***Spotify link to full playlist https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3Y3difpBaT27u2yhfkNG8u?si=SoFF1M-PS6S3gls998VPZQ&utm_source=copy-link ***

Sarah took the lens cap off from the video camera. She marched to the front door, crunching over the gravel laid down years ago by her grandfather, to stop mud entering the house.

Unlocking the door she pushed it open and stood in the entrance for a moment, gathering herself together. The moonlight framed her form from behind, throwing a shadow which covered the first steps of the stairs and stretched lazily over the hallway towards the kitchen. Someone was watching her. Eyes bored into the back of her neck as the fine hairs on her arms pricked up in alarm.

Spinning her head round, she found the culprit sitting in the top of a yew tree. Two reflective spheres of an owl's eyes glared at her. She breathed a sigh of relief, stuck out her tongue and blew a raspberry at the bird. Stepping into the farmhouse, she closed the door firmly behind her and flicked on the light switch beside the phone.

The bright illumination made her pupils dilate and her vision took a minute to adjust. She blinked her green eyes slowly, easing them into the light.

A bang came from the direction of the utility room as the back door swung shut. She must have left it open again. It wouldn't be the first time she'd forgotten to lock it before leaving for work in the morning. It worried her that she'd become so forgetful, it wasn't like her at all. Could this be a sign of early madness?

She kicked off her boots before checking her camera once again, it was ready to go. Just hit the record button and - Bob's your uncle - she had a good chance tonight. The moonlight always seemed to enhance the feeling here.

Her family home held no fear for her, well, apart from the front bedroom. That had been her parents' room and then hers after her mother had died, until she was nineteen. She made her way to the kitchen and passed through the dining room, coming to a stop at the living room archway.

She looked round at the chair at the head of the dining table. The wooden arms bore scratch marks caused by years of wear from the buttons of her grandfather's blazer. The movement of his arms as he flicked and straightened his morning newspaper or reached for his toast and tea caused the brass circles to chip against the wood. He never raised his gaze from the print. His pipe used to send up trails of sweet smelling smoke, as it curled upwards. It had always tried to escape the room through the window he had left on the latch. It didn't open anymore. The old, metal latch had long since broken. The last thing he'd asked her to do was to call on Luke's father to come and see if he could fix it. Her grandfather's chair now sat permanently vacant. Her heart still ached without him around.

Holding up the shoebox sized camera, Sarah gazed through the viewer screen which flipped out at the side of the machine and adjusted the focus. Concentrating on the pale lit square of the living room window, she paned over the room slowly. She focused on steadying her breathing as she moved her arms around. Her finger hovered over the 'record' button as she waited for the familiar hint of the scent of lavender which proceeded most of the unusual scuttling and scraping sounds that were common to this part of the house.

But it was the other kinds of movements she was more interested in catching on film. The ones that had unnerved her grandfather enough to cause him to cover up the furniture and banish any interaction with the room. He said it had sent her father crazy. Quite literally, as he was still a resident in the facility for the mentally disturbed, fifteen miles down the road.

She didn't think it was only the room that had affected his mind. Her mother's early death probably had a lot more to do with it. His gradual decline through the years was fixed in Sarah's childhood memories of spasmodic episodes of rage, never physically directed at her, mingled with shut down periods. This was how her grandfather had put it. Times when her father just wasn't at home in his head anymore.

One particular image she had imprinted in her mind was that of her father standing at the back door in the middle of the night. She must have been about ten years old at the time, and she distinctly recalled having been put to bed earlier that night by her grandfather. She had loved the bedtime stories he'd given her, but they had made her sleep restlessly as they'd always been so exciting. As usual she'd woken in the early hours and gone to collect a glass of water. The utility door had been open and so she'd looked through to see who was still up. Her father had been looking straight at her. His back to the garden, standing ridged in the open back doorway. The dark night had surrounded his shape, but his face was a blank. The memory of his vacant, staring eyes caused her to shiver in the here and now. He had still been standing there the morning after, and she'd watched her grandfather coax him back inside and up the stairs. All the while her father had been lost in another place in his own mind.

