravenwood’s streets stretched quiet under a mist that clung to the corners. Streetlamps burned halos through the fog.

She paused under a broken lamp, its bulb buzzing, sputtering, then flaring back to life in uneven bursts. The mist pooled heavier here, curling around the edges of buildings. Ravenwood had always felt strange at night, a little too quiet, a little too aware. But tonight, it felt watchful.

And that was when she saw him.

At the mouth of the alley, half in shadow, a man stood perfectly still.

Tall. Composed. Watching.

Heat flared sharp in her chest, too sudden to be adrenaline, too deep to dismiss. Instinct told her to look away. To walk. But her body rooted itself to the spot, heart thudding like a drum against her ribs.

The hum crescendoed.

A car passed behind her, headlights sweeping across the alley.

For one second, he was illuminated. Not just seen. Known. Like her bones remembered him.

And then he was gone.

Just wet pavement. Just mist curling into the dark.

Isla moved again, too quickly. Her breath came short, fast. The apartment lobby door thudded shut behind her, cutting off the damp night air. In the cracked mirror by the mailboxes, her reflection stared back gray eyes shadowed, auburn hair frizzed into a halo of static.

For a second, it looked like something flickered behind her reflection. A delay. A shadow where there shouldn’t be one. Then it was gone.

"Get it together," she muttered, climbing the stairs.

Inside, Titan shifted under the glow of his heat lamp, the bearded dragon lifting his triangular head as she set her bag down.

"Hey, buddy," Isla said softly, pressing her forehead to the glass. His blank stare didn’t judge. His world was warm rocks, food, routine.

Routine. That was the plan. Feed Titan. Shower. Wine. Sleep.

Normal.

She moved through the motions. Fed him. Showered. Wrapped herself in a soft hoodie and poured a glass of cheap red wine. But the hum didn’t leave. It lingered in the corners of the room like smoke. Like memory.

Outside the kitchen window, rain softened Ravenwood’s edges. The streetlights turned to halos. Buildings bled into watercolor.

She thought of Lila. Of how she’d laugh and say, "Girl, that was some capital-M magic shit right there."

Maybe Isla should call her. Maybe she should talk it through.  Instead, she walked to the window.

And under the nearest lamp, blurred by mist, a single footprint marred the sidewalk.

She stared at it. Then watched it fade, slowly, into nothing.