Alex adjusted the angle of the lamp on his desk, letting the soft light spill across the notepad like a quiet invitation. The office was designed to feel safe, earth tones, rounded furniture, no sharp edges. But today, the air felt thick, like something unseen had curled into the corners and refused to leave.

She sat across from him, legs tucked under the chair, hoodie pulled tight around her face. Annis. Fourteen. Mute. Her file said “selective mutism,” but Alex had learned that labels often missed the truth. Her eyes didn’t dart or flinch. They stared. Not at him, but through him.

He offered her a pencil and a blank sheet of paper. “You

don’t have to speak,” he said gently. “You can draw. Or write. Or just sit.”

She didn’t move. Not even to blink.

Alex scribbled a note to himself: Presence is heavy. Feels like grief, but colder. He’d felt this before, in sessions with trauma survivors. But this was different. It wasn’t her sadness pressing into the room—it was something else. Something that watched.

Outside, the wind rattled the windowpane. Annis turned her head slightly, just enough to acknowledge the sound. Then she reached out, took the pencil, and began to draw.

The pencil moved slowly in Annis’s hand, almost reluctantly, as if it were being dragged across the page by something invisible. Alex leaned forward just slightly, careful not to break the fragile moment. Her strokes were jagged, looping, erratic. Not a picture. Not words. Just a shape—round, with spindly lines radiating outward like legs or antennae.

Alex’s breath caught. He’d seen drawings like this before. Not exact, but similar. In trauma cases, children often drew monsters to represent feelings they couldn’t name. But this one felt… deliberate. Not imagined. Remembered.

He glanced at her face. Still blank. Still silent. But her

eyes flicked toward the drawing, then back to him. A challenge. Or a warning.

“What is it?” he asked softly, though he knew she wouldn’t answer. The silence stretched, thick and humming. He felt it again—that pressure behind his ears, like static building in a radio just before it catches a signal.

He wrote another note: Drawing resembles insect. Not imagined. Symbolic? Sentient? Then paused. Why did I write “sentient”?

The room dimmed slightly as a cloud passed over the sun outside. Alex rubbed his temples. He hadn’t slept well last night. Or the night before. His dreams had been

strange lately—full of whispers and flickering lights. He’d brushed it off as stress. But now, looking at Annis’s drawing, he felt a chill crawl up his spine.

She pushed the paper toward him. Her hand trembled slightly. Then she pulled her hoodie tighter and turned away.

Alex stared at the shape. The Bug. That’s what it looked like. That’s what it felt like. And somehow, he knew—this wasn’t the first time it had been drawn.

Alex felt the word echo inside him like a bell struck underwater. Now. It wasn’t just a moment—it was a shift. Something had changed between them, something invisible but undeniable. He looked at Annis, her face half-hidden by her hoodie, and saw not fear, but certainty. She knew what she’d done. Or what was happening. And she wasn’t asking for help. She was warning him.

He leaned back in his chair, trying to steady his breath. The room felt smaller. The air heavier. He glanced at the drawing again, then at the notebook. It lives in feelings. That phrase gnawed at him. He thought of his own past—the things he’d buried, the memories he’d locked away

in neat little boxes. Was that what the Bug fed on? Not just pain, but the act of hiding it?

Annis shifted slightly, her fingers tapping a slow rhythm on her knee. Alex recognized it—not a nervous tic, but a pattern. Morse code? A heartbeat? He didn’t know. But it wasn’t random. She was communicating, even in silence. He scribbled another note: She’s not mute. She’s strategic. That realization unsettled him more than anything. She wasn’t broken. She was protecting something. Or someone.

The heater clicked off, and the sudden quiet made the room feel hollow. Alex stood, walked to the window, and looked out. The sky was pale, the trees still. But his

reflection in the glass looked wrong. His eyes seemed darker. His posture unfamiliar. He blinked, and the image snapped back to normal. Just a trick of the light, he told himself. But the feeling lingered. Like something had looked back.

Her voice was soft. Barely audible. But it cut through the silence like a blade. “It doesn’t crawl,” she said. “It listens. It waits.”

Alex froze. He hadn’t expected her to speak, not like this. Her tone was flat, almost rehearsed, like she was reciting something she’d memorized long ago. He leaned in, instinctively, drawn by the fragile thread of connection.

“It finds cracks,” she continued. “In your thoughts. In your feelings. You don’t notice at first. You think it’s empathy. You think you’re helping.”