This was an aspect of her life which scared her far more than any paranormal activity. The fact that her previously wonderful, devoted father, a man who had lived to laugh along with her mother, could transform so steadily into a creature of Jekyll and Hyde tendencies. If it had happened to him, how was she going to be able to stop such a thing taking over her own mind. With all the loss she had lived with, her mother, her best friend and her beloved grandfather. What was to halt the progression of her mind sliping away from her control? How would she even know if or when it was happening? Clearly her father had no idea or surely he would have been able to do something about it. The way he'd had no choice in the matter terrified her. Using the camera to track down things she couldn't explain made her feel like she did have a choice. It was something tangeable and tactile, not abstract and unreal. It were as if she could take control of the situation somehow, being in charge of what she recorded with the safety of a view finder between her and the other world she felt but couldn't see.

Quiet ruled the house that night. So unlike the bookshop were she spent her days working. No traffic, no passing pedestrians, no sound system playing the grunge bands her boss was so into. Nothing. No leaves rustling in the wind, not even the chirp of crickets.

She yawned, it had been a long week but Friday night was her turn to host the guys. It had been that way since college. Duncan and Luke took their turn on a Saturday night. More often than not at Duncan's flat in Norwich, so they could make the most of the nightlife there. Luke's family farm wasn't much different from Sarah's, just larger and more modern, and his village didn't have anything anymore interesting to do compared to here.

Shuffling her feet as she moved the camera round, the thread of her green cotton socks caught on the splinters of the floorboards snagging up tiny loops. Her arms ached from holding the camera.
Come on... Come on... Something? Anything? Wait. There. By the fireplace.
Something moved so quickly that she had to snap back from looking at the covered sofa under the window and pull round to aim in lower.
There!
At the bottom of the boards hammered across the opening of the fireplace. Focusing harder through the viewfinder, she could just make out a sliver of a gap between the boards and the glint of dirty brass grating in the hearth. Something flickered. As she concentrated, the air temperature started to drop, sending goosebumps shivering along her spine.
Here we go.
Where was the lavender scent? She stared so intently at the point in the fireplace that when the phone in the hallway rang she jumped on the spot, banging her nose on the viewfinder.

"Shit!"

Annoyed by the interruption, she put down the camera on the dining table with a thud and stomped off to answer the call.

Ripping the receiver from its place on the wall, Sarah answered in the usual manner.

"8356172? Yes?"

A muffled scratching and clicking came to her from the other end of the line.

"Yes, hello, can I help you?" Sarah had an inclination that this was probably going to be one of those pre-recorded publicity things or something like that, but being trained and well practiced in dealing with the paying public, she had patience.

A kind of slurping and more clicking noises, followed by what sounded like a male voice clearing his throat, but still no words.

"Is there anyone there? If you don't answer right now I'm going to hang up."

A man's voice faintly answered. "Wait.... please, wait. I want to, to ask you something."

"Ey? Who is this?"

"I want to know, what colour are... your knickers?"

"Oh fuck off!"

Sarah slammed the phone back on its holder, now mad as hell. Her dark eyebrows knitted together and she ripped off her smart, black work jacket, and threw it across the hallway. She stormed up the stairs to use the bathroom, yanked open the door and slammed it behind her.

She sorted herself out and changed into her grey leggings and long, baggy checked shirt, splashed cold water on her face and rubbed her eye makeup with the hand towel, creating a fetching smoky effect.

Staring at herself in the round shaving mirror on the windowsill, Sarah commented to her reflection, still fuming from the dirty phone call.

"Now why the hell can't I look this good in the morning?"

She flicked the mirror on its hinges till it faced the mould flecked ceiling. Even though she knew that it would be facing the floor the next time she came in the room. It always turned downwards in her absence somehow. She fixed her shoulder length hair into a cute high ponytail, before stomping back downstairs.

A car pulled up behind her battered Land Rover, Sarah glanced out of the narrow window next to the phone and saw the shadowy shape of Duncan Goodwin step out from his Mercedes. She'd recognise him anywhere.

He stood a bit shorter than her at five foot nine, with a slight build and broad shoulders, what you might call an everyday kind of bloke. However, his charismatic manner and easy looks gave him an edge of desirability and Sarah was not immune.

Pulling down the track and grinding to a halt behind Duncan's white car, Luke Tyler grinded his bashed up Jeep to a halt, sending up a spray of gravel.

