The lights were still on in the living room, and there were flowers blooming on the mantelpiece. Anne had been here before — somewhere, in dreams? The house was always pristine, full of windows and doors, without even a speck of dust to settle anywhere.

Outside, birds hung like stars in the day sky, frozen in mid-flight, silenced in mid-song.

Anne looked around her, and suddenly knew that no one had ever been home.