🌹 THE LUST LUNER 🌹 Some desires are better left in the dark. Maya woke to the sound of knocking. At first, she didn't move. She lay still beneath her blanket, eyes half-open, listening. The room was dark except for the faint light coming through the curtains. Her ceiling fan turned slowly above her, making the same soft clicking sound it always made when it rotated. She waited, nothing. Maya exhaled and pulled the blanket higher. Probably the wind. She closed her eyes. Knock. Her eyes opened again, this time, she sat up. The sound had definitely come from the window. She glanced at the clock on her bedside table. 1:17 a.m. “Seriously?” She rubbed her eyes. Maybe a branch had hit the glass. That had happened before during heavy rain. But there was no rain tonight.Maya reached for her phone and turned on the flashlight. The room suddenly felt smaller. She stared at the window from her bed.Another knock didn't come, for several seconds, she considered ignoring it. Then curiosity won. She slipped her feet into her slippers and walked toward the window. With every step, she became more aware of how quiet the house was. Too quiet, she stopped a few feet from the curtains, her hand hovered over them. “It's probably nothing,” she whispered. She pulled the curtain aside. The street below was almost empty. A few houses still had their porch lights on. A car passed at the far end of the road, its headlights briefly cutting through the darkness. Maya frowned. There was no one outside her window. She almost laughed at herself. “See?” She was about to close the curtain when she noticed someone standing across the street. A man. He stood beneath a streetlight, hands in the pockets of a dark jacket. Maya stared. She couldn't see his face clearly from that distance. She wondered if he was waiting for someone. Then he looked up, straight at her. Maya froze. Her first thought was simple, how long has he been standing there? She stepped back from the window.The man didn't move. A strange feeling crawled up her spine, not recognition, not yet. Just the uncomfortable feeling of being watched. Maya quickly let the curtain fall. She stood there for a moment, staring at the fabric. “Okay,” she whispered to herself. “That's creepy.” She reached for her phone. Before she could unlock it, the screen lit up with an incoming message. Unknown Number. Maya's stomach tightened. She opened it. «Don't look outside again.» Her eyebrows drew together, she read it twice. Then a second message appeared. «He's looking for you.» Maya stared at the screen, a nervous laugh escaped her. “This isn't funny.” She immediately wondered if one of her friends was playing a prank on her. She typed: Who is this? The message showed as delivered, no reply, maya waited, nothing. She looked toward the curtains again.She didn't want to look, but she did, slowly, she pulled them apart by an inch. The man was still there. Only now, he wasn't looking at her window.He was walking away. Maya watched him disappear around the corner.She let the curtain drop. Her heart was beating faster than it should have. She told herself there was nothing unusual about a stranger walking down the street at night, there was nothing unusual about a mysterious text, there was nothing unusual about being nervous. Yet something about the whole thing bothered her. Something she couldn't explain. Then, as she turned away from the window, a memory surfaced. A dream she'd had countless times since childhood. A dark forest, a full moon, aman standing beneath it. She had never seen his face. Until tonight. Maya stopped. Her mouth went dry. “No.” She shook her head, it couldn't be, it was just a dream, a coincidence, nothing more. She climbed back into bed and pulled the blanket around herself. But sleep didn't come. Because for the first time, Maya couldn't shake the feeling that the dream she'd spent years trying to forget might not have been a dream at all.