2025 PARANORMAL FLASH FICTION CHALLENGE SECOND PLACE

and second place goes to…

Jennifer Quail

CIRCLE THE SQUARE

A walk around the block means something different in the country. Out here, where settlers had the space to lay everything out in an orderly grid, a block is a section, a square a mile long on every side. I don’t walk around the block every day. Four miles around on packed gravel with no sidewalks feels longer than it really is. 

On my right, the field is fallow, dotted by brown stubble marking the previous harvest. It won’t be long until it’s plowed under. I don’t miss the wall of cornstalks that rattle and hiss in the breeze, hiding anything from deer to coyotes to unnamed monsters my imagination conjures up. But harvest leaves a gaping space, stretching out to the vanishing point. There’s a house out beyond the road that marks the far boundary of this section. Even when I round the corner onto that road, the house never feels any closer. It’s always a speck in the distant field, white washed red by the setting sun. It could be abandoned, I could be abandoned, never another soul in sight.

Until I feel the eyes on the back of my head and hear the crunch of gravel and have the terrible certainty someone’s behind me. 

The left side is trees, almost up to the shoulder. Mailboxes and dark slashes of gravel or pavement mark houses, but except in winter and early spring they’re invisible. Even then some are so far away the bare branches only let out a glimpse of light from a window. They’re farther away than the lonely house and emptier somehow. I never see another soul along the road.

Until I see her in front of me.

The woman ahead must have come out of one of those drives when I wasn’t looking. There’s nowhere else. She’s dressed for the weather, tan fleece jacket, jeans, boots, hands in her pockets like she regrets not wearing gloves. Like me.

She doesn’t look back. I walk faster. 

I reach the corner. There is someone behind me, I can feel it. I walk faster. When I turn I’ll be able to see, out of the corner of my eye. I could turn left, go the other way, but I always turn right. 

They might go left. 

I catch a glimpse of tan fleece, jeans, shoulders hunched against the cold like me. I focus down the road, past the field, at the house that never gets closer.

She turns right but the crepuscular light is too dim to see her face. I should catch up. Maybe I should turn left, go the other way, but I always turn right. 

I don’t dare look back. Did she turn left? Two right turns to home. Walk faster.

I turn right. I’ve picked up the pace, but so has she. Maybe she’ll keep going around the block past my drive. 

I can’t shake the feeling that’s where she’ll stop. She’s still ahead, hands in her pockets, head down against the wind. Like me.

If I keep walking I’ll get home. But she’s behind me, I hear the footsteps, speeding up with mine. If I go in, she’ll know where I live.

What if she turns in at my house? Do I keep going? Pretend I didn’t see? 

What if I turn in and she follows? I don’t dare. I keep walking, gravel crunching, faster.

What if I take my eyes off her and turn in? I don’t dare. I keep walking, gravel crunching, faster.

We keep walking. Faster.

Four turns now. She’ll turn somewhere. Like me.

Assigned Phenomenon: Doppelgänger
This story was written as part of our recent paranormal-themed contest, in which each participant was assigned a different paranormal phenomenon.