The Window Nod

On the last night of January, the old farmhouse creaked like a ship in a storm, though the air outside was still. Marta had just settled into the back bedroom, the one that faced the fallow fields, when her two-year-old, Elsie, began to stir in her crib. The clock on the nightstand glowed 2:03 AM. Marta sighed, padded over, and lifted the warm, sleepy child into her arms. Elsie’s eyes fluttered open, and she gave a small, satisfied sigh as Marta tucked her into the big bed, pulling the quilt up to her chin.

Marta reached for the lamp, but Elsie’s tiny hand shot out, grabbing her wrist. ‘No, Mummy, no,’ she said, her voice eerily clear for that hour. Marta hesitated, then clicked the switch anyway, plunging the room into darkness. She lay back, one arm around Elsie, and stared at the ceiling. Within moments, she felt Elsie stiffen beside her. She turned to look. In the faint moonlight that filtered through the lace curtains, she saw Elsie’s eyes wide open, fixed on the window. A slow smile spread across her face, and she began to giggle, a soft, gurgling sound that seemed too knowing for a child. Then she laughed outright, as if sharing a private joke with someone invisible.

Marta’s skin prickled. ‘Elsie, sweetheart, what is it? What’s so funny?’ Elsie didn’t respond, just kept giggling, her gaze never leaving the window. Then she raised a hand and touched her cheek, as if something were caressing it, and she murmured, ‘Ssshhh, it’s here.’ Marta sat up, her heart thudding. ‘Elsie, tell Mummy who’s there. Who is it?’ But Elsie was gone, her attention wholly absorbed by whatever she saw in the darkness beyond the glass. Marta glanced at the window herself, saw only the reflection of the room and the black void outside. She reached for her phone, her hand shaking. ‘I’m calling Daddy,’ she said, and as she said it, she heard the front door open downstairs. Her husband, Sam, was home early from his night shift.

The footsteps came up the stairs, and the bedroom door swung open. ‘Sam?’ Marta said, but the figure in the doorway was taller, thinner, and it stood there without moving, a silhouette against the hall light. Marta’s breath caught. Then Elsie turned her head from the window to the door, and slowly, deliberately, she nodded at the figure, as if acknowledging an old friend. The figure took a step back, and Sam’s voice came from downstairs, ‘Marta? I’m home! Sorry, the door was unlocked, did I scare you?’ Marta snapped her head back to the door, but the hallway was empty. Sam appeared a moment later, yawning, and Elsie finally closed her eyes, a contented smile on her face.

Marta tried to laugh it off, but she couldn’t shake the image of Elsie nodding at that shape. She told Sam about the laughing, the touching, the ‘sshhh’ and the window. He brushed it off as a child’s imagination. ‘She’s two, Marta, she sees things we don’t.’ But Marta wasn’t satisfied. She called her mother, an old woman who knew the old ways. ‘It could be a friend,’ her mother said, her voice hesitant. ‘But there are friends, and there are friends. You need to watch her. If she starts talking to it, naming it, you come to me.’ Marta agreed, and hung up. She lay back down, pulling Elsie close, and stared at the window until dawn broke, but she saw nothing.

The next night, Elsie was in her own room. Marta kept the baby monitor on, but Elsie was silent. At 2 AM sharp, the monitor crackled. Marta heard Elsie whispering, too soft to make out. Then a giggle. Then a voice that was not Elsie’s, low and muffled, as if it came from far away, but unmistakably present. ‘It’s time, little one.’ Marta flew to Elsie’s room, throwing open the door. Elsie was sitting up in her crib, staring at the window, which was wide open, though the latch had been rusted shut for years. The wind was blowing the curtains inward, and on the glass, in condensation, was a child’s handprint, too small for Elsie, too perfect.

Marta snatched Elsie up, held her tight, and called Sam. They moved to the living room, all lights blazing. Elsie was quiet, her head buried in Marta’s shoulder. ‘She’s fine,’ Sam said, but his hands were shaking. Marta didn’t sleep that night. She watched the windows, the doors, the shadows. In the morning, she packed a bag and drove to her mother’s, miles away. For weeks, nothing happened. Elsie was her normal, bubbly self. Marta began to relax, to think it was just a phase, a night terror.

Then, on a sunny afternoon, while Marta was hanging laundry in the garden, she heard Elsie laugh, a clear, joyful sound. She turned and saw Elsie pointing at a spot near the old well, a place where the grass never grew, a circle of bare earth. ‘Look, Mummy, he’s back!’ Elsie said. Marta followed her gaze, but saw only the well, its wooden cover rotted and askew, and the dark opening beneath. Elsie walked toward it, her hand outstretched. Marta dropped the laundry and ran, catching Elsie just before she reached the edge. ‘No, Elsie, no!’ she cried. Elsie looked up at her, her eyes not entirely her own, and said in that same low voice, ‘But I’m already here.’ And then she smiled, and nodded, and Marta saw, in the dust on the well’s rim, a fresh handprint, small and perfect, as if a child had just touched it. Marta grabbed Elsie and ran inside, locking every door. She called her mother, but the line was dead. She looked at Elsie, who had started giggling again, her eyes fixed on the kitchen window, and Marta knew, with a sick certainty, that the friend had followed them home, and it would never leave until it had what it came for.