The Day After I Go Missing

Not my debt to pay

Day 6 – Her Perspective

The morning feels wrong before she even opens her eyes.

Her apartment is too quiet, like the city outside has paused. She sits up in bed, feeling that deep, chest-heavy dread she can’t explain anymore.

She doesn’t bother with coffee. The last of her groceries are gone; she has $4.26 left in her bank account.

On her way out, she notices her doorframe: fresh scratches near the lock. Maybe it’s just old wood, she tells herself, but she remembers locking the deadbolt last night. She knows she did.

She walks for hours with no real destination. Every time she glances over her shoulder, someone seems to be there:

A woman with a stroller stops walking when she does.

A man in a baseball cap ducks into an alley when she turns suddenly.

The same car with tinted windows cruises by three separate times, slowing near the corner.

By afternoon, she’s shaking. She goes into a convenience store and lingers too long in the snack aisle, pretending to browse while watching the street through the grimy window.

The cashier notices. “You okay, miss?”

She wants to tell him no. She wants to tell someone everything. Instead she forces a smile and leaves.

That night she barricades her door with a chair. The envelope with the words “WE SEE YOU” is still under her mattress. She checks it three times before she can sleep.

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Day 7 – Her Perspective

She wakes with a start. Someone is pounding on her door.

She freezes. The knocking stops, replaced by a slow dragging sound along the wood, like a fingernail tracing the frame.

Then silence.

She waits for hours before moving. When she finally looks outside, the hallway is empty, but something’s been taped to her door: another torn scrap of paper.

> “DEBTS GET PAID.”

Her stomach flips. She doesn’t owe money to anyone except her landlord. None of this makes sense.

That evening she calls her sister. Her voice shakes as she tries to explain. Her sister laughs nervously and says she’s just paranoid, probably stressed. But when she asks her sister to come stay the night, the line goes quiet. Then:

> “I… can’t. I’m sorry.”

When she hangs up, she feels more alone than ever.

She doesn’t sleep that night. Around 2 a.m., she swears she hears footsteps outside her window.

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Day 8 – The Day She Disappears

The next morning, her phone rings again. Same unknown number. She doesn’t answer this time.

She’s seen near the corner store on the security cam around 10:14 a.m. buying a bottle of water. That’s the last confirmed sighting.

Her neighbor later tells police she heard her apartment door slam hard around noon and then… nothing.

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Missing Person Report – Filed Day 9

Reporting Party: Lydia’s sister, Angela M.

Time Filed: 4:47 p.m.

Location: Central Precinct

> “She’s not answering her phone. She missed work—well, she got fired, but she missed the appointment she was supposed to have with me yesterday. Her apartment was locked when I stopped by. It’s not like her to just disappear. And she’s been scared lately… saying weird things about people watching her.”

The responding officer lists her as MISSING – SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES.

Details noted:

Apartment door locked, chair overturned inside.

Mattress disturbed, with a torn scrap of paper reading “WE SEE YOU.”

Phone left behind on the kitchen counter.

Purse missing. No wallet or ID found.