Sense that something was wrong.

She sat still in the car, making no move to open the door even after Ted had switched the engine off. Her feeling of unease was growing.

“Mary?” Ted finally asked. “What is it? You okay?”

His words seemed to bring Mary back to life, and she groped for the door handle. The door stuck for a second, then opened. She got out, moved along the cracked sidewalk, then stopped at the front door. She should have reached out and tried the knob — Kelly practically never remembered to lock it — but didn’t. And when Ted came up beside her, she reached out to touch his arm, almost as if to prevent him from opening the door either.

“What is it?” Ted asked again.

Mary shook her head, as if to rid herself of the strange premonition she was having. “It — I don’t know,” she breathed. “There’s something wrong. I can feel it.”

A slow grin spread over Ted’s face, and his voice took on a drawl that was even broader than usual. “What could be wrong? I got no job, and my daughter hates me, and my wife thinks I give the farm away.” He reached out and tried the knob. The front door swung open.

About to go inside, he hesitated. Now he, too, felt a chill wash over him. His grin fading, he crossed the threshold. “Kelly?” he called out.

Silence.

And yet the house didn’t feel empty.

“Maybe she’s in her room,” Ted said, hearing the lack of conviction in his own voice.

Mary, firmly putting aside the fear that was crawling inside her, moved past her husband, starting toward Kelly’s room. But as she reached the hallway she paused, glancing into the bathroom.

She froze, her mouth open, an unvoiced scream constricting her throat. On the floor, lying still in a pool of blood, her face deathly pale, lay her daughter, a large, jagged fragment of the smashed mirror still clasped tightly in her right hand.