The floorboards in the hallway were always cold at three in the morning.

I stood outside Lily’s bedroom door, watching a thin wedge of yellow light spill onto the carpet.

The door was supposed to be shut.

I pushed it open, the hinges giving a soft, familiar creak.

At first, I only saw the silhouette.

A figure sat on the edge of Lily’s mattress, hunched over my sleeping eight-year-old daughter.

My heart hammered against my ribs.

“Who’s there?” I whispered, my voice trembling.

The figure turned slowly.

In the faint glow of the nightlight, Eleanor’s pale blue eyes stared back at me.

They were wide and vacant.

She was wearing her flannel nightgown, the one with the frayed lace collar.

“Eleanor?” I stepped into the room, my hands clenched into tight fists.

She didn’t answer me.

Instead, she reached out and stroked Lily’s hair with a dry, wrinkled hand.

“She looks just like her,” Eleanor murmured, her voice thin and hollow.

“The little one we lost.”

Lily stirred under her pink duvet, letting out a soft sigh, but she didn’t wake up.

I moved quickly, placing myself between Eleanor and my daughter’s bed.

“Eleanor, you need to go back to the guest room,” I said, keeping my voice low but firm.

She looked at me as if I were a stranger.

Then she stood up, her stiff joints popping in the quiet room.

Without another word, she shuffled past me.

The faint scent of lavender soap and old paper lingered in the air.

I closed Lily’s door gently, making sure the latch clicked.

Then I walked down the hall to our master bedroom.

Nathan was asleep, his chest rising and falling in a steady, peaceful rhythm.

He looked so calm.

He was the successful pediatric surgeon who spent his days saving other people’s children.

I pulled the heavy duvet off him.

“Nathan,” I said, my voice sharp. “Wake up.”

He blinked, squinting against the darkness of the room.

“Chloe? What’s wrong?”

“Your mother was just in Lily’s room,” I said, my hands shaking.

“She was sitting on her bed, talking about a lost child.”

Nathan sat up, rubbing his face with both hands.