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The New Tenant
15 August 2010
My friend Amy was in the process of moving into a new place; consisting of a small formerly-guest house behind the house of her landlords.
As we approached for me to see it for the first time, she told me that her landlords were away, but that landlords' personal housekeeper
(an east Indian who apparently doesn't speak a lick o'English),
"spies" on Amy, often "casually" following down the driveway, etc.
This was conveyed with amusement, and we drove down the long single drive to the back where was her "new" house.
As I was noticing over the top of the cinderblock wall the very top of a pool-slide next door, my friend was looking beyond me at the house and with bemused astonishment realized,
"She's in my house...!"
I didn't realize what she meant right away, and turned to the bay window but my friend indicated that the woman inside looking out at the window had turned and walked towards the back of the house inside.
"Wait, she's inside the house?" I clarified, figuring breaking and entering taking "spying" to a whole new unsettling level, particularly so early in my friend's tenancy.
My friend responded in the affirmative as she quickly unlocked the door and we hurried inside.
I scooted in one way as she went the other, to confront the trespassing housekeeper.
But it was quickly clear: there was no one in the small house.
There was not enough Stuff moved in with which really to hide anywhere; whatever short woman my friend had seen looking out the window... she had vanished.
Back outside later, getting ready to drive me home, I noted the actual housekeeper way way down at the very front of the long driveway.
We figured that as there was someone with my friend, the housekeeper was not going to come down.
So considering so soon while even still moving in, the possibility existed that there was already a spectral tenant with whom my friend may have shared the place...
A few days later Amy conveyed that that same night after dropping me off at home, she came back to the house and found the housekeeper on her doorstep, upset.
Eventually Amy was able to deduce the housekeeper had locked herself out of her own place and had no way of calling anyone for help... nor could she remember any of the phone numbers for her brother or friends.
So my open-hearted friend allowed her to sleep on the couch.
At around 2:30am, Amy had the sensation that someone was walking around her bed as if someone kept bumping into it while walking around in the dark.
She woke up and was understandably concerned, thinking it was the housekeeper needing something
(and as Amy was in no mood for another marathon round of charades),
she didn't move or acknowledge the sensation... but then Amy felt the very distinct pressure of someone sitting down on the bed, right in the crook of her knees.
Understandably unsettled, she still thought it was the housekeeper, and that she was waiting for Amy to wake up.
After a while, my becoming-annoyed friend turned over to address her, but there was no one there.
A quiet glance into the living room served to prove that her corporeal "guest" had not moved nor had she awakened.
Amy reported after that first night there had been no activity; after several years she eventually moved to another place.
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