One evening, when I was in my junior year of high school, my mom and dad went out, leaving me home alone. I had a lot of homework to do, so I spent the whole evening sitting at the desk in my bedroom.
My parents left the house around 6 PM. While I was doing my homework, I put on my headphones and listened to loud music. There was a big storm that night and my desk was facing the window, so I could see the rain and the lightning outside.
My parents got back around 11 PM. When I saw their car drive up, I took off the headphones. As soon as my mom opened the front door and came inside, I heard heard her shout my name.
“What on earth happened in here!?” she demanded in an angry voice.
Confused, I ran downstairs. My mom was standing in the hallway with a furious look on her face. She pointed at the floor and yelled, “Was this you!?”
I looked down and saw that the carpet was covered in muddy footprints.
“I have no idea how those got there,” I said. “I spent the whole night at my desk, doing my homework.”
I watched as the look on her face changed from anger to confusion, and then to fear. We both realized it at the same time. Someone else must have been in the house.
We followed the trail of footprints, trying to make sense of the whole situation. They started at the back door, which we usually left unlocked. Then we noticed something else. The footprints started at the backdoor, but there was no trail of footprints leaving through the back door.
All of a sudden, we hear something a loud, pounding noise that echoed throughout house. Then, the sound of the front door being wrenched open and slammed shut again. WHAM!
We all ran into the garage and locked the door behind us. My mom took out her cell phone and called the police.
“Please come quickly!” she shouted. “Someone’s in our house!”
After what seemed like hours, a patrol car arrived with two police officers, a male and a female. One officer stayed with us in the garage while his partner went through the house, searching it room by room. When she came back, the female officer told us that there was no one in the house and it was safe to go back in.
As we were all breathing a sigh of relief, she asked, “Whose bedroom is upstairs on the left?”
My parents looked at me.
“It’s mine,” I told the officer.
She asked us to follow her. As we walked through the house, we could see the trail of muddy footprints leading from the back door, through the living room, through the hallway, up the stairs, into my parents’ bedroom and then towards my room. They stopped at my doorway.
The female officer pointed at my door, which had been open the whole night. Scrawled on it, in black marker, was the following:
8:47 I see you
8:53 You forgot to lock the back door
8:59 You seem focused
9:24 Turn around
9:47 Look at me
10:15 Look at me
10:37 Look at me
10:49 Look at me
For more than two hours, someone had been standing in my doorway, watching me. To this day, I still shudder to think what would have happened if I had turned around…
ns 15.158.61.6da2
