Page 53 of Stay Scared

“What are these?”

“Places where I saw the same man.”

“The man with the bird mask?”

“I didn’t connect him to the mask then.”

Owen removes a photograph from the lower corner of the board.

I am outside Halden Coffee. Across the street, a man in a dark hood stands near a parked car. Another picture catches the same build near my apartment entrance, and a later one puts him behind the crowd at a haunt opening.

“You noticed him first.”

“Yes.”

“Before you started watching me?”

“Yes.”

“You could have warned me.”

“If I approached you, I expected him to change his pattern.”

“How long was that the reason?”

His eyes drift toward the rest of the wall. “Not very long.”

I open one of the notebooks.

The early pages follow the hooded man, recording approximate height, vehicle plates, distances, rental companies, and dead businesses attached to temporary addresses.

My name enters later.

At first, I am only the person he watches. Then Owen starts recording me too.

He writes down whether I ate, how late I stayed, which comments made me close the laptop, and when I began checking the coffee-shop entrance before sitting down. Eventually the threat disappears from several pages, but I remain.

“You kept watching after he stopped appearing.”

“I did.”

“Why?”

Owen meets my eyes. “Because I wanted to.”

I close the notebook.

“How much did you see?”

“Enough that your routines stopped surprising me.”

“That tells me almost nothing.”

His mouth tightens.

I step closer. “You filled a room with me. You learned when I slept and what I ate. You sat behind me often enough that I noticed when you weren’t there. Do not get shy now.”

“What exactly do you want to know?”