Small Acts
The Light That Went Out

Six Years of Nights

August 25, 2026 · Part 2 of 10 · 2 min

I didn't sleep well. Told myself it was my hip. Wasn't my hip.

By six the next morning I was back on the porch with a mug of coffee gone cold in my hand, watching Louise Tanner's house like it owed me money. Nothing moved. Her ancient sedan sat in the driveway with a fine skin of pollen on the windshield, same as it had for at least two days by the look of it. The mystery car from last night was gone.

Around nine, Delphine came by on her mail route, ball cap pulled low, snapping her gum like she was punishing it.

"Morning, sunshine," she said, which is her idea of a joke, on account of my face doesn't do sunshine.

"Louise get any mail yesterday?" I asked.

Delphine checked her cart. "Three days' worth stacking up, actually. Figured she was out of town." She squinted at the house. "Why?"

"No reason." I don't share my business easily, and I wasn't about to start with a woman who tells the whole route everything by lunch.

Truth is, I have history with that house I've never told anyone. Six years back, before her husband died, I hollered at their son for peeling out on this street doing sixty in a twenty-five. Words were exchanged. Ugly ones, on both sides. He didn't come around after that, not that I noticed, and Louise never once brought it up — just kept nodding at me over her mums like nothing happened, kind in a way I didn't deserve.

Maybe that's why I've watched her light all these years. Guilt wears funny shoes.

By afternoon I couldn't stand it anymore. I walked across, slow on account of my hip, and knocked.

Nothing.

I knocked again, harder, and pressed my ear near the door. For one second — just one — I swear I heard the floor creak upstairs, like weight shifting from one foot to the other.

Then the porch light directly above my head, the one that hadn't worked in three days, flickered on for exactly two seconds.

And went dark again.

Continue the story Part 3: The Face in the Window →

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