Chapter 4: Deaf Ears

The sun rose like a benediction, flooding Ethan's apartment with natural light that made his fortress of artificial illumination seem almost pathetic. He'd made it through the night—barely—surviving on coffee, adrenaline, and the desperate hope that morning would bring some kind of reprieve.

It didn't.

The thing that wore his father's face might have retreated with the darkness, but the muddy footprints in his closet remained. The stain on his hardwood floor seemed darker in daylight, more permanent. And when Ethan finally worked up the courage to turn off the work lights, shadows still felt deeper than they should be, hungry in a way that made his skin crawl.

He needed help. Professional help. The kind that came with badges and authority and the power to make problems disappear through official channels.

The Rogers Park Police District was a squat brick building that looked like it had been designed by someone who'd given up on life around 1975. Ethan sat in the cramped waiting area for forty minutes, watching a parade of human misery file past the duty desk—domestic disputes, fender benders, the usual catalog of urban desperation.

When Detective Ray Morrison finally called his name, Ethan felt a flutter of hope. Morrison was everything central casting would have ordered for a Chicago cop: thick mustache, coffee-stained tie, the kind of weary competence that came from twenty years of seeing everything the city had to offer.

"Mr. Hayes? I understand you want to file a report about a stalker?"

Morrison's office was a testament to bureaucratic entropy—file folders stacked on every surface, a computer that looked older than Ethan, and the lingering smell of cigarettes that had been officially banned from the building for at least a decade.

Ethan settled into the uncomfortable chair across from Morrison's desk and tried to organize his thoughts. How do you tell a police detective that your dead father is stalking you? How do you explain muddy footprints that appear in closets and figures that vanish when exposed to light?

"It started three days ago," Ethan began carefully. "I was visiting my old neighborhood, and I saw someone watching me. A man who looked like... who resembled my father."

Morrison's pen paused over his notepad. "Your father?"

"He died eight years ago. Heart attack." Ethan forced himself to continue. "But this man had his face, his build. He was standing in the shadows across from my childhood home, just watching."

"Could have been a coincidence. People sometimes resemble—"

"He followed me to Chicago. To my hotel. My colleague saw him too—we both watched him standing in the hotel courtyard, staring up at our window." Ethan's voice was getting faster, more desperate. "Then yesterday, someone broke into my apartment. Left muddy footprints in my closet. Size twelve work boots, the same kind my father used to wear."

Morrison set down his pen and leaned back in his chair, studying Ethan with the kind of expression usually reserved for people claiming alien abduction. "Mr. Hayes, I need to ask—are you currently under any kind of medical care? Taking any medications?"

The question hit like a slap. "I'm not crazy."

"I didn't say you were. But you've just described a deceased family member stalking you across state lines. You can understand why that might raise some concerns about your mental state."

"My colleague saw him too. Sarah Chen, she works for Meridian Analytics in Seattle. Call her. She'll confirm—"

"Even if that's true, what exactly do you want us to do? Arrest a dead man?" Morrison's tone wasn't unkind, but it was the practiced patience of someone explaining reality to a child. "Look, I can see you're upset. Losing a parent is traumatic, especially at a young age. Sometimes grief manifests in unexpected ways."

Ethan felt something cold and desperate unfurling in his chest. "Someone broke into my apartment. That's a crime, regardless of who did it."

"You said you found muddy footprints. Was anything stolen? Any signs of forced entry? Security cameras that might have caught something?"

"No, but—"

"Then what we have is some dirt in your closet and a man who may or may not resemble your deceased father. I'm sorry, Mr. Hayes, but that's not enough to open an investigation."

The words felt like a physical blow. Ethan had known it was a long shot, but some part of him had hoped that involving the authorities would make this whole nightmare feel more manageable, more real in a way that could be dealt with through normal channels.

Instead, he was being dismissed as a grief-stricken man seeing ghosts.

"What if it escalates?" Ethan asked, desperation creeping into his voice. "What if he tries to hurt someone?"

Morrison's expression softened slightly. "If you have a genuine concern for your safety, I can put you in touch with some resources. Therapists who specialize in trauma, support groups for people who've lost family members. Sometimes talking to someone who understands can help process these kinds of experiences."

Ethan left the police station feeling more alone than ever. The detective's business card was crumpled in his pocket, along with a pamphlet about grief counseling that might as well have been written in a foreign language for all the good it would do him.

The sun was high and bright, casting sharp shadows on the sidewalk that made him flinch. Every dark doorway, every alley mouth, every space where the light didn't quite reach felt like a potential hiding place for something that wore his father's face and smiled with too many teeth.

His phone buzzed: a text from Sarah. Called you six times. Are you okay? What's going on?

Ethan stared at the message for a long time before typing back: Fine. Just need some space to deal with family stuff.

That's bullshit and you know it. Whatever happened at the hotel, we're in this together.

No, we're not. Stay in Seattle. Stay safe.

He turned off the phone before she could respond.

The drive to his mother's house in Evanston took forty minutes through traffic that felt designed by malevolent gods. Linda Hayes-Patterson lived in a Tudor revival that looked like something from a lifestyle magazine, all manicured lawn and carefully maintained suburban perfection. It was the kind of place where nothing bad ever happened, where the past stayed buried under layers of fresh paint and new memories.

