For the last few days, I have been trying to keep things as normal as they were before. But now that I know that I'm living next to a monster, I must be careful and not let Adrian know that I know what he is. I worry what he might do to me. Lucky, I haven't crossed paths with him since Friday. I wonder, what is he doing? Since of learning of his true self, I began to question whether his backstory is true or fake. Working with snakes, I believe that to be true because of the income that he would have to get to live here. But the other parts, I'm still not sure of.

After reading for an hour or so to get that thought out of my head, I decided to head out for a bit to get away from the house. Picking up my keys, phones and earphones, I walked out the door only to see Adrian at his mailbox. I stood there hesitantly but then snapped out and shut the door. No, I cannot shy away from him in fear, it will just give me away. I started walking towards the footpath, looking at but then slowed when I noticed him being a bit pale and looking distressed? Feeling pity for him I decided to make myself known.

"Adrian." I called out which caught his attention, "Are you alright?"

"Oh, yeah." He sort of mumbled his answer, "I've just had a massive cold over the last few days." Liar. "I'm better now but still have a headache." While he spoke, I took a closer look at his appearance. He does look completely human. Despite, knowing what I saw, my heart and mind are convinced that he is human. However, there is now this voice telling them to be alert and wary of him.

"That's terrible." I said with pity, "Well, I'm glad that you are feeling a bit better." I'm keeping the conversation as normal as possible before my mouth blurted out something. "Would you like to go to the movies tomorrow night?"

He smiled in response but only shook his head, "No thank you." He answered which I was relieved, "I need to catch up on my work that has been on hold due to my sickness. Another time perhaps."

"Oh, okay then. Well, I'm off for a walk, so I'll see you around." I waved him as we said our goodbyes before I progressed to my walk. Placing the earbuds in my ears and putting the music onto shuffle. Oh god, I felt lucky that he hasn't noticed yet. But what am I going to do? I don't think that I can handle living next to a monster while keeping it a secret from him.

I continued the day as normal as I can without doing any work. Trying to get Adrian out of my mind. Though, it was kind of hard after that brief chat we had. My mind was a bit worried that he knows. I've seen too many films and read too many books where the enemy always finds out that the main character knows something about them no matter how hard they've tried to keep it that way. But then again, he may not know for now. What am I going to do?

The phone rings, pulling me out and I immediately went and grabbed the phone.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Sophia!" My heart relaxes as I recognise the voice of my father. "How is my little sunshine?"

"I'm fine, father." I answered, "The usual things but at the moment I'm on leave from work." No doubt that mother told him everything in the past weeks about the things I told her.

"I'm glad to hear that you are finally taking time off work." He stated. I giggled, he always told me that I'm workaholic. It is true but not all the time.

"Where's mum? She usually calls me?" I asked, "Wait, wait...let me guess...she's on a shopping spree." Dad laughs in response.

"Yes, indeed. Wasting our retirement money and she complains that I spend the most money." I laughed along with him. The laughing soon the died down, "It's sad that you couldn't come and spend time with us." I agreed with him. Despite the regular phone calls, since I left the home to live on my own and work and with them travelling, we seem to have only rare moments when we can spend time together. On Christmas and birthdays are the time we always spend time but that's only four visits each year, any other visits are hard to get to. It's always one is busy while the other is free like right now.

The chat soon ended and already it was dinnertime and it was making me uncomfortable. Ever since learning the truth about Adrian, I have been frightened by any unnatural sounds I hear as it got dark. Fearing that it could be him outside trying to get in. Being paranoid, I go around the house every hour, checking that every doors and window are locked. I try to settle down, I put the TV on and started watching my favourite wildlife shows only to then turn it off when it was talking about snakes. God fucking damn it.

Suddenly I jumped as my mobile rang loudly. I saw Adrian's name and number clearly on the screen. Crap.

"Hello?"

"Hey Sophia, I'm sorry to bother you but you wouldn't happen to be busy now, are you?" he asked. My heart dropped. What does he want?

"No, what's happening?" I asked only to realized that I could have lied. Oh God, why aren't you helping me?

"I just need your help, could you come over, please? The front door is unlocked." Unable to deny his request, I accept it. I hope it's only some small issue. As casually as I could, I headed over to his house and opened the door. The house seemed quiet, too quiet. I don't like this.

"Adrian?" My voice echoed a bit through the empty home.

"Upstairs." He calls back. I shut the door behind me and headed up as my head looks around. I haven't really been inside his house since we first meet. He really has made himself home. I got up to the stairs and spotted a door slightly opened. I glanced only to then backed away quickly. It was full of tanks with his snakes in them. Looking down the hallway, I sighted a wide-open door with noise coming from it.

"Adrian?" I called again and this time the response was his head poking out of the room. He smiles and me.

"Glad you could come. In here." He said before disappearing. Perhaps, it is just a small issue. I wonder what the problem could be, but I had to ask.

"There are no snakes in that room, right?" I asked as I walked closer to it.

"No, there aren't any in here." He replied which made me feel more comfortable to enter. The room was dark, but I headed in and noticed a king size bed. This must be his bedroom. The room I saw him with the woman. But what turned my stomach inside out was that Adrian wasn't in sight.

"Adir..." Suddenly the door behind me slams shut, and the room turns black. Only to have two glowing eyes staring at me and a loud hiss.