Lighted

The first spark appeared beneath her heel.

Lina almost missed it.

She had been walking home the same way she always did—head down, earbuds in, the long gravel path cutting between the dark field and the empty parking lot. It was late, but not dangerously so. The sky held that deep blue that feels suspended, as if night hasn’t fully claimed it yet.

Then something flared under her foot.

A brief scatter of orange light, like a match struck and dropped.

She stopped.

The gravel lay still.

She pulled one earbud out and listened. Wind moved through the dry grass in low waves. A distant car passed on the road beyond the trees. Nothing unusual.

She shifted her weight.

Another spark.

This one brighter.

It snapped and flickered beneath the sole of her shoe before fading into the dirt.

Her breath slowed.

She lifted her foot and looked at the ground.

No wire. No glass. No exposed cable. Just pale stones pressed into dust.

She stepped forward deliberately.

The moment her heel touched down, the earth ignited again—soft but undeniable. Tiny embers flared outward in a small halo around her step, then vanished.

She pulled her foot back.

The darkness returned, unmarked.

For a long second, she stood very still.

Then she tested it.

Another step.

Another bloom of light.

This time it lingered a fraction longer, sparks skittering across the ground like fireflies startled from sleep.

Her throat tightened, not with fear exactly but with awareness.

The path ahead of her stretched into shadow.

Slowly, cautiously, Lina took another step.

The ground answered.

The light was not violent. It did not burn. It did not spread beyond the imprint of her foot. It simply appeared, alive and precise, then dissolved as if it had only been waiting for pressure.

She looked behind her.

The path she had already walked was dark again.

No trace.

She removed her second earbud.

The night felt closer now.

She crouched and touched the gravel with her fingers.

Cold.

Ordinary.

When she stood again, she hesitated.

If she stayed still, nothing happened.

If she moved, the earth responded.

She tried a half-step sideways off the path, onto the patch of dry grass.

Nothing.

She stepped back onto the gravel.

Light burst beneath her again.

A line began to form in her thoughts, quiet but insistent: It’s reacting to you.

The idea felt both impossible and obvious.

She glanced toward the road. No headlights turned in. No one stood watching. The field to her left lay open and indifferent.

She took another step forward.

Flare.

And another.

Flare.

Each ignition slightly brighter than the last.

The air around her ankles shimmered faintly, as if heat rose from the ground. But there was no warmth. No smoke.

Just light.

A strange calm settled over her, threaded with unease.

She thought about turning back.

The parking lot was only a hundred yards behind her. Her apartment building stood beyond it, five stories of concrete and lit windows. Familiar. Predictable.

She shifted her weight as if to pivot.

The moment her heel angled backward, the spark beneath her foot snapped sharply; brighter, hotter, almost warning.

She froze.

The flare faded.

Her pulse quickened.

Very slowly, she angled her foot forward again.

This time, when she stepped ahead, the light bloomed wide and steady, spreading slightly farther than before. Not uncontrolled. Just… encouraged.

The path ahead seemed subtly outlined now, faint specks appearing even before her shoe touched down—as if anticipating her.

The darkness on either side thickened.

Wind moved through the grass again, but it sounded different—lower, more contained.

She swallowed.

“This isn’t real,” she murmured.

But the ground answered her voice with a flicker at her toes.

She stood suspended between directions.

Behind her: the world she knew, unlit and unchanged.

Ahead: a path that would only reveal itself if she continued.

No one had asked her to step here.

No one had warned her not to.

The silence felt deliberate.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket.

The sudden vibration made her gasp.

She fumbled it out, half-expecting to see something impossible on the screen.

No service.

No notification.

Yet it buzzed again.

She stared at the blank display.

The gravel beneath her foot warmed—not physically, but visually—sparks clustering closer to her sole.

The air felt charged, like the moment before a storm splits open.

She looked once more toward the parking lot.

Everything there remained still. Ordinary. Safe in its sameness.

She imagined walking back.

She imagined the light resisting.

Another faint shimmer appeared two steps ahead of her, as though the ground were inhaling.

Waiting.

Lina drew in a breath.

The night seemed to lean toward her.

She shifted her weight forward; not fully committing, not yet retreating, hovering in that narrow balance where something has already begun but has not declared its shape.

The gravel pulsed faintly beneath her heel.

And ahead of her, just beyond the reach of the last flare, the darkness stirred.