The Point of No Return

I'm grinning like Tom every time he thinks he's caught Jerry.

This is a chapter from I Hear You Watching, my novel based on my experience with hearing voices and paranoia.

But you can jump in here! The “previously on” will get you up to speed.

Previously on I Hear You Watching…

Alex hears strangers following and mocking him wherever he goes. When recording them and confronting his neighbors didn’t work, he turned his apartment upside-down looking for surveillance bugs and blew a fuse trying to inspect his smoke detector. But now he’s got ‘em cornered!

Footsteps in the dark? Circling me. Marching. How many are there?

The cream-colored grid of my kitchen floor stretches from my cheek to a vanishing point under the oven.

Not footsteps.

Ringing, like a choir of air conditioners. The growl of the fridge? No, the fridge is silent.

My jeans sting against my scraped shin. Extending my leg simultaneously feels good and hurts more.

I look up at my looming fridge. A hole in the sky. The smoke detector hangs from it like a peeled scab ripe for the final pluck. I hit a nerve when I pulled. The scab screamed and gave a jolt, a pop of blue-white heat. What a fucking idiot. Jabbing a screwdriver into power outlets, light switches, then pulling on this live-wired smoke detector!

The footsteps fade as my heart calms. No one is here.

The blown fuse took everything out. I imagine any other hidden bugs have burst and are dripping in my walls. Sweet relief.

The indicator light on the smoke detector stares down at me, dark and unblinking like a dead eye. I’d spit at it, if the spit wouldn’t fall back in my face.

I laugh.

For a short while this cocoon, this cave, will be cast back to a time before electricity. My TV sits blank-faced and useless. My fridge—shit, my fridge. All my groceries. The ice cream. For now, everything is sealed in cool compartments. But as soon as I open the door, that trapped cold will spill out. Slow rot will set in.

I need to go to the fuse box and power everything off. Never too late for safety. It’d be just my luck to short out the apartment, then reach up to pluck the golden fruit at the end of my quest and touch the one remaining live wire.

They’d love for that to happen. I wonder if they were watching my window moments ago, maybe they saw the flash and the lights go out through the blinds. Maybe they think I’m dead, and are having their own celebration.

Or maybe they’re gathering their tools to come and remove the evidence before anyone finds my body—sprawled on the kitchen floor, cupboards empty, rice and sugar and stacks of books spilled around the coffee table, the table itself askew in the middle of the room below a hole in the ceiling where the smoke detector hangs by its wires.

They might clean up some of the mess. Put things back in the cupboard. Sweep up the rice and sugar. Make it look like my smoke detector went off, maybe malfunctioned, and I climbed up to turn it off.

I open the blinds to let in orange light from the street, but not enough for them to see me.

The fuse box is in the coat closet, and I check the front door locks again before I open the closet, push my coats aside, and flip the main switch off.

I take pliers from the shoebox of tools in my bedroom. Then I climb, reach, and feel the jaws slip around one wire. I’m staring at the window, the soft streetlight squeezing through the hanging blinds, knowing they’re on the other side cursing their fate or toasting my death. The wire clips like a finger bone. The smoke detector settles heavier in my hand.

The pliers open and seek the other wire. Find it and close. Clip. I catch the thing on my fingertips like a platter. Deliverance is served.

Now to relish the removal of that most damning of evidence: the microphone and the speaker. That terrible tinny speaker like the voice box in a child’s toy. Pull the string, and it calls you a faggot.

I’ll crack this nut and eat its heart.

My face hurts; I realize I’m grinning. Like Tom every time he thinks he’s caught Jerry.

I leave the smoke detector on the coffee table while I go back to the toolbox for the hammer. I saunter, spitefully slow, like I’ve just pummeled the bad guy and he’s a pulpy mess gasping for breath behind my car, and I’m about to put the thing in neutral and blast exhaust in his face before I finally drive off. I can already taste the beer. Intoxicating, bitter victory. The ice cream is still cold; I’ll eat the whole carton.

The clipped wires stick out from under the screw heads like lopped-off antennae. The parasite sits frozen with fear in my lap. I can see the seam where its carapace fits together. I pull, and it opens just a hair’s width.

I note that the device itself must stay in working order so I can reinstall it, in case those fucks try to set me on fire. If they could still hear me, I’d dare them to come over and set me on fire right now. I’d use the hammer and pliers on them.

