Flagging this as speculation up front, per the rules, because I have no proof of anything and I am not trying to start a mob. I just cannot shake it and I want to know if anyone else on Thornveil Court has seen the same.

Edna Thatch, three doors down from me, has been coming home past midnight for the better part of a month now. Not once or twice. Most nights of the week. I am up late with a bad shoulder and I hear the gate, and when I look she is coming up the lane alone, slow, carrying that satchel and sometimes a flat wooden case she never used to carry. She does not stop to talk the way she always did. She used to know everybody’s business on this row and now she keeps her head down and her curtains drawn and her lamp burning at hours no one should be awake for.

I want to be clear that I like Edna. That is exactly why it worries me. Something in how she is carrying herself has changed, and a quiet person suddenly keeping strange hours and looking that tired and pale is the kind of small thing this channel says we should write down before it becomes a big thing. So I am writing it down. Has anyone else noticed anything, or am I the one who needs more sleep?