Ethan sat in the driveway for ten minutes, gathering his courage. He hadn't spoken to his mother in three months, not since their last disastrous attempt at family dinner had ended with her crying and him storming out after she'd suggested, again, that maybe it was time to "move forward" and "stop dwelling on the past."

Tom answered the door—Linda's husband, a pleasant man in his fifties who wore golf shirts like armor against life's uncertainties. His smile faltered when he saw Ethan.

"Ethan! We weren't expecting you. Is everything all right?"

"I need to talk to Mom. It's about Dad."

Tom's expression shifted to something that might have been pity. "She's in the garden. But maybe you should know, she's been having a difficult time lately. The anniversary is coming up next month, and—"

"The anniversary?" Ethan felt something cold settle in his stomach. "Next month?"

"September 15th. Eight years since Daniel passed." Tom's voice was carefully neutral. "You didn't remember?"

Ethan pushed past him into the house, through the living room with its carefully curated photographs that included exactly three pictures of Daniel Hayes, and out onto the back patio where his mother was deadheading roses with the kind of methodical precision that suggested barely controlled panic.

Linda Hayes-Patterson had been beautiful once. Still was, in the carefully maintained way of women who refused to let age win without a fight. But when she looked up at Ethan, he saw something fragile and desperate in her eyes, something that had been there since the night his father died and had never quite healed.

"Ethan." Her voice was bright, false, the tone of someone pretending everything was normal through sheer force of will. "What a lovely surprise. Tom, bring us some iced tea."

"Mom, I need to ask you about the night Dad died."

The pruning shears slipped from her hands, clattering onto the flagstone patio. "I don't want to talk about that."

"Something's happening. Something connected to Dad's death. I need to understand what really happened that night."

"Nothing happened." The words came out too fast, too sharp. "Your father had a heart attack. These things happen. There's nothing mysterious about a middle-aged man dying of cardiac arrest."

"He was healthy. He exercised, watched his diet. And why was he outside at midnight? Dad never walked at night, never. You know that."

Linda's face had gone white beneath her careful makeup. "I don't know why he went out. People do strange things sometimes. Maybe he couldn't sleep, maybe he needed air—"

"Mom, please. I'm not asking you to relive it, I just need to understand. Was there anything unusual in the weeks before? Anything different about his behavior?"

"Stop." The word was sharp enough to cut. "I won't do this. I won't tear open old wounds just because you can't accept that your father is gone."

"Someone's been following me. Someone who looks like Dad."

The effect was immediate and devastating. Linda Hayes-Patterson crumpled, actually physically folded in on herself like she'd been struck. Tom appeared at her side instantly, protective and concerned.

"Ethan, that's enough," Tom said quietly. "Can't you see what this is doing to her?"

But Ethan was focused on his mother's face, on the expression of pure terror that had replaced her careful composure. This wasn't just grief. This was recognition. She knew something.

"Mom, what aren't you telling me?"

"Get out." Her voice was barely a whisper. "Get out of my house."

"Linda, he didn't mean—" Tom started.

"GET OUT!" The scream was primal, desperate, the sound of someone pushed past all rational limits. "I won't listen to this! I won't have you dragging that... that darkness back into my life!"

Ethan stared at his mother, seeing her clearly for the first time in years. She wasn't just grieving. She was terrified. And whatever she was afraid of, it was the same thing that was hunting him.

"Mom, if you know something—"

"I know that your father is dead and buried and at peace, and I won't let you destroy that with your sick fantasies!" Tears were streaming down her face now, taking her makeup with them. "If you can't respect his memory, if you can't let him rest, then don't come back here!"

Tom was already guiding Ethan toward the door, his expression apologetic but firm. "I think you should go. She needs time to calm down."

Ethan found himself on the front porch, the door closed firmly behind him, his mother's sobs audible through the walls. He'd come looking for answers and found only more questions, more fear, more confirmation that he was completely and utterly alone in this nightmare.

The drive back to his apartment was a blur of suburban streets and growing dread. The sun was setting again, painting the sky in shades of orange and red that reminded him uncomfortably of the strobing lights in the parking garage. Soon it would be dark, and the thing that wore his father's face would come hunting again.

But now he knew something new, something that made the terror even worse: his mother had recognized his description. She'd known exactly what he was talking about, and it had terrified her more than his own obvious breakdown.

Whatever was hunting him, it wasn't new. It was connected to his father's death, to secrets that had been buried for eight years, to a darkness that his mother would rather pretend didn't exist than confront.

Ethan parked in the building's garage—the lights were working normally now, casting harsh fluorescent shadows that seemed deeper than they should be—and took the elevator up to his apartment. His fortress of light was exactly as he'd left it, blazing like a beacon against the encroaching night.

But as he settled into his kitchen chair with his baseball bat and his coffee, Ethan realized something that made his blood turn to ice water: he was completely on his own. The police thought he was crazy. His mother would rather pretend he didn't exist than face whatever truth she was hiding. Sarah was three time zones away and as helpless as anyone else.

No one was coming to save him. No one was going to make this stop.

Outside, darkness gathered like a living thing, patient and hungry and wearing the face of the one person Ethan had loved most in the world.

The lights flickered once, twice, and in that brief moment of dimness, Ethan could have sworn he heard his father's voice whispering his name from somewhere in the walls.

He was alone with his terror, alone with his questions, and alone with the growing certainty that tomorrow night might be his last.