Creepy house in one of the toniest parts of Toronto? Perfect. This story made me late for a meeting.

The narrator is alone in her husband’s family home, and smells gas. Things start to get creepy:

Darius had been away for a week when I started smelling gas in the kitchen of his parents’ house. We’d been staying there the past six months, tending to their new property while they took care of business in Iran. Once I checked that the burners were turned off, I asked him whether I should call the gas company. He told me to ignore it. The neighbours were building a new house, uglier somehow than the other ­McMansions lining Forest Hill, and Darius said the smell probably had something to do with their construction.

It’s a slow burn but once it gets going it won’t let you go.