My Neighbor Vandalized My House, Which Belonged to a New Woman, and She Noticed the Tattoo on the Woman’s Arm
PART THREE: THE WALL THAT MOVED
Chapter 17: The Truck Across the Street
The engine belonged to a dark delivery van pulling away from Lorraine Pike’s driveway.
Elena watched it turn at the intersection without trying to read its license plate through the trees.
Officer Shah stepped onto the workshop threshold and told everyone to stay clear of the exposed floor.
She had called a building inspector because the loose boards and sliding track presented a hazard.
June stood beside the painted panel, turning the company’s name over in her mind.
“Northfield was supposed to remove the sets after the production closed,” she said.
“I remember arguing with their supervisor about the cost.
”
Peter asked what had happened to the equipment.
“The company said it was destroyed,” June replied.
“They billed the theater for disposal, and everybody wanted the nightmare finished.”
Felix photographed the track’s fasteners and pointed out that several were noticeably newer than the surrounding wood.
The old mechanism had not merely survived beneath the floor.
Someone had serviced it.
Elena felt an unexpected wave of anger at the thought of strangers working inside the building she had just purchased.
She had imagined the workshop as a place to restore furniture and build practical things with her hands.
Now she could barely look at its doorway without wondering who else considered it theirs.
Shah asked Felix to cover the opening with temporary plywood and leave the hardware untouched.
Then she spoke to Elena privately beside the garden gate.
“The damage to your house is one investigation,” she said.
“Whatever this company is doing may be another, and I don’t want either one confused by speculation.”
Elena nodded.
“Can you find out who owns Northfield?”
“I can request business information and speak to the people involved,” Shah answered.
“For tonight, I want you out of that building.”
As Shah returned to her patrol car, Peter approached Elena with the theater photograph folded inside a protective sleeve.
“Lorraine knew about the courtyard,” he said.
“She knew enough to be frightened when she saw your tattoo.”
“Then why attack the house instead of talking to me?” Elena asked.
Peter had no answer.
Across the street, Lorraine’s front curtains remained closed.
Chapter 18: A Room for Rent
By Friday morning, Elena had replaced the kitchen window and moved her mattress away from the wall facing Lorraine’s house.
She was carrying a box of dishes upstairs when Felix called.
He had checked the workshop’s electrical service while arranging the inspector’s visit.
“Somebody added a separate outlet behind the cabinet,” he said.
“It’s disconnected now, but the conduit runs toward the rear wall.”
Elena asked whether that was dangerous.
“Not in its present condition,” Felix said.
“What’s strange is that the outlet is positioned at waist height behind a panel nobody should be moving.”
He had also found a recent delivery label stuck to the underside of a workbench.
The recipient was a business called Westbridge Events, not Northfield.
Elena wrote down the name and passed it to Shah rather than making her own visit.
Later that afternoon, Peter arrived with two coffees and news from a friend who worked in theatrical production.
Westbridge Events rented interactive scenery for corporate parties and escape-room attractions.
One of its advertised products was a moving hallway designed to confuse visitors without actually trapping them.
Peter showed Elena a public photograph of the attraction on his phone.
The walls were painted blue and gold, nothing like the old Lantern Room sets.
But the narrow runners beneath them looked familiar.
“You think they copied the design?” Elena asked.
“Maybe,” Peter said.
“Or maybe they bought the equipment and never stopped using it.”
Elena studied the photograph until her coffee cooled.
“That would explain why someone needed the track,” she said.
“It wouldn’t explain why they kept the original scenery hidden here.”
Peter enlarged the photograph.
A small caption identified the attraction as a prototype that had never opened to the public.
The company had canceled its launch after an insurance inspection.
The cancellation date was only six weeks earlier.
Elena looked toward the workshop through her repaired window.
Somebody had been trying to make an old mechanism work again almost twenty years after the Lantern Room closed.
And the attempt had apparently failed.
