On the fourth Friday of my vigil, I lay in my narrow bed beside the illuminated numbers of my digital clock, my clothes folded neatly on a wooden chair beside the door. I'd lived in my small flat for twenty years. I kept it tidy, dusted and swept it once a month, cleaned the bathroom regularly, and took my bed linen to the launderette when required. I didn't bother my neighbors, and they didn't bother me. They were just abstract subjects I was studying. I
certainly had never felt even the remotest inclination to be drawn into their lives. In fact, I could say with confidence that I didn't care about them at all.
But as time went by, I wondered what had changed, because I knew with certainty that I wanted to be drawn into Psycho's life. I wanted it very much. Perhaps I felt a responsibility to protect her, to call the police if Castor attacked her again. Perhaps it was because the telescope had brought her so close that I felt a connection with her. Or maybe it was something simpler, baser. Behind my closed eyes, I pictured her putting her fingers into her mouth—her full, bloodied lips tightening around them—and groaned.
Sleep would not come. The image in my head would not go. It taunted me. Tormented me. I rolled onto my side, my front, my back and groaned again. In desperation, I turned my attention to my throbbing hand. I'd been diligently administering the cream twice daily for a month now, but it was showing no signs of improving. In fact, it was getting worse. A moment before, I'd been oblivious to the pain; now, it was unbearable. Making me grit my teeth. Making me sit up, get out of bed, put on my overalls, and go up to the roof.
The folding canvas chair was leaning against the wall. I opened it, sat, and checked my watch. It was a quarter to three.
The moon was highlighting the myriad leaves, bathing the garden in a green, almost ghostly glow. I held up my damaged hand. It looked gangrenous in this light. The cream may have prevented amputation, but it was neither an antidote nor a cure. The poison was lodged deep in my epidermis, and there was nothing to be done except wait for the pain to subside. I rested my damaged hand lightly on my thigh. It would never regain the strength it had once had, but it was better to have a weakened hand than no hand at all.
A light snapped on in one of the houses behind my apartment block, illuminating the red flowers of the Mandevilla sanderi vine covering the railings. I stretched my neck and saw that the light was coming from Psycho's front room. The battle between respecting her privacy and checking her safety was over in less than five seconds. I stood and went to the telescope. A naked man was pacing the length of the room, back and forth, with long-determined strides while he talked on a mobile phone. It was Foxglove, the personal tutor. He usually left at ten o'clock. I frowned, then exhaled and did the thing I had promised myself I wouldn't do: I panned the telescope upward to Psycho's curtainless bedroom window.
The room was in darkness. It was difficult to find anything to focus on, so I moved my head back and noticed a dim glow on one side of the room. I put my eye back to the eyepiece and focused on the glow—the light from a small screen. Now that my eyes were adjusted, I could see Psycho sitting up in bed, tapping buttons on a small black Nokia. As she tapped, she repeatedly looked up at the bedroom door, as if worried Foxglove would open it. Then she took the back off the Nokia, removed the SIM card, put the phone into her bedside-table drawer—right at the back—dropped the SIM card into her makeup bag, and lay down.
Immediately, she sat up again and picked up another mobile that must have been on the bed beside her. This was a smartphone, with a large, bright screen that fully illuminated her face. She frowned as she scrolled down the screen, shook her head as she rapidly thumb-tapped a text, then rolled her eyes as she read the reply. She was typing another text when Foxglove appeared at the bedroom door, illuminated from behind by the hall light. Quickly, she slipped the phone under the duvet and smiled. I focused on him. He wasn't returning her smile but was looking from her to the place where she'd hidden the phone. She patted the bed beside her. He didn't move. She watched him a moment, smiling, shrugging, then lifted the duvet, and I caught a fleeting glimpse of one perfect breast.
Flinching, I gasped, jerked my head back, and quickly retreated to the canvas chair. What was I to do now? What was I to do with this new image of her that would torment me as I tried desperately to sleep? I stared at the telescope. Willing myself not to go to it. Forcing my eyes to look at the garden, the rooftops, the stars, anything but the telescope. But in the end, I stood, crossed the roof on leaden legs, and lowered my head to the eyepiece.
The bedroom was softly lit by ambient moonlight from the uncovered window. Just enough to see two shapes in the bed. Two shapes moving rhythmically. With a cry of disgust, I spun away, my skin crawling with revulsion, and hurried down the ladder into the kitchen. Covering my face with both hands, I marched back and forth, bumping into the counter, the table, knowing that what I'd seen could never be unseen.
At the back of a cupboard was a bottle of whisky that had belonged to Father. I don't know why I had it. Nostalgia, maybe. I took it out and put it on the table, thinking that if I drank enough, it could erase what I'd just seen. I picked up the bottle, my hand on the lid. If I drank enough, I might even sleep. I twisted the lid a quarter turn, stopped, tightened it again, and returned the bottle to its place at the back of the cupboard. I knew there would be no sleep for me that night, even if I drank the lot. No. The only way to get through this ordeal would be with the certainty that Foxglove had gone and Psycho was asleep in her bed—alone.
I sat at my kitchen table a further half hour, then crept back up to the roof and put my eye to the telescope. With a sinking heart, I saw Foxglove standing at the bedroom window, looking out over the gardens, but it was dark. He must have only been able to see his own reflection. I shifted the focus and discovered that Psycho was no longer in the room, so I panned out to see a sliver of light underneath a door I assumed to be her bathroom. Even though he
repelled me, I forced myself to return the focus to Foxglove. Unlike the others, he wasn't young. He looked to be in his midfifties, his stomach extended, the skin around his upper thighs loose, and there was a graying at his temples. He was standing in a wide-legged stance, scratching his testicles, supremely confident in his nakedness. Then, as he stood before his reflection, he tipped back his head to check his teeth and nostrils, sucked in his stomach, and fussed with his hair. And it was that action that caught my breath because, even though I'd been watching him for weeks, when he fussed with his hair, I finally recognized him.
