Chapter 3

That night, I was jolted awake by a violent shaking. My whole body was being rattled back and forth. For a second, I thought it was an earthquake.

Then I heard the scream.

My eyes flew open. It was Karen. She was in her bed across the room, thrashing wildly, her limbs flailing. But she wasn't having a nightmare. Her eyes were wide open, staring at the ceiling in sheer, unadulterated terror. They were shot with red, the pupils tiny black dots.

"Get it off me!" she screamed, her voice cracking. "Get it off!"

Her body twisted in a way that looked unnatural, painful. Her back arched, and she clawed at her own arms as if trying to rip something off her skin.

Jessica was already out of bed, fumbling for the light switch. The room flooded with harsh, fluorescent light.

"Karen! Karen, what's wrong? Wake up!" Jessica yelled, rushing to her side but hesitating to touch her.

Karen's screaming didn't stop. She thrashed again, a violent jerk that sent her tumbling out of the bed. She hit the floor with a sickening thud, her head cracking against the leg of her desk.

Then, silence. She lay on the floor, completely still, a thin line of blood trickling from her temple.

"Oh my god," Jessica breathed, her hands flying to her mouth. "Karen!"

I scrambled to my feet, my heart pounding against my ribs. We both knelt beside her. She was unconscious, but she was breathing.

Jessica called 911. The paramedics arrived within minutes, followed by campus security. They loaded Karen onto a stretcher. As they carried her out, she started to come to. Her eyes fluttered open, unfocused and dazed. Then they landed on me.

The terror immediately returned to her face.

"No," she whimpered, trying to shrink away, even on the stretcher. "Don't let her near me."

One of the security officers, a stern-looking woman, turned to me. "What happened here?"

"I don't know," I stammered. "She just started screaming. We woke up, and she fell out of bed."

The officer's eyes narrowed, taking in my presence in the room. "You're not on the resident list for this room."

"She's my friend," Jessica cut in quickly. "Her roommates transferred without telling her. She had nowhere else to go."

The officer gave me a long, hard look before turning her attention back to getting Karen out of the building.

The next day, we were called into the office of our college advisor, Professor Thompson. He was a kind, middle-aged man with a perpetually worried expression, but today he looked sterner than I'd ever seen him.

Karen was there, sitting in a chair as far from me as she could get. She had a bandage on her forehead and refused to look in my direction. Her parents were on a speakerphone on the professor's desk, their voices tinny and angry.

"She is not spending another night in that building," Karen's mother said sharply. "I don't know what's going on with that girl, but my daughter is terrified."

Professor Thompson held up a hand. "We are handling the situation, Mrs. Davis. Karen will be moved to a new room immediately." He looked at me, his brow furrowed. "Sarah, we need to talk about your housing situation. But first, I need to understand what's been happening. First, your three roommates from Room 304, Emily White, Ashley Green, and Megan Brown, all file for emergency transfers on the same day, citing 'personal safety concerns.' They refused to give any details, just that they couldn't be near you. Now, Lisa Chen and Karen Davis have had extreme reactions to you. Karen's parents are telling me she's been having night terrors ever since you started staying in the room."

He leaned forward, his hands clasped on the desk. "All five of them, Sarah. Five different students are terrified of you. Karen was shaking when she talked to me this morning. She said she's afraid to even be in the same building as you. You need to tell me what is going on between you and these girls."

My throat felt tight. "I don't know," I said, my voice small. "I honestly don't know. I haven't done anything. I got back from a trip and they were just... gone. And Lisa and Karen, I only met them two nights ago."

"Sarah is the victim here," Jessica argued, stepping forward. "Her friends abandoned her without a word. She's the one who's been left completely in the dark."

Professor Thompson sighed, rubbing his temples. He looked from Jessica's defensive posture to my confused and miserable face, then to Karen, who was practically trying to merge with the wall.

"I'm not accusing anyone," he said, his voice softening slightly. "But this is an unprecedented situation. I've never seen anything like it. Five students. All of them afraid of one person."

He looked at me with a mix of pity and bewilderment. "Sarah, there has to be something you're not telling me."

But there wasn't. There was a gaping hole in my life where my friends used to be, and now this new, inexplicable fear followed me wherever I went. I was the common denominator, the center of it all, and I had no idea why.