I pulled over immediately.
⸻
“Say that again,” I told him.
⸻
He did.
Calm.
Like it meant nothing.
⸻
But it meant everything.
⸻
Because that name…
was from my past.
⸻
A past I had buried.
Locked away.
⸻
“No one knows that name,” I whispered.
⸻
But he just shrugged.
⸻
“He talks to me sometimes,” he said.
⸻
I turned to him slowly.
⸻
“What do you mean… talks to you?”
⸻
He pointed behind him.
At the empty back seat.
⸻
“He sits there.”
⸻
I felt cold.
⸻
There was no one there.
⸻
Of course there wasn’t.
⸻
But my son wasn’t joking.
⸻
And the name he said…
belonged to someone who wasn’t supposed to be in our lives anymore.
⸻
Someone who disappeared.
⸻
Someone who knew things about me…
no one else did.
⸻
And suddenly…
I realized something terrifying.
⸻
If my son was hearing him…
⸻
Then maybe…
he was closer than I thought.
⸻
Do you believe children can see things adults can’t?