Chapter 2
I waited until the promotional link finished loading before touching anything else.
The page looked ordinary at first. A still image, a short description of the drama series, and the same call to action that had appeared beneath the video. The button promised a full episode. Under it, a thin gray line showed the address the link had passed through before opening the page.
I copied it into a note on my phone.
Then I opened the browser history and checked the redirects one at a time. The first address belonged to the campaign. The second looked like a shortened tracking code. The third wasn't a webpage at all. It was a location marker.
A church parking lot near a county road.
I stared at the map until the blue route stopped looking like a route and started looking like a dare.
The marker had no name attached to it. No event, no episode screening, no instruction. Just a pin beside a small church, several miles outside town, where the county road bent past fields and a line of cedar trees.
I should have sent the information to Titus.
Instead, I put on my shoes, took the original link with me, and left.
The farther I drove, the weaker my cell signal became. The campaign page remained open on my phone, but the map marker kept shifting slightly whenever I refreshed it. Not enough to look accidental. Not enough to tell me where someone actually wanted me to go.
I turned onto the county road with both hands tight on the wheel.
The church appeared after a bend, low and pale beneath a wide gray roof. Its parking lot was mostly empty. A pickup sat near the fellowship hall, and an older sedan rested beside a row of painted concrete blocks. There was no banner for the drama series. No table. No people waiting in the open.
I parked near the entrance but stayed inside my car.
A paper flyer had been tucked beneath my windshield wiper.
My name wasn't on it. The campaign logo was.
The flyer advertised the series and gave the same promotional link, but the address printed beneath the call to action was different from the one on the page. It led to a general campaign office downtown. Someone had placed it there recently; the paper was dry despite the damp air, and the wiper had been lifted carefully rather than bumped.
I looked across the lot.
The church doors were locked. The pickup's windows were dark. Nothing moved except a plastic bag caught against the fence.
My phone vibrated.
For one second, I thought it was Titus. The screen showed a notification from the campaign instead. The link had registered another visit.
I hadn't opened it.
I placed the phone face down on the passenger seat. A moment later, it vibrated again.
This time, the notification showed a new message beneath the familiar call to action:
You came farther than most.
My mouth went dry.
I took a picture of the flyer, the parking lot, and the map marker. Then I stepped out of the car.
The church office was attached to the side of the building. A handwritten sign directed visitors around back, where a woman in a quilted vest was carrying a cardboard box toward a recycling bin. She looked up when she saw me.
“Can I help you?”
“I found this on my car.” I held out the flyer without giving it to her.
Her eyes moved over the logo. Her expression changed so slightly I might have imagined it—a pause, a tightening near one corner of her mouth.
“That’s not ours,” she said.
“I didn't think it was.”
She set the box down. “People use the lot for all kinds of things. Church groups, county meetings, campaign volunteers. We don't approve every handout.”
“Has someone been leaving these here?”
She glanced toward the road before answering. “A man came by yesterday. He asked whether the church still had the old roadside sign.”
“What man?”
“I don't know his name. He had a lanyard with that logo on it.” She nodded at the flyer. “He said he was checking locations for a production promotion. He wanted to know when the lot was busiest and whether the office kept a visitor book.”
The information landed quietly, which made it worse.
“Did you give him one?”
“No.” She folded her arms. “I told him we don't keep personal information for people who aren't members.”
“Did he ask about me?”
Her eyes met mine. “He asked if a woman named Sophia had ever come here.”
I felt the cold move from my hands into my chest.
“What did you tell him?”
“That I wouldn't discuss visitors.” She picked up the box again. “He didn't argue. Just wrote something down and left.”
“Did he say who sent him?”
“No. But he said the campaign manager needed a clean location for a private conversation.” Her gaze returned to the flyer. “I assumed that meant someone important.”
I almost laughed, but nothing in me had enough air for it.
A car turned onto the county road. I watched it pass without slowing. My phone vibrated again inside my car.
The woman noticed my face. “You should probably go.”
“I know.”
I returned to the parking lot and stopped beside my driver's door. The message on my phone had changed. The location marker now showed my exact position, not the church entrance or the public lot. My blue dot sat beside the driver's side of my car.
The campaign link wasn't only counting clicks.
It was reporting where I stood.
I disabled location access, but the page refreshed before the setting took effect. A new prompt appeared, asking me to confirm whether I had arrived safely.
I took one last photograph of the screen.
Then I drove away.
At the first gas station, I pulled beneath the canopy and checked the rearview mirror. No one had followed me. The road behind me was empty except for a delivery truck and a school bus turning at the intersection.
I opened Titus's contact.
My thumb hovered over his name. If I called, he'd ask where I was. He'd hear the strain in my voice. He'd come looking, even if I told him not to.
I wasn't ready to let the campaign turn his concern into another piece of evidence.
So I closed the contact and sent myself the photographs instead.
May you like
By the time I reached town, the promotional link had stopped updating. That silence felt deliberate too.
I kept driving, carrying the phone in my lap and the knowledge that going alone hadn't meant going unseen.
