Chapter 5 The Shelf I Didn't move

I didn't move.

The phone was still in my hand, Jamie's voice long gone, but the words stayed.

"Some from the shower. The bedroom."

I was already turning toward the hallway before I realized I'd moved. My gaze locked on the shelf - the narrow oak one that Jade had told me not to touch when I moved in.

"Don't shift that one," she'd said, all casual. "It's nailed weirdly into the wall. Might mess something up."

I'd shrugged and agreed. It had seemed like such a small thing then. A harmless quirk. Like the way she always told me not to microwave tea.

But now, it buzzed under my skin. Like a thread being pulled from a sweater - slow, inevitable unraveling.

I approached the shelf slowly. My feet felt like they were moving through water. My whole body was trembling by the time I crouched.

I reached out once - missed. My fingers were shaking too hard.

Breathe. Just breathe.

On the second try, I got a grip. Pulled gently.

It shifted - only slightly, barely an inch - and there it was.

A tiny black dot.

Tucked behind the shelf, embedded so seamlessly that you'd never notice it unless you were looking for it. A camera.

Blinking.

Watching.

Still watching.

I stumbled back like it had hissed at me. My shoulder hit the wall with a soft thud and I slid down until I was sitting on the floor. My knees came up to my chest. I wrapped my arms around them and tried to breathe. But my lungs weren't working. My chest felt too small, like the panic was taking up all the room inside me.

I wasn't imagining it.

It was real.

They had watched me - not just glimpses, not just moments - but in my most private spaces. The shower. The bed. The moments I thought were mine.

I felt like I was made of glass. Shattered into a thousand pieces, all cutting me at once.

I sat there for a long time. I don't know how long. Minutes. Hours maybe.

At some point, I crawled across the floor and grabbed my phone again.

I called Jade.

The dial tone was sharp. Unforgiving. I almost hung up.

She answered on the third ring.

"Eva," she said softly. Like my name was a warning. "Hey."

My throat burned. "Why."

Silence stretched.

"I-" Her voice broke. Then she inhaled, steadier. "Eva, listen. I didn't do anything directly. I didn't install anything, okay? I didn't... set anything up."

"But you knew." My voice cracked in the middle. "You told me not to move the shelf."

She didn't deny it.

"I needed the money," she said finally, her tone more clipped now. "It wasn't like I was selling your organs. It was-just cameras. You didn't even know."

I flinched. "That's supposed to make it better?"

"No. I'm not saying that. I'm just saying-" Her voice wavered. "It wasn't supposed to be like this. I didn't know it'd blow up. I thought it'd be one of those weird streams with like, twelve dudes watching and then forgetting it happened."

"Twelve dudes?" I echoed, stunned.

"You were barely even home at first!" she snapped, then paused like she hadn't meant to raise her voice. "I didn't think you'd stay."

I swallowed hard. "And when I did?"

Silence.

"You could've told me. You could've taken it down-"

"I couldn't," she said, lower now. "I signed things too. NDA stuff. I got paid, and they kept renewing it, and I thought-hell, I don't know what I thought. I didn't think you'd find out like this."

"Why didn't you warn me?"

"I tried," she insisted. "That shelf thing - that was me warning you. Subtle, but-God, Eva, what did you expect me to do? Send a postcard saying 'Hey, your privacy's a subscription model now'?"

The words hit like a slap.

"You signed a lease," she added. "It's all in there. I made sure it was legally clean."

I blinked. "Legally clean? Is that what this is to you? A legal issue?"

"I'm just saying I didn't break any laws. You signed it, Eva."

I stared at the blinking camera across the hall, bile crawling up my throat.

"You watched me," I whispered.

She didn't say anything for a long moment.

Then: "I didn't watch it. I just... leased access. I didn't want to know the details."

"You're disgusting."

"Eva-"

I hung up.

Not because I was done. But because I couldn't hear her voice anymore without feeling like my skin would crawl off my body.

I lay back on the rug. My heart pounding so hard it hurt.

I didn't move for the rest of the day. Not to eat. Not to drink. Just... stayed there. Shaking. Trembling. Thinking of all the places the cameras might be.

Behind picture frames. Light bulbs. The bathroom mirror. Maybe even the plants.

That night, I slept under the dining table. I took a pillow and a blanket and crawled beneath it like a bunker. I don't know why. It didn't make me safer. But it felt like the only space they might not be able to see.

Saturday blurred. I unplugged the router. Smashed the hallway lamp with a wooden spoon. Unscrewed the vent covers with shaking hands. No new cameras - or maybe ones I just wasn't smart enough to find.

I stopped caring around 4 p.m.

On Sunday, I sat on the floor of the hallway for so long my legs went numb. I had a screwdriver in my hand but no energy to move. My whole body was aching. Not from exertion - just from existing.

I didn't eat. Didn't shower. The air felt stale and sour and heavy, but I couldn't bring myself to open the windows. I didn't want to give the outside world access too.

By Monday morning, there was no panic left.

Only a hollow ache. Like a fire had come and gone and all that was left were the ashes.

Why me?

How long?

I stared at the ceiling until I could see shapes in the plaster. Faces. Eyes. Maybe I was imagining it. Maybe not.

That's when the knock came.

Three sharp raps.

I froze.

Another knock.

I crept to the door, every instinct screaming not to open it. But my curiosity - or desperation - was louder.

I looked through the peephole.

A woman.

She wasn't shifting nervously. She just stood there, still. Waiting.

I cracked the door an inch.

"Eva Quinn?" she asked.

I nodded.

She gave a faint smile. "My name's Celeste. I work with a private legal firm. One of our clients has been following your situation and... they'd like to help. Discreetly."

She held up a folder.

"I know this is unexpected," she said softly. "But we need to talk."