Someone’s Always Watching

Had a series of dreams last night that have inspired me to write some imaginative short stories. It was a series of 4 dreams. This one is inspired by the first dream.

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Having just turned 21, Frances wanted to prove that she could live independently from her family, so when she saw an Ad for a room to rent in a share house, she took up the opportunity.

The day arrived when Frances went to check the vacancy advertised in the paper in a multi-roomed house across town. When she arrived, she was taken to a front lounge room area where she was invited to sit down on an 80s style recliner.

The room was expansive and at first glance, appeared as if it could sit at least a dozen people at any one time. As well as the 80s recliner she sat on, Frances could see three large 3 seater sofas, 4 stools by a cocktail bar in one corner, a couple of pouffes and a bunch of bean bag style chairs in a semi-circle layout around a good sized television in another corner of the room.

Random doors at intervals led to hidden rooms beyond what Frances could see.

In front of her, spread out among the seats sat a handful of people. One guy that reminded her of Shaggy in the Scooby Doo cartoon series, with longish hair, scraggly beard, super thin. Leaning back in his chair, seemingly looking at her with a nonchalance type expression on his face was introduced as Jim.

The person doing the introductions appeared to be older with blonde hair, going by the name of Vicki.

“We’re pretty much on a first name basis here, no time for formalities when one of us wants to use the bathroom,” the others giggled as she said this, she waited before continuing, “sitting over there,” she pointed to another 3 seater, “is Heather. She’s the nominated cook here only because she’s an absolute whizz in the kitchen, especially when making her chicken biscuits, mash and gravy!”

A blush crept up Heather’s cheeks at the mention of this praise, “You guys! It’s just a family recipe!”

“Sitting on the stools over there,” she nodded her head in the direction of the cocktail bar behind her, “are Johanna and her live in boyfriend Rob-“

“-Just call me Jo,” the girl interrupted, “everyone else does.”

Giving a look of annoyance in Jo’s direction, Vicki continued, “Rob gets away with living here rent free because he’s our handy man.. need a light bulb changed, a wardrobe put together or heavy lifting, Rob’s your man.”

“Only on loan though, he’s MY man!” Jo intercepted as she leaned into him wrapping her arms around him as if to show ownership.

“There are roughly ten of us living here, you’ll get to meet the others later if you decide to move in.” She looked down at the clipboard in her hand. “So tell us a bit about yourself.”

“Well, I just left Uni after finishing a BA in photography and will be working in my Aunt’s photography business as of next week. I’m a non smoker…” Frances continued to describe herself as best she could until she could see that the others appeared satisfied with what she had to say.

After the talk, Vicki stood up and handed over a form for Frances to sign. “Well with that done and dusted, would you like to see the room?”

“Sure” Frances stood up and followed Vicki as they walked into a hallway and past openings that led into a kitchen, a tv room, dining area, sun room and what appeared to be two more lounge areas filled with more recliners and coffee tables.

“That’s our library” Vicki explained as they walked past. Sure enough, a second glance into the room revealed bookshelves filled to the brim with multitudes of eclectic books.

Walking up a flight of stairs, the house suddenly appeared to look bigger on the inside as the final step gave way to a long corridor which seemed to contain several doors.

“This used to be a boarding school roughly a century ago before it was refurbished into a residential property. It’s been through a number of owners before I bought the property about 30 years ago. It can house up to 50 people, but I like to keep the numbers small so that we can use some of the spare rooms for storage and other things. Your board comes with two rooms, the room you sleep in and you’ll be assigned a storeroom for any other belongings, and we also have two craft rooms, a sewing room, a workshop, 2nd book room where we store excess books and down the end of the corridor, what we dub the spy room.”

“Spy room?” Frances looked toward the end of the corridor.

“Yes, that’s where all the monitors are for all the cameras in the house.” Vicki explained. “Just a precautionary measure to prevent theft or anyone doing anything illegal.

It was then that Frances noticed all the cameras in the corners of every room, even the private rooms had a camera. Frances wavered at the thought of moving into a house with cameras everywhere. Did she want to live in a house where her every move was being watched?!?

“I figured it’s safe to tell you of that now since you signed the 6 month lease. Keeping in mind that breaching the lease will cost you heavily in penalties.” Vicki explained with a knowing look on her face.

“Oh.. no.. umm… that’s ok.. it’s just….” Frances stuttered.

“Oh don’t worry,” Jim had followed the two women up the stairs and spoke up from behind her as he looked her over from head to toe, “I turn the cameras off for half an hour each morning and evening so as to give everyone enough privacy to change outfits.”

“Ummm ok.. well.. good to know I guess.” Frances looked up nervously at one of the many cameras as she was led down the hall to her new home. The camera following her every move.