The yellowish sheet remained beneath the folder until nearly noon. Joneb noticed it again when he reached for the documents Valder had left on his desk. He lifted the folder, expecting to find another purchase request or an ordinary office memorandum. Instead, the strange paper stared back at him with its printed eye.
He turned it over. The reverse was blank, except for a faint line near the bottom that looked like a crease made by age. The paper felt unusually thick. Its edges were worn, but there was no dust on it, no staple mark, and no sign that it had come from the office's filing cabinets.
“Where did this come from?” he muttered.
Across the aisle, Lira, the records clerk, looked up from her computer. “What?”
“This paper. Was it included in the folder?”
Lira came closer. The moment she saw the symbol, her expression changed. It was slight—a tightening around the eyes, quickly hidden—but Joneb noticed.
“I don't know,” she said.
“Maybe it was attached to the documents.”
“It wasn't.”
“Then put it aside. We have enough papers to worry about.” She returned to her desk before he could ask anything else.
Joneb studied the symbol. The open eye seemed ordinary when viewed directly, yet when he looked away and back again, he had the uncomfortable impression that its pupil had shifted. He blinked hard. It was only ink, he told himself. Fatigue could make a person imagine things.
At lunch, he carried the paper to the small records room. He checked the incoming-document log and asked Lira whether anything unusual had been received that morning. She insisted there had been nothing without a control number. Joneb searched the tray where unrecorded submissions were temporarily placed. Nothing.
When he returned, the paper was gone.
He checked beneath the folders, inside his drawer, and on the floor. He even asked the utility worker whether he had cleared the desk. The man shook his head. No one had touched it, he said.
Joneb tried to forget the matter. He had a report to finish, and Valder had already asked for it twice.
At three thirty, Valder summoned him. The report was on the supervisor's desk, marked with several red corrections. Most were minor. One, however, concerned a payment entry that did not match the supporting schedule.
“You prepared this?” Valder asked.
“Yes, sir. I flagged the difference in the remarks.”
“You should have adjusted it.”
“I couldn't, sir. The amount in the schedule is different from the amount in the voucher.”
Valder leaned back. “Then coordinate with the person who prepared it. We need this cleared today.”
“I can request a corrected schedule.”
“Don't make a simple matter complicated, Joneb.” The words were spoken quietly, but they landed heavily. Joneb knew what was being asked of him: make the discrepancy disappear, or at least stop drawing attention to it.
“I'll verify it, sir,” he replied.
Valder returned the report. “Do that.”
As Joneb walked back to his desk, the office lights flickered once. His monitor went black, then came back on. For a fraction of a second, a line of unfamiliar characters appeared across the screen. They vanished before he could read them.
At home that evening, Jaycee ran to the door and showed him a drawing of a castle. Jayvee asked about his project money. Amira asked whether he had eaten lunch. Their voices filled the small house with the ordinary sounds he needed.
Later, after everyone had gone to bed, Joneb opened his bag to take out the unfinished report. The yellow paper was inside, folded neatly in half.
He was certain he had left it at the office.
This time, beneath the eye, a new line had appeared. He could not read the symbols, but the meaning came to him with a certainty that made his skin turn cold: THE DOOR HAS FOUND YOU.