My house is watching me. I feel these eyes watching me everywhere I go, every room I step into, every time I pour myself water. There is always an uneasy feeling that sends prickles down my back and makes the hair on my arms stand on end. My house is watching me. I’m watching the tv, no, not watching, listening, to the tv. I’m listening to the tv when I hear it. It’s soft, the creaking of feet on floorboards. Not mine. There isn’t anyone in the house but me. Someone is watching me. I listen. Listening. Listening. I realized something is now listening to me. Hearing me breathe, hearing my heart-beat in my chest. I turn off the tv, pushing my hair off my ears, trying to zero in on anything. Anything. My feet betray my need for quietness, making the loudest noises of all. I hear nothing. But It hears me. Listening for when I stop listening for it.
After an hour of listening, I relinquish my search for nothing and get ready for bed. Something is watching me. I brush my teeth and then wash my face, patting it dry as I look in the mirror above my sink. I see a face that is not mine. I scream and look behind me. No one is there. I breathe rapidly, letting my racing mind settle. I just need sleep, clearly no one was there. I lay in my bed fully clothed, letting my hair lay across the pillows. Something is watching me. I sleep strangely that night, dreaming of people in blue uniforms taking me from my hiding place, while the family I watch, watch me being taken away. I awake in my white room with white ceilings. My hands are strapped down and I struggle against my bonds. A person in white comes into my room and puts a needle in my arm. In my last moments of consciousness, I see another person in white come into this white room, and then black.
“What is she in here for?”
“She was a squatter watching the family living in the house, through the walls.”
“How’d they find her?”
“Her schizophrenia made her think that she was the one being watched. They heard her screaming in the walls.”
“She was the watcher.”
I was the watcher.