The alarm buzzed like a hornet trapped in my skull. 5:47 a.m., the same godforsaken time every shift at The Daily Drip demanded.
I slapped it silent, my hand fumbling over the nightstand cluttered with half-read poetry books and empty chamomile tea bags.
Eldridge City didn't believe in gentle awakenings; it preferred the rude shove of garbage trucks rumbling down cracked asphalt and the distant wail of sirens that never quite reached their mark.
I rolled out of bed, bare feet hitting the cold laminate floor of my one-bedroom shoebox apartment.
Rent was $1,200 a month for 400 square feet of regret—peeling wallpaper in the kitchenette, a shower that dripped like a leaky faucet of despair.
Mom called it "character"; Dad called it "temporary." Both were wrong. It was just mine.
Mirror check: Auburn curls a tangled halo, hazel eyes shadowed from last night's scrolling through rejection emails for my chapbook submissions.
Elara Kane: Poet of the Forgotten. Yeah, right. At twenty-three, I was more forgotten than poet.
Freckles dusted my nose like misplaced stars, and my curves—soft hips, full breasts—strained against the faded band tee I'd slept in.
Cute enough to flirt for tips, not enough to escape the grind.
Breakfast was black coffee, scalding and bitter, gulped while scrolling the local news on my cracked phone screen.
Eldridge Morning Herald: Another Night, Another Shadow—Victim #4 Escapes "The Wire's" Grasp.
My stomach twisted. The article was sparse, as always—woman in her thirties, found wandering I-95 at 3 a.m., babbling about "wires in her head" and a man who made her confess sins she'd buried for years.
No death, thank God, but the torture... bruises like lace across her thighs, cigarette burns spelling Liar on her forearm.
Mental games too: recordings of her own voice, twisted into pleas for mercy she never made.
The city was unraveling.
Mom had texted last night: Lock your doors, baby. That monster's getting bold.
Dad, ever the pragmatist, forwarded a police advisory: Stay vigilant. Report suspicious activity.
As if Eldridge PD had time for "suspicious" when half their budget went to bribing union reps.
Friends group chat lit up: Lila (my coworker, all sharp edges and sharper envy) with memes about "Wire-proof panties," Theo (the bar regular who tipped too much and lingered too long) offering to walk me home.
I replied with a thumbs-up emoji, because what else? Fear was currency here—spend it, and you're broke.
I slipped into my uniform—black apron over jeans that hugged just right—grabbed my notebook, and headed out.
The stairwell smelled of stale piss and yesterday's takeout, Mrs. Hargrove's door creaking open as I passed.
"Elara, honey, you see that Ramirez boy lurking again? Eyes like a fox in the henhouse."
She was sixty-five, widowed, and convinced every shadow was a suitor or a thief.
Ramirez was the neighbor across the hall—tattooed, quiet, always "forgetting" his mail by my door with a wink.
Harmless flirt, or so I told myself.
"Will do, Mrs. H," I called, heart picking up as I hit the street.
Eldridge at dawn was a bruise—purple skies bleeding into gray concrete, the East River churning like it wanted to swallow the whole borough.
My bus stop was three blocks, past the bodega where old man Patel slipped me free samosas if I smiled wide enough.
Today, he didn't. "Bad night," he muttered, nodding at the TV behind the counter.
Grainy footage: A press conference, Commissioner Hale with his comb-over and forced gravitas. "We're deploying additional patrols. The task force is world-class—FBI consultants on board. This Wire? He's a ghost, but ghosts leave traces."
Traces. Like the one on victim's #3—a microchip scar behind her ear, pulsing with a looped audio of her childhood abuse, played on repeat until she clawed her own skin raw.
The city reacted like you'd expect: Bars emptied early, apps for "safety buddies" spiked, churches overflowed with prayers for the damned.
Women like me? We clutched pepper spray and second-guessed every alley cat's meow.
Parents like mine? Double-locked doors and curfews I hadn't followed since high school.
Friends? Jokes to mask the jitter.
The bus lurched up, late as sin, and I wedged in beside a suit who smelled of Axe and anxiety.
His knee brushed mine—accidental? Theo's face flashed in my mind, all earnest smiles and "Let me buy you dinner sometime?"
Lila's voice in my ear: Girl, he's harmless. Unlike that boss of yours, always "accidentally" grabbing your ass.
Jealousy simmered under her barbs; she'd kill for my tips, my "easy" charm.
But easy? It was armor, paper-thin.
As the city blurred past—graffiti-tagged warehouses, hookers nursing hangovers on stoops—I jotted in my notebook: In the wire of the world, we tangle, unspooling secrets we never meant to share.
Profound? Nah. But it beat screaming.
Little did I know, someone was already reading between the lines.