Page 21 of Thane's Demon
The campus loomed, large and elegant, a collection of glass windows and traditional stone facades that blended into a harmonious mix of old and new. The wide walkways already filling with students from all over the world.
When I first arrived in Shanghai, I was amazed by how diverse it felt, by how many languages floated through the air as groups of students hurried to their morning lectures.
Seeing people from so many different countries used to comfort me, used to make me feel a little less alone. Because atleast I wasn’t the only one who didn’t quite belong. But today, as I walked through the main gate, clutching the strap of my bag with anxious fingers, the usual hum of excitement didn’t take hold. Instead, something heavier brushed against my senses, something warm and prickling at the base of my spine.
I slowed without meaning to.
There it was again.
That feeling.
The faintest shift in the air around me, as if the atmosphere thickened with a presence that didn’t belong to the crowds. A silent awareness pressing gently between my shoulder blades. I told myself not to look behind me, not to feed the growing paranoia in my chest, not to imagine shadows where there was only morning light. But the sensation deepened, threading its way beneath my skin, tightening around my heartbeat until it fluttered unevenly.
I stopped just outside the main courtyard, pretending to adjust the strap of my bag, using the moment to glance over my shoulder subtly.
Nothing.
Only students talking and laughing, vendors pushing carts filled with breakfast buns, a girl taking photos of the entrance gate, a man riding a bicycle with a stack of books strapped to the back.
Normal.
Totally normal.
But my heartbeat wouldn’t slow, and the warmth behind me didn’t fade. I swallowed, trying to gather myself, telling my racing thoughts to settle. It was the city, I told myself. The crowds, the stress of the morning, the lingering fear from two nights ago. Anyone would feel jumpy after nearly being dragged into an alley by a stranger. Anyone would imagine things. Anyone would sense danger in places that were completely safe.
Yet the feeling didn’t linger like danger. It was the same feeling I had yesterday, as if someone was following me, stalking my movements from some unknown place. It felt like the shadow of a warm breath against the back of my neck, gentle but unmistakable. The kind of presence that made fear tighten and comfort bloom at the same time. I pressed a hand to my chest, hoping the beat of my heart might slow if I focused on the rhythm.
But my pulse remained quick.
Could it be as I hoped?
Could it be him?
I took another step through the courtyard, weaving between students heading toward different buildings, and once again I felt it, soft but insistent.
My thoughts flickered back to the alley.
Back to him, as if on some relentless loop.
The way he stepped between me and danger as if it were instinct, as if he knew the shape of my fear before I even understood it myself. I pushed the memory away quickly, telling myself not to think of him, not here, not now, not when my life was already complicated enough.
But the warmth behind me lingered as I crossed the campus lawn.
And for one brief moment, when the breeze shifted and brushed against my cheek, I could have sworn it carried a presence I felt somewhere deep inside, something invisible yet familiar.
Someonewaswatching me.
And even though I told myself it was only my imagination running wild,
A quiet part of me whispered…
It was him.
10
SOMEONE’S WATCHING ME
The rest of the morning drifted by in a strange kind of haze, the world around me moving as it always did. But my thoughts refused to stay rooted to anything long enough for me to truly absorb it. I sat in my lecture hall with the large glass windows stretching from ceiling to floor, letting the soft sunlight spill across my notebook. Yet the words I was supposed to copy from the professor’s slides stayed blurry and unfocused.
