Darcy Coates

The dock protruded from the shore below the cabin, running twenty meters into the lake. Something large and misshapen sat at its end; Sam squinted in the poor light, trying to make out what it was, then her heart faltered as the shape moved.

It was a man, on his knees, bent over the edge of the dock. His broad shoulders trembled as he stared, fixated on the water below.

She made it halfway across the room before she stopped. She’d been so intent on looking for a stranger in her cabin that two very important changes had escaped her notice. Firstly, there were three mugs laid out on the kitchen bench, just in front of the window overlooking the shrubs behind the cabin. She hadn’t used any mugs the day before. The cups had been arranged with precision, too; their handles all pointed in the same direction—towards the easel.

There she found the second change, and it froze her breath in her lungs. Someone had painted on the canvas.

A man’s face stared at her from the cloth. It was a closely cropped portrait, realistic and barely dry. Deep-set grey eyes gazed out from above a crooked nose and thin lips. He had thick salt-and-pepper hair and uneven stubble. A red mark—a cut that had not quite healed—marred his cheek.

Sam sighed and glanced at her art book. Shock hit her like a cold slap. In the centre of the paper, surrounded by scribbled plants and indistinct shapes, was a drawing of the man.

“Police have called off the search for Ian McKeller nearly two weeks after his disappearance. He’s the fifth this year, so take care if you plan to visit the lake. Up next, we have some local talent, Jamie and the Spitfires, performing a song of their own creation, ‘Dreaming of Hills’. Enjoy!”

Then she glanced about the room and did a double-take. A new painting sat on the easel. Sam’s stagnant heart rate spiked, and shaking off her grogginess, she crossed the room in three paces.

Water frothed and churned as something struggled just under the surface. The ripples, which had at first lapped peacefully against the shore, were battering at it, surging forward and retreating like small waves.

And on the ledge stood a man.

Sam’s mouth opened in a silent gasp. The stranger’s pose was stiff, except for his arms, which hung limply at his sides. He was too far away for her to see him clearly, but Sam thought he seemed tall and lean and wore dark clothes.

Hands crept out from between the dense water plants. Ghost white and bone thin, they caressed her skin, tangled in her hair, and tugged at her ankles. There were dozens of them. Sam had a vague idea that they should have bothered her, but all she cared about was finding the energy to take another breath as the blackness crept across her vision

Sam woke with a jolt. She wasn’t in the plush armchair anymore, but was standing in front of the easel. Her left hand held a pallet filled with swirls of well-blended paint, and her right was clasped around a paintbrush that barely touched the canvas.

She took a shaky breath and stepped back from the image. Though well painted, it shocked her deeply. That came from me, she realised, glancing at the vivid red paint soaked into her brush. I created that.

More paintings stood propped against the furniture, all facing Sam. It was an onslaught of images: a shadowed shape barely visible between dense trees. The man, his pose stiff and somehow unnatural, stood at the end of the dock—Peter’s dock—and watched the rippling water below. A single finger, detached from its hand, rested on the forest floor