There was a young man who started college in a big city. He didn’t have much money, so the only place he could afford to rent was in an old, run-down apartment building that was in a bad area of the city. When he moved in, he found that the apartment was in a bad state of repair. The floor was dusty and stained, the furniture was falling apart and the wallpaper was peeling off the walls.
After unpacking his belongings, he decided to try and tidy up the apartment a little. As he was tearing off a piece of peeling wallpaper, he happened to uncover a small hole in the wall. Peeking through the hole, he discovered that he could see into his neighbor’s apartment. There was nobody home, so he just plugged up the hole with some tissue paper and set about dusting and cleaning the place.
The next evening, when he came home from college, he got into the elevator and a beautiful woman stepped in after him. As they ascended, the man couldn’t take his eyes off the young woman’s shapely legs and generous curves.
The elevator stopped on his floor and he got out. He was surprised to see the woman was following him. He walked down the corridor and when he reached his apartment, he looked over his shoulder. The young woman was opening the door of the apartment next to his. He realized that she was his neighbor.
Once inside his apartment, the young man couldn’t stop thinking about the beautiful woman next door. Unable to resist the temptation, he decided to take a peep through the hole in the wall.
When he put his eye up to the hole and peeked in, he had a perfect view of the entire apartment. He was shocked when he saw the woman start taking off her clothes and preparing to take a shower. The woman apparently wasn’t aware of the peephole, so the young man kept quiet and watched her undress. He couldn’t believe his luck and was disappointed when she turned off the lights and went to bed.
In the middle of the night, the young man woke up to the sound of groaning coming from the apartment next door. He wondered what it was and decided to look through the hole in the wall. He was horrified by what he saw.
There was a tall man standing over the young woman. He held a long, thin knife in his hand and kept stabbing her, over and over. The young woman was groaning in pain and lay in a pool of blood.
The young man was so shocked by the scene before him that he couldn’t move a muscle. His knees felt weak and his stomach churned. Before the college student had a chance to think, the tall man delivered one last blow and the groans ceased. The woman was dead.
The murderer grabbed some things and made his way out of the apartment. As he was closing the apartment door behind him, the killer turned and the young man got a good look at his face. He had a thin nose, a dark beard and a long scar on the side of his cheek. He would be easy to identify.
The young man ran into his bedroom and grabbed his mobile phone. He was about to call the police, when he suddenly stopped in his tracks. He held the phone in his trembling hands as his mind began to race.
If he reported this to the police, they would find out that he had been spying on the woman through the hole in the wall. His neighbors would find out about it. His friends and family would find out. What would they say? What would they think of him? He would be embarrassed beyond belief.
Slowly, he placed the phone on his bedside table and sat down. He never called the police.
The next evening, when the young man returned from college, the police were waiting at his door. They told him that his next door neighbor had been murdered during the night and said they needed to ask him some questions. He tried to keep them talking in the corridor, but they invited themselves into his apartment.
Sitting at the kitchen table, the policemen asked him if he had seen or heard anything unusual the night before. The young man began to sweat profusely. He told them he had gone to bed early and must have slept through the whole thing. They asked him a few more questions, but he denied knowing anything about the murder.
Just then, one of the policemen noticed the hole in the wall. He got up from the table and peered through it.
“Are you sure you didn’t see anything?” he asked suspiciously.
“I just moved into this apartment two days ago,” said the young man, his voice shaking. “I didn’t even realize there was a hole in the wall. I swear to you, I didn’t see or hear anything. If I did, I would tell you.”
The policemen eventually grew tired of questioning him and, as they said their goodbyes and left, it seemed as if they believed his story. The young man couldn’t forget having witnessed the terrible murder, but the guilt of not reporting it to the police quickly evaporated and he tried to get on with his life.
A week passed and the young man gradually forgot about the murder. He blocked up the hole in the wall with paper, not wanting to be reminded of the terrible crime. He also installed new locks and a deadbolt on his apartment door.
One day, he picked up the newspaper and saw a story about the murder of the girl who had lived next door. It said that the police were still investigating and the murderer was still on the loose.
That night, the young man woke up to the sound of groaning. It seemed to be coming from the apartment next door. He was puzzled. The apartment had been vacant ever since the murder. There was still police tape on the apartment door.
Try as he might to convince himself it wasn’t so, the sound was definitely coming from next door. Curiosity got the better of him and he couldn’t resist. He had to take a peek.
With trembling hands, he removed the paper from the hole in the wall and looked through the peephole.
At first, he didn’t see a thing. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, but he still couldn’t make out anything. He couldn’t even hear the strange groaning sound anymore. Only an eerie silence.
Then, just as he began to move away from the hole in the wall, he saw something.
Staring back at him, through the small hole was a wide-open bloodshot eye.
The young man recoiled in horror. The hideous unblinking eye stared at him as he crouched on the floor, frozen in fear.
Then, the silence was broken by a woman’s raspy voice hissing, “I know you saw!”
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