Swipe

brushed off so many times by his parents and teachers and adults of any kind that sometimes Logan wondered what was real and what was imaginary.
    But his sister had died. That happened . And ever since, Logan was about one floorboard creak away from certainty that someone, somewhere, was out to get him too.
    3
    His parents didn’t know it, but Logan kept a flashlight hidden under his pillow. The switch to the ceiling light was all the way across the room, and he would have had to get up out of bed to turn it on. That was unacceptable. So Logan sat, now, back to the wall, covered in blankets up to his neck, and his hand braced the flashlight against his cheek to steady the beam of light as he swept it around each corner of the room.
    There was nothing immediately out of the ordinary, except for the opened window. No mud on the floor, no stuff out of place . . .
    He turned the flashlight around, pointing the unlit end of it away from him, and flipped a switch along its handle. The main light turned off, and out of its other end, the violet haze of a black light began to glow.
    Black lights were useful. They revealed lint, smudges, blood, traces not seen by the unaided eye . . . and most importantly to Logan, they showed nanodust. There wasn’t a Marked person around who didn’t leave a cloud of it behind.
    Tonight, though, like every night, Logan saw nothing—just the single small trail left by his father, an empty room with an unpleasant draft, and a window slightly ajar.
    Time to check the rest of the house.
    Logan tiptoed to the corner of his room and called for the elevator, which arrived promptly and took him to ground level.
    Like many private residences in the town of Spokie, Logan’s house had just one room to a floor, with an elevator connecting them and an open-air spiraling staircase outside in case of emergency, or for use during the nice summer months. Each room had panoramic windows and doors in two of the corners—one to the elevator and one to the outside staircase. The height of these houses varied widely and could reach higher than twenty floors, but Logan’s had only eleven. This was good. More would have taken longer. Because every night, without fail, after his parents had tucked him into bed and gone to sleep themselves, it was Logan’s job—self-appointed— to look thoroughly through each floor, bottom to top, flashlight in hand for signs of even the slightest suspicious thing.
    Paranoid? To Logan, it was practical. These were simply the habits any boy might develop if he were certain that someone was out to get him.
    The first floor was the foyer, lined with pictures of the family and hangers for coats and not much else. Nothing unusual this evening, so Logan double-checked the front door’s dead bolt and moved on.
    The second floor was the kitchen. Knives were all in place. That was a good sign.
    The third floor was the dining room, only ever used for holidays and entertaining guests, and tonight it was as empty as expected.
    Fourth floor was the bathroom, but no one lurked in the shower tonight. Floor five was the living room, cluttered but hardly suggesting a break-in. Six was Mr. Langly’s office, and the holograms of his latest architectural projects glowed untouched. Seven was Logan’s bedroom, which he skipped for now.
    Eight was a rec room that no one ever used. It had been Logan’s room up until five years ago—right there was where his bed used to be—but he’d moved down a floor when his sister passed away. Because she had lived on the ninth, and because every night while she was alive she’d tap a rhythm for Logan to hear through the floorboards. Shave-and-a-haircut , it went, and Logan would throw both shoes up at his ceiling. Tap-tap , they went . Two-bits . That was how they always said good night. When Lily died, it didn’t take more than one tapless night for Logan to know that he couldn’t live under that ceiling anymore.
    Lily’s room, nine, was a floor frozen in time like a museum of her last days, like one big held breath. It was Logan’s least favorite to visit. A chill ran through him each time he did, and his eyes watered and made it hard for him to see, but still he never skipped it—nine was the perfect place for an intruder to hide. Tonight, though, like each night, there was no one there, or at least no one Logan could find, and he wasted no time stepping back into the elevator, knocking a soft tap-tap against the wall as he did.
    Ten was his