"I'm sorry, but I have a question..."
"I broke up with my boyfriend, who I discovered was having an ongoing affair with another woman - my boss, no less - two weeks after he proposed to me. Obviously, I couldn't stay in New York anymore."
"I'm very sorry to hear that."
" No need to be." Adela sighed, "My grandmother always said that if you miss something, maybe that's your good luck coming. I think it's time to come back and accompany my grandmother."
"Is she a Canadian?"
"Yes, she married into America, but that's an old story now. Buffalo is a quiet place, I wanted to come back to clear my mind, but as soon as I arrived, it felt too remote. Maybe I'm more suited to the bustle of New York."
"I came back briefly to tidy up the house, and then went to sleep. The next morning, I drove across the border to Canada, planning to visit Niagara Falls, but on the way, I felt something was off."
May leaned forward, listening carefully to Adela's words. Coulson also showed a focused demeanor, which made Adela a little nervous. She clasped her arms and rubbed her hands, then said.
"The fog that day was unusually thick. When I drove through the toll station early in the morning, I couldn't even see the signs clearly."
"Could you clearly feel the change in the air?" Coulson asked.
Adela nodded and said, "I felt it becoming humid around me, but I didn't have any trouble breathing. I opened the car window, and the air outside was just as cold and damp as every early morning, with a hint of forest aroma."
She turned to look nervously at Coulson, as if waiting for him to ask for more details, but Coulson just nodded and said, "Please continue, ma'am."
"The fog got thicker and thicker, I don't know when, but the cars that had crossed the border with me disappeared, as if I was the only one left on the highway."
"Do you remember what time it was?"
"Around 7 in the morning, maybe closer to 8." Adela pursed her lips and said, "I didn't check the time, but the sunlight at least felt like it was around 7 or 8 o'clock."
"Thank you. Please continue."
"I kept driving forward, but something felt off. When my grandmother was alive, sometimes our whole family would drive back to Canada to visit relatives. We used to take this route often, and if I remember correctly, about a kilometer ahead it was supposed to turn right."
"But the car kept going." Adela spread her hands out, very bewildered," I felt like I had driven at least 10 kilometers, but I didn't see any junctions or bends."
"And then? Did you continue driving?"
"Of course not. I thought I had taken the wrong road, so I parked in the lane beside and got out of the car to figure out what was going on."
"To confirm whether I had taken the wrong road, I switched on the navigation device, but there was no signal, the phone also had no signal, I was completely cut off from the outside world, and I couldn't wait for any other cars."
"I had no other choice but to keep moving forward, and then after who knows how long - I think I must have driven at least 70 to 80 kilometers - my car ran out of gas, so I had to stop."
"And then?" Coulson knew the crucial point was coming.
"I thought... maybe the signal would be better outside the car, so I got out." Adela shrugged her shoulders as she said, "And just as I got out, I saw a figure standing at the end of the thick fog."
"Could you see him clearly?"
Adela shook her head, looking slightly troubled," The fog was too thick, visibility was less than 20 meters, and that shadow was deep in the fog, I could only see a very vague silhouette."
"But I'm pretty sure it was a human shadow, or at least a humanoid. He was standing there straight."
"How tall is he?"
"I'd say maybe about 1.9 meters, but not particularly tall or very muscular. He looked like a human male, but I don't think he was a man."
"Why?" Coulson asked.
"Why what?"
"What feature on him made you think he wasn't human?"
"It's hard to describe." Adela lowered her head, threw her hair back using her hands that were clasped together, flicked her lips, and then said, "His figure was constantly shaking, something that humans can't do. It was as if he was a cloud of fog swaying in the wind."
"I felt it was too... ethereal, not at all like a person standing on the ground, more like a mirage floating in the air."
"Did he do anything?"
"No." Adela shook her head, "I felt he was looking at me."
"Why? Why did you feel he was looking at you?"
"I don't know, but I just felt like he was staring at me, as if he wanted to say something to me, but then... nothing happened."
"So what did you do?"
"I felt very upset, I didn't know why these things would happen to me, referring to everything that happened before and the accident at that time. I felt things weren't going well, so I went back into the car and started to cry."
Adela took a deep breath and exhaled, leaned back on the couch and said, "I don't know how much time passed, but I just felt very tired, so I fell asleep."
"When I woke up, I found that the Canadian traffic police were knocking on my car window. They thought my car had broken down and asked if I needed help."
"And where were you at that time?"
"At the border check point." Adela frowned, massaging her temples with a pained look, "The queue in front was very long, and I had been waiting. I must've fallen asleep during that process."
"So was this a dream you had?" May asked.
Adela's face immediately showed a suffocating expression, and Coulson quickly stepped forward to supplement, "What we're asking is, do you think this was a dream you had?"
"Of course not." Adela said somewhat frantically, "If I thought this was a dream of mine, why would I call the police?"
"When I tried to start the car again, I found the car was out of gas, exactly like what happened in the fog. But this is impossible, I had refueled at Buffalo and the fuel tank was full."
"Even if the fuel was running low, how could it be that it had run exactly out when I was at the border check point?"
Adela took out a cell phone from her bag next to her and said, "And if it was a dream, how would the satellite navigation records be there? These can be checked on the official websites of the communication operators. You're not trying to say that all the programmers at the communication company have gone mad, are you?!"