by Kristen Davenport
The air felt different, charged with an electricity, as I walked in the unlocked door. I knew in that moment: someone else had been in my apartment; someone else had traipsed through my life who I likely did not know and would never know, a stranger had gone through my belongings and knew more about me than I would ever know about him.
There was little indication that someone else had been in my home beyond the slight odor of animal sweat, the nervousness of a house burglar who likely had never done this before, who had broken in with little preparation. There would be fingerprints if dusted, I somehow knew, but they would not pull up anyone in the system because this man did not have a criminal record. He was not a seasoned criminal, maybe only someone down on his luck, someone who had taken the chance that no one would be home in the middle of the day on a Wednesday. He didn’t want to hurt anyone. It wasn’t personal. Mine was one of the many anonymous doors he had considered in my apartment complex.
I moved through the rest of the apartment slowly, my initial pit of terror slowly being replaced by a strange sense of calmness, resignation. The man, whoever he was, was long since gone. My bed was as I had left it, slept in, the covers rumpled and the pillows slightly askew. The drawers revealed little more than slight tampering with, my clothes pushed aside in a way that I had not left it. The only thing I was immediately able to tell was taken was a set of pearl earrings from my grandmother, probably the only thing I owned of any value at all. Everything else was as I had left it, the belongings of my life on display for the stranger that had been here—hours ago, minutes ago, only moments ago? How far away was he by now?
I sat down at my kitchen table. I saw no real reason to call the police for a petty burglary of which the sum total of value taken was little more than my own sentimentality. For the first time in a long time, I felt strangely content. I wondered halfheartedly why the man had chosen my dinky apartment, in a city of run-down apartments, to break into. That night, I slept deeply as I had not in weeks; I woke refreshed.
* * *
A few days later, I came home to find the apartment door just slightly ajar as though someone had left in a hurry out of it. I knew, immediately, that the man must have been back. The distinct smell of male perspiration hit my nostrils as I closed the door softly behind me.
Inside, on my kitchen table, was a used coffee mug, just a few sips left of black coffee inside of it. The exterior of the cup was still just barely warm to the touch as though the man had slipped out only several minutes before I pulled into the parking lot. My usual chair was moved away from the table like the man had simply let himself in, sat down for a cup of coffee, and abruptly left—but was that because he had somehow sensed I would be home soon, that I would confront the stranger in my home with understandable anger at having been so violated by another person? But why come back at all for a simple cup of coffee in an apartment hardly worth having robbed the first time around?
I walked back into the bedroom, which looked undisturbed. In my bathroom, there were fresh footprints on my bathmat and steam residue on my mirror. I grasped my toothbrush out of the holder and felt the bristles: wet. Still, I felt almost nothing at the thought of someone else having showered in my house, having used my toothbrush, and having drunk my coffee. Maybe he was homeless, I thought. Maybe he had nowhere else to go. Maybe he would return if I played along with his cat-and-mouse game. Maybe he was totally harmless.
The now-familiar smell of sweat greeted me after work the next Monday. Yet again, the doorknob slipped open easily without the use of a key: left unlocked again by the mysterious stranger. Immediately I became aware of the scent of tobacco in the room, a scent that was incredibly foreign to me as I was not and never had been a smoker. On the kitchen table, there was a bowl full of ash and a still smoldering cigarette. Moving closer, the potent smell making me cough sharply, I inspected the cigarette with a detached calm. I did not recognize the brand, nor did it truly seem to matter. Again, it seemed the man had stepped into my home as easily as though he had a key of his own, using my belongings while I was gone and carefully slipping out when he was through.
I moved to open a window, resolving myself to the reality that I would need to air out the apartment from the smoke. I sat down at the kitchen table where the man had clearly sat, in the same chair that was slightly uneven from the rest of the uniform chairs. I breathed in the smell of the tobacco, surprising myself with how much I liked it, how calm it seemed to make me feel. Perhaps, I thought, my years of non-smoking were behind me. Perhaps there were much worse things happening in the world than my personal decision to tarnish my clean lungs with the black tar of nicotine. Absentmindedly I reached for the cigarette, turning it over in my hand to look at the end: this was where the mouth, the lips, of my visitor had been, seemingly only a few minutes before. I wondered who he was—where he came from, why he chose to come here, how he continued to slip in unnoticed and undetected, and when he would eventually miscalculate, and I would come home to find him sitting at my kitchen table, eating my food and drinking my coffee, his identity finally exposed. At this point, he just seemed like anybody else, if anybody else had rifled through my belongings while I was not there, that is.
* * *
The next night, I sat at my kitchen table in my pajamas, smoking a cigarette. I heard movement outside the front door, a physical presence that I could feel even in the apartment. Him, I thought. It’s him. A shudder of apprehension ran through me. The doorknob shook. I eyed it, remembering distinctly that I had locked it a few hours ago. Suddenly, the doorknob stopped moving as quickly as it had begun. Footsteps moved in the opposite direction, becoming more faint and distant.
