I still think about something that happened last year, and I honestly cannot figure out if I made the right choice or if I just survived something by pure luck. It was one of those nights that stays stuck in your mind forever, no matter how much time passes.

I had just finished a late shift and got home around eleven. I live in a very small apartment in a part of the city that people politely call gritty, which is just a nicer way of saying unsafe. Every time I walk home at night, my body feels tense and alert, like my instincts are on high alert even when nothing is happening.

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That night felt different the moment I stepped into my hallway. I cannot explain it, but the air felt heavy and strange. As I was unlocking my door, I noticed a man standing at the far end of the hall. He was not doing anything.

He was just standing there, but something about the way he stared in my direction made my stomach twist. I rushed inside, locked the door, and tried to convince myself that I was overreacting. Living in a rough neighborhood makes you jumpy. At least that is what I kept telling myself.

I had barely put down my bag when someone knocked hard on my door. The kind of knock that makes your heart stop for a second. I froze in place. My neighbor always texts before dropping by, and nobody else shows up at my place without warning. Then I heard a voice. A woman. She sounded out of breath and scared. She said, please can you let me in for just a second.

My whole body went cold. I looked through the peephole and saw a young woman, maybe mid twenties, with wide eyes and shaky hands. She kept glancing down the hallway like she expected someone to appear any second. I knew it was risky, and I knew people can pretend to be in danger to get you to open the door, but there was something in her voice that felt real. Something terrified.

I opened the door just a little and asked what happened. She whispered that a man had been following her since she got off the train. She said she tried to lose him, but he kept turning up behind her. She said she did not know where else to go. And that is when it clicked in my head. The man at the end of the hallway. The one I saw right before I stepped inside.

My heart was pounding but I stepped back and let her in. I locked the door again immediately. We turned off the lights and just stood there in the dark listening to every little sound. A few seconds later, heavy footsteps moved past my door. Slow steps. Heavy steps. The kind that make your skin crawl because you know someone is searching for something. Or someone. Then everything went silent.

The woman sat on my couch shaking. I gave her water and tried to ask if she was hurt, but she could barely talk. After a while she called a friend who came to pick her up. Before she left she just looked at me with this stunned, exhausted expression and said thank you. Then she walked out and I never saw her again.

Sometimes I wonder if she was telling the truth. Sometimes I wonder if I put myself in danger by letting a stranger inside my home. Sometimes I wonder if trusting my gut saved both of us from something horrible. I think about the fear in her eyes. I think about the footsteps in the hallway. I think about how quiet everything was afterward.

I still cannot decide if I made the right choice or if I was unbelievably lucky that the night ended the way it did. All I know is that my intuition has never felt louder than it did that night, and I still feel a mix of fear, guilt, and relief every time I think about it.

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