The blinds in my office window did their best impression of prison bars, throwing slats of gray daylight across a desk that had seen better days. Rain tapped at the glass like a nervous client, and the radiator hissed like it had a grudge against me. I leaned back in my chair, listening to the creak of the old wood, watching dust particles dance in the half-light. My cases these days weren’t glamorous—missing cats, lost receipts, husbands who’d misplaced their poker faces. Nothing that would make the papers.

I was running over the week in my head—two unpaid invoices, one neighbor complaining about a “strange smell” that turned out to be last Tuesday’s Chinese food—and wondering if I should fix the leg on my desk or let it wobble itself into the grave, when the door opened.

She walked in like every cliché given flesh and heels: the type that makes you sit up a little straighter without meaning to. A long coat hung around her shoulders, dripping from the rain outside, and her eyes darted to every corner of the room before they found mine. Trouble had a way of knocking—hers just had good posture.

“Mr. Callahan?” she asked, voice high but with a thread of steel woven through.

“That’s what the door says,” I answered. “What can I do for you?”

She sat down opposite me, crossing one leg over the other. My chair creaked again in protest as I leaned forward.

“I’m being followed,” she said flatly.

The words hung in the air. Simple, clear, and about as welcome as a subpoena.

I studied her. No twitch, no tremble—just the barest crease of worry in her brow. “Tell me everything,” I said, reaching for the notepad that had more doodles than case notes.

“It started a week ago. Every day, without fail, just as the clock strikes two. He arrives. Stands right outside my house. Sometimes he lingers. Sometimes he leaves quickly. But always—always—he comes.”

I scribbled it down. Arrives daily, two o’clock sharp.

“Describe him.”

“Tall. Average build. Wears a cap. Always carrying something, though I can never see exactly what.”

I nodded slowly. “And you’re sure it’s the same man?”

“Positive. He comes to the door each time. Doesn’t say much. Just… appears. Then he’s gone again.” She shivered.

The radiator hissed at us like it didn’t believe her story either.

I tapped my pencil against the pad. Patterns matter. Obsessions matter. Predators like schedules—they savor them. Still, something about the edges didn’t quite line up.

“What does he do when you see him?” I asked.

“He doesn’t speak much. Sometimes he leaves things. Rectangular things. Thick. Piles of them, bound together. Sometimes there are envelopes. Always addressed to me.”

My pencil paused mid-tap.

She went on, oblivious. “The strangest part is, when I open the door, he’s already walking away. I call after him, but he never turns back. Just tips his cap and keeps moving. Always the same direction, down the street.”

I closed the notebook. Sat back in my chair. For a long moment, I just watched her, rain dripping from the edge of her coat onto my floor.

“Well, Miss—?”

“Evangeline,” she said quickly.

“Well, Miss Evangeline,” I said, voice even, “I believe your case is solved.”

Her eyes widened. “So soon?”

I stood, pulling on my trench coat and giving the radiator a final glare for good measure. “Your shadow isn’t a stalker. He’s your mailman.”

The silence that followed could’ve filled the room with smoke if I’d allowed the stuff. Her lips parted, then closed again. She blinked. Twice.

“The… mailman,” she repeated faintly.

“Cap, two o’clock sharp, rectangular objects, envelopes with your name. Classic pattern. He’s been following the route, not you.”

Her face flushed crimson as the realization dawned, though she tried to keep her composure. “Oh. Well. That… would explain why the things he leaves usually have stamps.”

I offered her a small smile. “It’s easy to mistake routine for pursuit when you’re looking over your shoulder. But in this city, Miss Evangeline, sometimes the only thing chasing us is the calendar.”

She gathered herself, stood, and offered a nervous laugh that barely made it past her throat. “I… suppose that’s all, then.”

“Consider it pro bono,” I said, settling back into my creaking chair. The radiator hissed one last time like it was laughing at us both.

When the door shut behind her, I jotted down the case in my files under a single word: Delivered.