But they didn’t stop. They got comfortable. My name’s Daniel Mercer, and the house I’m talking about sits on the corner of Alder and Ninth in a town called Brook Hollow.
One of those quiet suburban places where people wave even if they don’t know you. Where lawns matter more than they probably should. And where everyone secretly keeps score about who’s keeping things nice.
When I bought that house, it wasn’t the biggest on the block, not even close. But it had this wide stretch of green wrapping around the corner. Soft grass that caught the morning light just right.
And I remember thinking, “Yeah, this is it. This feels like something I can take care of.” For the first few months, it was exactly that. Peaceful, predictable. The kind of place where mornings are slow and coffee actually tastes better because there’s nothing rushing you out the door.
And then one Tuesday, nothing special about the day, just another weekday morning, I noticed tire marks on the grass near the curb. Not deep, just enough to bend the blades in a way that didn’t bounce back.
I stood there a second longer than I needed to, mug in hand, staring at it like it might explain itself. “Probably just someone turning too wide. ” I muttered, more to convince myself than anything else.
It didn’t feel like a big deal. The next morning, though, there were two sets of marks. Slightly deeper this time. Same curve, same entry point off the road, same exit angle back toward the intersection.
That’s when something in the back of my mind started connecting dots I didn’t want to connect. By the end of that week, it wasn’t random anymore. It was a pattern.