I walked to the front door and opened it to the outside world, but there was no sign that anyone had ever been there. In just several seconds, the man who had been in my home multiple times, who perhaps knew more about me than I even knew about myself, had vanished into thin air.
My heart beat wildly in my chest. I could not recall a time that I had felt more disappointed. I closed the door, sat back down at the kitchen table, and resumed my vigil for the man who had eluded me.
* * *
For weeks, I waited for the man to return to me. Every day, coming home from work, in a rush of excitement, I was met with a crushing blow: immediately, I knew, the moment I stepped through the door, that the man had not been here. At night, I would anxiously sit at my kitchen table and chain smoke cigarette after cigarette as though the scent of the man’s chosen brand would bring him back to me. In my bed, I almost wished that the man was beside me; no degree of tiredness could seem to lull me into a restful sleep. Instead, I would wake again in the morning feeling as though I had not slept at all, my fatigue only increasing with each passing day.
I could not help but feel abandoned, as though the man’s absence was a personal slight against me, against the home that had welcomed him in with open arms. It was as though he had sensed the fondness I had grown to have for him, and so he had retreated, deeply uncomfortable. I was supposed to remain an anonymous person, an anonymous apartment for him to slip in and out of as he pleased, and here I had ruined it all with my emotion. Now, if he came in, he had to confront something that perhaps he had spent a long time avoiding: that this apartment was inhabited by a real person, with a real life, with feelings and thoughts and needs. It was too intimate, somehow more intimate than taking a shower in my home, sleeping in my bed, and drinking from my coffee cups had been. Perhaps, I thought, he had been forced to feel like he knew me—so now he could not exploit me without the deep shame that comes from taking advantage of someone who is too vulnerable, or maybe just too stupid, to resist.
It hit me hard: he had not returned because he felt sorry for me. Because what kind of person is aware that a total stranger is breaking into their home and using their belongings without at least attempting to prevent it in the future? Someone that even a homeless person would feel pity for, I guess.
* * *
After a month, I had resigned myself to the reality that perhaps the stranger would never return. Each day—one long, boring work day fading into the next—I would return home, almost breathless with anticipation. I would stand, poised outside of my door, my apartment key held in my hand; yet, as soon as I stepped through the door, I would be hit with a wave of profound disappointment.
Finally, I had come to the conclusion that I could no longer expect the man to come back. Life drug by, day after day, minute by minute. The cigarettes I now chain smoked served as a reminder of it all.
One weekend day I dredged through the deep snow to a nearby corner store on the hunt for more cigarettes. A habit I had once hated in others, one I had found repulsive and judged without reserve, was now one I found sustaining.
The corner store was busy as I entered through the door, the usual line of alcoholics holding pints of liquor in their hands to get their next fix. As I reached the cashier, pointing to my usual brand, I suddenly became acutely aware of a nearby scent. I looked around, stunned, immediately recognizing the smell to be that of the man. He was here.
Behind me stood a man I did not know, but felt as though I did. I estimated he was around thirty years old, tall and lanky but not gaunt. He met my eye contact with disinterest, almost contempt.
“You—“ I stammered.
“Some of us have other places to be, lady,” he snapped.
“But—I think—“
The cashier watched our exchange. The line continued to grow behind the man, the man who I suddenly knew had been in my apartment so many times, the man who now looked right through me as though I did not exist at all.
The cashier watched our exchange. The line continued to grow behind the man, the man who I suddenly knew had been in my apartment so many times, the man who now looked right through me as though I did not exist at all.
“Jesus Christ. Are you going to buy those cigarettes or what?”
I spun on my heels to see the pack on the counter. I heard, but did not process, the disgruntled and exasperated sighs from other customers behind the man.
“I swear I know you from somewhere,” I said to the man.
“I don’t know who you are.”
He said it with so little emotion, such detachment, that it stung. All I wanted was for him just to admit that he knew who I was; after all, he had been in my home, he had rummaged through my belongings, had seen all of me in a way no one else ever had—
The cashier interrupted my train of thought. “I’m sorry, ma’am, either you need to buy the cigarettes or let everyone else go in the line.”
The cigarettes did not matter anymore; I didn’t even feel capable of paying for them, of having a seemingly normal exchange with another person that involved something as meaningless as money, of what was essentially a piece of paper yet controlled so many aspects of my life. I felt like I was on the verge of a panic attack.
I ran out of the store, beginning to hyperventilate, sinking down the wall of a nearby store as I lost my breath altogether. It was him. I knew. No matter what, we knew each other to the core. I would have to live with that for now.
Kristen Davenport is a writer of short stories and screenplays and is currently at work on a novel. She is interested in exploring themes of mental illness, relationship dynamics, and how our lives interconnect with others. Through her background in clinical social work, she strives to approach her writing honestly and openly. Kristen resides in the Atlanta area.