Sarah grinned as she waited for what she expected to be Duncan's reaction.

"Hey! Arsehole." Duncan yelled at the Jeep, his hands held up high in exasperation. "Watch the paintwork. This one's not made by bloody Tonker Toys you know."

With a squeal of rusted metal, a big, blonde man with a long, beard clambered out of the mucky vehicle with his hands full of shopping bags. His hair tied back in a thick braid.

"Ah, so sorry, Dunc. Did I scratch your penis enhancement machine again? Come on, give me a hand will ya? I got us fish and chips."

"And beer?"

Luke handed over a clanking carrier bag full of bottles to his friend. "Here. Don't say I never give you anything." When he looked up at the little window next to the front door, Sarah knew the hallway light would be surrounding her laughing face in a halo of auburn hair. He smiled at her.

Both of the men still wore their work clothes. For Duncan that meant a smart, white shirt and faded jeans. He worked for himself so he could choose what he wanted. Luckily for him, he had good style. Luke was in his uniform of a red collared t-shirt and black trousers from the computer shop chain he worked for. Definitely not his choice of clothing.

His family, the Tyler's, had lived and worked on the same sheep farm, seven miles away in the next village for countless generations. They expected Luke to take it over once his father had had enough. However, that was a long way down the line considering how healthy and active his father still was. Besides, she thought that son number two, Luke, was far more interested in technology than farming while son number one, Chris, was winning the Brownie points by serving his time in the army.

Duncan opened the front door and peered around it in a dramatic, vampire impersonation, his fingers gripping the edge of the door one by one and snarling, showing his teeth to Sarah behind the door, glaring his cool blue eyes at her.

"Blah, blah, blah, I want to suck your thumb."

Sarah held up her hands in mock terror and screamed a piercing screech.

"Eeekk please! Somebody help me."

Bursting through the door Duncan grabbed around Sarah's substantial waist and attempted to dip her backwards while making a dive for her throat. She felt him struggle a bit as she was a big girl.

"Blah, blah, blah. Then I want to bite your bum."

Luke's large body banged open the door, bashing it against Duncan's backside, rattling the bag of bottles hooked on his arm. Duncan yelled at him.
"Careful, farmboy."

Luke carried on through the hallway, ignoring the two of them. He went into the kitchen from where Sarah could hear him banging the top kitchen cupboards and whistling out of key to 'Sweet home Alabama'.

Sarah smacked at Duncan to let her go and slapped his bottom roughly as she pushed past him.

"Ooh, saucy." He smirked, then rubbed his door-bruised bottom as he followed her into the kitchen.

Luke tore open one of the packets of fish and chips on the counter top, his fingers sliding on the greaseproof paper and proceeded to cover the food with salt and vinegar, licking the hot fat off from his fingers.

"Did you have any luck?" He glanced sideways at Sarah as she opened up her own packet and took the salt and vinegar containers from him.

"Not tonight." She smiled up at the tall man, a real life gentle giant. Her previous bad temper had subsided. "Got a phone call from an old friend though."

"What, ho!" Duncan reached between the two of them and snatched the remaining parcel. "Not our old buddy with the underwear fetish again?"

"Yep, the one and only."

Luke sighed heavily and waved a long chip at Sarah. "You've got to make your number ex-directory, stop that bloody weirdo from calling."

Duncan laughed loudly, clapping Luke on the back. "I thought you'd scared him off when she put you on the phone last time. You remember? When he asked you what colour your bra was and he must have shit himself because Eric the Viking here told him, 'blue and lacy mate.' God I nearly pissed myself laughing."

Luke grinned and took the bag of bottles from Duncan, leading them all out to the garden. They sat themselves down in the plastic loungers to enjoy dinner.

"Here's to Friday nights, guys." Sarah raised a bottle of beer, reaching forward to clink their good cheer. As she did so, she realised that her white, lacy bra and cleveage were being put on display while her over sized shirt gaped open.

Duncan raised an eyebrow and she noticed that he took in a good portion.

He grinned. "Oh, yes indeedy."

She saw Luke catch his friend's eye as he slapped Duncan hard across the back of his curly brown head.

"To Friday, " Luke toasted, clinking his bottle with Sarah's. His dark eyes met hers and he smiled. "And as always, here's to absent friends."