Chapter 3 Yesterday's Picture

I didn't touch the Polaroid at first.

I couldn't.

It sat on my kitchen counter where I'd dropped it, the glossy square reflecting the dim light overhead, mocking me. My fingers twitched every time I passed, but I forced myself not to look too closely. Not yet.

The only thing worse than finding another Polaroid taped to my window was the date written on the back. Tomorrow.

It was impossible, absurd. Photos captured the past, not the future. And yet there I was in the image - hand on the curtain, head turned slightly, caught mid-motion in the exact moment I had just lived.

Except it wasn't dated today. It was dated one day ahead.

I spent the night pacing, my nerves stretched thin as piano wire. Every creak of the floorboards, every hum of the refrigerator made me jump. My apartment felt like a trap I'd wandered into, and the walls were closing in.

At some point near dawn, exhaustion dragged me onto the couch. I dozed fitfully, dreams tangled with flashes of beaches I'd never been to and Christmas trees I'd never decorated.

When I woke, the first thing I did was check the Polaroid again.

It was still there. Still me. Still dated tomorrow.

The logical part of me whispered explanations. Maybe the date was a mistake. Maybe whoever had left it miswrote. Maybe it wasn't even me in the picture at all, just a cruel trick.

But I knew better.

I knew because the shirt I wore in the photo - a faded gray tee with a hole near the collar - was lying in a heap on my bedroom floor. I hadn't worn it in weeks.

Until that night.

The realization crawled over my skin like ants. Whoever was taking these photos wasn't just watching me. They were predicting me. Or... controlling me.

The thought curdled my stomach.

By noon, paranoia had gnawed me raw. I needed answers, but the only lead I had was him. My ex. The one who pretended not to know, but whose voice had cracked when I confronted him about Myrtle Beach.

I scrolled through my contacts and hovered over his name. Every instinct screamed at me not to. He wouldn't talk. He'd twist my words, gaslight me the way he always had.

But he knew something.

I dialed anyway.

It rang once. Twice. Then voicemail.

I hung up. Called again.

This time he answered, voice sharp. "I told you not to call me."

"You lied," I said. My throat was tight, but I forced the words out. "About Myrtle Beach. About the photos."

He was silent long enough for me to hear traffic in the background. Then: "You don't understand what you're messing with."

"Then explain it."

"I can't." His voice cracked, and for the first time, I heard fear. Not annoyance, not anger. Fear. "They'll know if I talk."

"They?"

Click.

The line went dead.

I stared at my phone, cold spreading through my chest. They. Not me. Not you're crazy. He'd said they.

Which meant he wasn't behind it. Or at least, not alone.

The day dragged in a haze. I couldn't eat. Couldn't work. I just kept circling my apartment, double-checking locks, yanking blinds shut, waiting for another sound outside my window.

By late afternoon, I snapped.

I grabbed the box, the Polaroids, everything, and dumped them into a backpack. If I stayed here, I'd lose my mind. I needed to move, to act. To chase the only lead I had.

The Seaview Inn.

Myrtle Beach was six hours away by car. I told myself it was reckless, insane, but the decision had already been made. The Polaroid with tomorrow's date sat in my bag, burning like a live coal.

If the photos could show me my past, maybe the Inn could show me my future.

I left just before dusk.

The highway blurred under my headlights as the city fell away, replaced by dark stretches of forest and empty fields. The farther I drove, the tighter my chest grew, like I was threading myself into a trap.

Somewhere past midnight, fatigue clawed at me. I pulled into a roadside motel - one of those sagging two-story places with flickering neon signs and curtains that never quite close.

The room smelled faintly of bleach and mildew. I locked the door, shoved a chair under the knob, and collapsed onto the bed.

Sleep came fast, but it wasn't kind.

I dreamed of mirrors. Of dozens of me, lined up in neat rows, each one a fraction off - a smile too wide, an eye too dull, a hand raised at the wrong angle. They whispered in unison, words I couldn't hear, until one of them pressed against the glass and mouthed: We're not done.

I woke gasping, sweat plastering the sheets to my skin.

And on the nightstand, propped against the lamp, was another Polaroid.

My blood turned to ice.

It showed me in this room, tangled in these sheets, asleep.

The date on the back: Yesterday.

I stared until my vision blurred. My throat closed around a scream I didn't dare let out.

Who had been here? How had they gotten in without me hearing?

I tore the room apart - checked under the bed, in the closet, even yanked open the bathroom curtain. Nothing. Just the stale stink of mildew and the hum of the air conditioner.

But the photo was real.

The me in it was real.

And the date - yesterday - made less sense than anything else.

If the Polaroid from my apartment had shown the future, this one showed the past. But not just the past. A past that shouldn't exist. A moment that hadn't happened - until it had.

It was like someone was rewriting time around me, one glossy square at a time.

I stuffed the photo into my backpack and sat against the wall, knees to my chest, waiting for daylight. My thoughts spiraled tighter and tighter, every explanation worse than the last.

When dawn finally bled through the curtains, I was already packed.

I didn't stop for breakfast. Didn't stop for gas until the tank was nearly empty. Just kept driving south, toward Myrtle Beach, toward the Seaview Inn, toward whatever answers waited.

But the question gnawed at me the whole way:

If someone could take photos of tomorrow... and yesterday...

What did that make me today?