Where He Can't Find You

by Darcy Coates

When Hope first started posting videos, it had felt like she was yelling into the void. She’d get a handful of views but no likes. No comments. She later admitted that she was on the edge of giving up when her first fans found her. Just five accounts to begin with—but those five accounts watched every video and always commented, asking for more. So she kept filming. Kept posting. Now, she had nearly two thousand subscribers. She’d started to get small sponsorship deals. But those five original followers were still there, still cheering her on with each new video, and she always replied to thank them. Abby hadn’t told Hope that the accounts were hers. She probably never would.

Things in Doubtful just broke easily.

“Haven’t you noticed how they’re different?” She squinted one eye open to see him. “Late night, and early morning? You can go jogging at four a.m. and people will think you’re just a little too healthy for your own good. But go jogging at midnight and…well. It’s weird, right? It’s just not normal.”

We want to feel that we have control over our destiny, that we wouldn’t ever make the same mistakes that cost someone else everything.

Sometimes the worst things that happen to you come from the smallest decisions. You lean on the accelerator instead of the break. Or you shift your weight on the ladder. Or you leap into the pool headfirst without checking how deep the water is. Tiny, tiny mistakes that would have been inconsequential any other day. But for some reason, the universe’s gears get jammed at that exact second, and your tiny mistake permanently changes the remainder of your life.

“Are we certain the Stitcher’s human?” Abby had no idea how to answer him.

“The Stitcher is Charles Vickers, isn’t he?” Nick clasped and unclasped his hands. He chuckled, nervous. “That’s a complicated question. No, he’s not exactly. But you’re also not terribly far off the mark.”

Nothing about Doubtful is quite as simple as it seems.”

“Knowledge does not always equal wisdom, as I’ve learned through my own repeated failings.

You never know how you’ll act under pressure until you’re forced to find out.