The Watcher

8

No, there are no new jobs available at the moment. My contact at the agency sounds almost amused when I call at 8:01 on Monday morning to find out if they have any more manuscripts they need read.

“You just finished two manuscripts, Elena. I’m looking at your email now, and everything looks great. As usual.”

He says that they went through a large batch of manuscripts on Friday and divvied them up to a handful of readers. But since I had two other open projects then, they chose to place them with other freelancers this time.

“You’re one of our hardest-working readers, Elena. I’m sure you could use a break every now and then, right?”

I have to bite my lip to keep from screaming. What I need is something to fill my time and occupy my mind, something to stave off the effects of idleness and passivity. I don’t need to take time off. I need to keep the worried turbulence inside me in check.

But of course the man at the agency knows none of this.

“Take a walk in the city,” he advises me. “Go meet a friend for coffee. You can do that kind of thing when you work freelance. Call back next Monday, and we’ll see what’s come in by then.”

I ask him to keep me in mind if anything should happen to pop up in the meantime. I force myself to sound calm, but when I hang up, I’m cringing. Next Monday? There’s a vast ocean of time between now and then. What am I going to do with myself until then?

I take a bite of my sandwich and look out the window just as the woman with the ponytail walks out her front door and across the yard. She is wearing an elegant coat and a pair of dark sunglasses that cover half her face. She looks like an old-fashioned movie star, cool and collected. But I saw you, flashes through my head, I saw you go berserk on those flowers. I watch until she disappears around the corner. At some point during the day yesterday, Suit Man must have returned from his trip, because he also left the house a little while ago, around the time when I walked into the kitchen. His back straight and his shoes highly polished, he hurried out to the street, holding tight to his briefcase. He looked stressed out, like an important man on his way to deal with important matters. The complete antithesis of me.

My sandwich tastes like nothing, and I toss the rest in the trash and get up from the table. What was it the man at the agency recommended—going for a walk?

I pull on a pair of worn pants, a soft long-sleeved top, and a down vest. Then I’m suddenly standing outside the house for the first time in several days, and I’m looking around. There’s not a person in sight. The shared green space is empty, the town houses curve around its periphery like one long contiguous body composed of huddled, slumbering house creatures. I slowly make my way along the path that cuts across the grass. I should head left toward the street. There’s no reason to keep going straight, past the bushes and trash cans. And yet, that’s what I do.

Before I know it, I’m standing in front of the house across from mine. There’s a black sign attached at eye level right beside the front door: THE STORMS.

I can’t explain what happens next, only know that suddenly I’ve opened a search page on my phone and entered the address. It only takes a second for the results to appear. There are three people listed at this address, Philip, Veronica, and Leo Storm. In other words, there’s a child in the household, a son. I nod to myself, recalling that I’ve seen a boy walking toward the house a few times. I’d guess him to be about twelve years old. I noticed him because the backpack he wore over his narrow shoulders looked so heavy and unwieldy.

I do a new search for Philip Storm. At the top of the search results, there’s a link to a corporate law firm’s sober-looking home page. I click on “Meet Our Team,” and a photo of the man in the house across from me pops up. Under his picture, it says “Attorney” and “Partner.” I’m about to do yet another search, this time for Veronica Storm, when I hear a scraping sound somewhere very nearby. I stiffen and realize that I’m no longer alone. Someone is standing behind me.

I turn around and am looking into the eyes of an elderly woman with a hunched back. I can’t recall having seen her before, but she’s wearing what looks like a bathrobe, so I assume she’s actually one of my neighbors. I attempt a smile, which she does not return. Instead she studies me with suspicion and I quickly realize how close I am to the Storm family’s house and how strange it must look that I’m just standing here staring.

I open my mouth and hear myself going on and on, saying that I’ve just moved in and that I feel like there’s something familiar about the family in the house across from mine. Each word sounds more forced than the last, and before I’ve gone as far as introducing myself and shaking hands, the old woman simply turns her back to me and shuffles away to one of the houses farther down. I’m left standing there with a sense of having been caught red-handed doing something scandalous.

I glance toward my own kitchen window. I’m tempted to hurry back home, but then I remind myself what awaits me: absolutely nothing. Somehow I have to make it through the days until I get more work. I need to distract my mind and tire out my body.

I pull up the zipper on my vest and start walking.

An hour and a half later, I’m downtown. My legs are numb, and there’s a blister developing on my heel. I’m hungry, and even thirstier. There’s a bakery where I sometimes go to write. It’s cozy but a little out of the way, which means walking for another ten or fifteen minutes. I’m not sure I’m up to that. I slow my pace and stop in front of a high-rise. Still trying to make up my mind, I lift my face to take in the façade in front of me. That’s when I see it—the sign bearing the name of a familiar company, the name of a law firm: Philip Storm’s office.