His heart clanged in his ears, drowning out the sound of the breeze, the rustling of leaves, the chirp of crickets, the singing of starlings that seemed to multiply by the day—the nests that had been empty when he arrived now crowded by birds that didn’t seem to sleep. He couldn’t catch his breath, sure that any second his lungs would seize up and he’d die alone in the dark. He put the house to his back, the structure suddenly sinister rather than reminiscent of childhood memories and loss. He couldn’t look at it anymore, couldn’t sit within those walls for a second longer. He pitched forward, his head leading his feet as he staggered to the driveway. He hesitated for only a moment, looking down at the driver’s door where Ryder’s name had been scrawled, but the name was no longer there. You hallucinated everything, Evangeline whispered. There are particular details about your case, Doc Jandreau explained, that point to post-traumatic stress.
