For weeks, her daughter had been talking about her new teacher as if he were some kind of superhero.
“Mr. Blake is the best, Mom,”
She’d gush over dinner.
“He makes every lesson fun, and he knows everything.”
At first, she had smiled and nodded, happy her daughter liked school so much. But the way the little girl spoke about him constantly, almost obsessively began to nag at her. She brushed it off as a harmless crush on a favorite teacher. After all, kids got attached to adults they liked. It was normal. Still, after nearly a month of hearing Mr. Blake this and Mr. Blake that, she decided she wanted to meet him herself. She’d only ever spoken to him over the phone for school matters, brief exchanges about homework and schedules.
One Friday morning, she offered to drive her daughter to school instead of letting her take the bus. The girl was delighted.
“You’ll finally see him!”
She said, practically bouncing in her seat as they pulled into the school parking lot. The plan was simple, drop her off, say hello to this remarkable teacher, and get on with her day. They parked, and she waited in the car as her daughter scanned the sidewalk.
“There he is!”
The girl squealed after a few minutes, pointing toward the school entrance. A man emerged from the building. Tall, neatly dressed in a crisp white shirt and navy tie, his clothes so perfectly pressed they looked untouched by human movement. His posture was perfect, his hair combed with precision, his expression warm but reserved. She studied him for a moment. Something about him… felt familiar. Unsettlingly familiar. But she couldn’t place it.
The thought pricked at her mind, but the morning rush and the dozens of other things she had to do today pressed in like a weight. She didn’t have time to linger on vague feelings. With a polite smile, she waved to her daughter and drove away, chalking it up to déjà vu.
That night, she was cooking dinner when she heard her daughter humming in the living room. Then singing. At first, it was just background noise, sweet and harmless. But then the melody hit her like ice water down her spine. She knew that song. The lyrics were slightly wrong, as if her daughter were filling in the parts she didn’t remember, but the tune was unmistakable. Six years ago, before she’d moved to this city, a man had stalked her. He had learned her routines, sent her notes, followed her car. He’d once left a voicemail in the middle of the night—just that song playing, over and over, no words, no explanation.
It had been the last straw. She had fled across the state, changed her phone number, even legally altered her last name. She had built a new life where she and her daughter could be safe. And now, here it was again. The realization sat in her gut like a stone, cold and heavy. She asked her daughter where she’d learned the song.
“Oh,”
The girl said casually,
“Mr. Blake sings it sometimes when he’s helping me with reading.”
She forced a smile, but her insides were screaming. For the next several days, she did what she’d always promised herself she’d do if she ever felt unsafe again—she investigated. While her daughter was at school, she combed through public records, school staff bios, and social media. She traced what little information she could find on Mr. Blake and lined it up with what she remembered about him. The years. The locations. The physical descriptions. Every detail fit too neatly to be coincidence. It was him. Her hands shook as she closed the laptop. He had found her.
She thought about running. About packing everything she could into the car and vanishing before nightfall, just like before. But this time, she had an advantage—she knew who he was, and she wasn’t going to spend the rest of her life looking over her shoulder. So she set a trap.
The following Thursday, she called a trusted friend and arranged for her daughter to spend the night at her house. She didn’t tell her the whole truth—just that there was something she had to deal with at the school. That evening, she parked in the school lot and waited. The building loomed in the fading light, the windows darkening one by one as the sun went down. She knew his schedule. He stayed late on Thursdays to prepare lessons. When he finally emerged from the building, briefcase in hand, she stepped forward from where she’d been leaning against her car. Her phone was already recording.
“Do you remember me?”
She asked, her voice low but steady. He froze mid-step. She played the song from her phone—the same version he’d once sent her years ago. For a moment, his expression was blank. Then, slowly, the polite mask he wore slipped. His smile twisted, his eyes sharpening into something colder, hungrier.
“You were always so… observant,”
He said, his tone dripping with something that made her skin crawl. She smiled coldly.
“And you were always predictable.”
Right on cue, two police cruisers pulled into the lot, lights flashing. Officers emerged, moving toward them with purpose. She had pressed charges years ago; the case had never gone to trial because he’d disappeared. But now, with the recording, the identification, and the witness accounts, there was no escaping. As they cuffed him, he leaned closer, voice a whisper meant only for her.
“I just wanted us to be a family,”
He murmured, almost pleading. Her jaw tightened. She stepped closer to him, her voice steady, almost calm.
“You’ll never see her again.”
She didn’t wait for his response. She turned and walked away, the sound of his voice once the thing she feared most, now nothing more than background noise. Her daughter was safe. And this time, she intended to keep it that way.