Alex nodded slowly, scribbling notes. Breakthrough moment. Verbal description of Bug. Possibly metaphorical. But even as he wrote, his hand felt distant,

like it belonged to someone else.

“It likes guilt,” Annis whispered. “And secrets. Especially the ones you hide from yourself.”

Alex’s breath caught. He thought of his father. Of the night he never talked about. Of the way he’d buried it under degrees and credentials and long hours helping others. He shook the thought away. This was about Annis. Not him.

“It doesn’t hurt you,” she said. “Not at first. It makes you feel… useful. Important. Like you’re the only one who can understand.”

He felt a chill run down his spine. Her words were too precise. Too familiar. He’d felt that before—with patients,

with friends, even in his own reflection. That aching need to be the one who saves.

Annis looked up. Her eyes were clear now. Calm. “You’re already listening,” she said. “That’s how it starts.”

Alex smiled gently, trying to reassure her. “I’m here to help.”

She didn’t smile back. “I know,” she said. “That’s why it chose you.”

Alex felt a strange warmth in his chest, like a slow-burning ember. It wasn’t comfort—it was something heavier. He looked at Annis, who now sat with her hands folded neatly in her lap, her posture relaxed. The transformation was subtle, but undeniable. She had spoken. She had shared. And now, she was still.

He tried to focus on his notes, but the words blurred. Empathy. Transfer. Guilt. They didn’t feel like his handwriting. He blinked hard, rubbed his eyes, and looked back at her. She was watching him again—not with fear, but with something else. Expectation.

“I want to understand,” he said, his voice quieter than he intended. “I want to help.”

Annis tilted her head. “You already do,” she said. “That’s why it listens to you now.”

Alex felt a flicker of unease. The phrase echoed in his mind—it listens to you now. He opened his mouth to respond, but the words didn’t come. Instead, he felt a sudden rush of memories—faces, voices, moments he hadn’t thought about in years. His mother crying in the kitchen. The silence after the accident. The way he’d learned to smile through it all.

He shook his head. “I’m fine,” he said aloud, though no one had asked.

Annis didn’t react. She simply reached into her notebook and tore out the page with the Bug drawing. She folded

it once, then again, and placed it gently on the table between them.

Alex stared at it. The paper looked ordinary. But something about it felt wrong. Like it was humming. Or breathing.

“You’ll dream about it,” Annis said. “Tonight.”

Alex swallowed hard. He wanted to dismiss it. To rationalize. But deep down, he knew—he already had.

Alex ended the session with practiced warmth, thanking Annis for her openness and encouraging her to keep drawing. She nodded once, collected her things, and left without a word. The door clicked shut behind her, but the silence didn’t feel empty—it felt occupied.

He sat at his desk, staring at the folded drawing she’d left behind. He didn’t open it. He didn’t need to. The image was already etched into his mind, pulsing like a second heartbeat. He told himself it was just a metaphor. A projection. But the feeling in his chest said otherwise.

He tried to return to his notes, to organize his thoughts, but the words refused to settle. His handwriting looked foreign, the letters slanted in ways he didn’t remember.

He flipped back through the pages, searching for something familiar, but found only fragments—phrases he didn’t recall writing. It listens. It waits. It likes guilt.

He stood abruptly, needing air. The hallway was quiet, the lights dimmed for the evening. He walked past the other offices, each one dark and still. At the end of the hall, he paused by the mirror. He didn’t know why. Just a pull.

His reflection stared back, but something was wrong. His eyes looked deeper. Not tired—emptied. He leaned closer. For a moment, he thought he saw .... movement behind his own pupils. A flicker. A twitch. Like something adjusting to its new home.

He blinked, and it was gone.

Back in his office, the folded paper still sat on the table. He picked it up, hesitated, then slipped it into his drawer. He told himself it was just a drawing. Just a session. Just a girl.

But deep down, he knew—something had changed. And it wasn’t hers anymore.

That night, Alex dreamed in static.

He stood in his office, but the walls were wrong—too tall, too smooth, pulsing faintly like lungs. The furniture was gone. The window showed nothing but a swirling gray fog. He turned slowly, sensing movement behind him, but saw only shadows stretching across the floor like spilled ink.

A low hum filled the air, vibrating through his bones. He looked down and saw the drawing—the Bug—etched into the floorboards, pulsing with each beat of his heart. He tried to step away, but his feet wouldn’t move. The lines of the Bug began to shift, rearranging themselves into words he couldn’t read, symbols he almost