I grip the halves and turn, but nothing budges. Of course it’s tamper-proof. But then how did they get the bug in there? Is this a custom device made to look like an old smoke detector? Or maybe it’s real, but after installing the mic and speaker they superglued it shut.

At the very least it’s disconnected, powerless; they have no ears, no mouth. God, the fucking mouth on that thing. It’s one thing to know you’re being watched, and another to have the watcher shouting, “Here I am, I’m here, I hate you and I’m here, motherfucker, I’m here, I’m always fucking here!”

My other option is to pound the whole thing to pieces and examine the rubble.

“Should we tell him?”

“Not yet. See what else he does first.”

The voice sends a cold buzz across my skin like white noise.

This is when Tom peels his hands apart to find them empty, and looks up to see Jerry wave at him from across the room.

My grip is so tight it’s rattling.

“What’s that weird sound?”

“I think he’s—hey, Alex, are you trying to shake the mic outta that thing?”

They laugh.

“You know that’s not gonna work, right?”

Batteries. In case of a blown fuse or power outage. “Clever motherfuckers,” I say.

“We’ve thought of everything, I guess.”

“You didn’t think it was gonna be that easy to get rid of us, did you?”

I drop the smoke detector onto the kitchen counter.

“Hey! Fuck, that was loud!”

I lean close, lips almost touching the grille, and shout, “I hope you made this shit waterproof!” then push the stopper into the drain and open the faucet.

“I wouldn’t do that, Alex.”

“I’m sure you wouldn’t! Ruin all your careful electrical work, huh? How much did this thing cost you? Or did you not pay for it yourself? Maybe you’ll be in deep shit with your supervisors. Sloppy spy work.”

“Alex, there’s shit in there that’s dangerous in water.”

I settle my chin in my hand, smiling, and shout over the rushing water, “Dangerous, huh? For whom?”

“For you. As soon as that thing gets wet, it’ll release toxic gas into the air and you’ll be dead in seconds.”

“And why, pray tell, would you give me this information, dearest pals o’ mine? Don’t tell me you care about my well-being.”

“Fuck no. But we don’t need a murder charge on top of everything else.”

“I gotta tell ya, I’m this close”—my fingers pinch together—“to denying you the satisfaction of helping me. This thing is dangling over the sink, fellas. I’m calling your bluff.” The sink is full enough that it’s draining off. I shut the faucet.

“Alex, you crazy fuck, this is the truth! If you get that thing wet, you will die!”

I’ve talked myself into a position wherein my demise is the ultimate rebellion. But what do I stand to gain? I don’t believe in an afterlife, so I can’t look forward to seeing them punished. Worst-case scenario, my death is an inconvenience. They’ll show up in plastic suits, use some kind of government-grade chemical vacuum to clear the air, drain the sink, drop the smoke detector in a protective bag, and leave me here for someone else to find. The corpse of a lunatic after what was clearly an eventful afternoon.

No, it’s much later now.

The one thing in my apartment that isn’t dead—besides the smoke detector parasite and me—is the wall clock. It says 10:47. Forty-three minutes until my shift.

I take my phone from the bedroom, turn it on, and call work, feigning food poisoning. It’s a lie I can ride for a couple of days, if necessary.

When I hang up, the quiet in the apartment is overwhelming. No sound from outside. None of the usual hum of fridge, lights, or wires. I can almost hear my muscles move.

“What’s your plan, Alex?”

---

When I was six, I had a hamster named Cocoa. At one point I was playing with her on my bed, and she burrowed under the pillow, and I pushed down on it to keep her from getting out the other side. I remember seeing her head peek out, and her eyes bulged. I thought if I pushed harder her eyes would pop out. I could imagine them hanging on the optic nerves, wetting her fur with slime. I could see her scramble to find safety.

Even at six years old, the idea that something would have to seek safety from me gave me vertigo. I could’ve done it. A hamster is easy enough—just tell my parents I rolled over on her, an accident.

But it wouldn’t have been an accident. And the thought of just wanted to see what would happen made me imagine all the nights I’d spend staring at the ceiling and remembering the way her eyes bulged, the way I pressed down harder, her tiny muscles and bones unable to move between the pillow and the bed. The worst part would be when her eyes came out, like tiny black corks from pop guns. The point of no return.

Maybe because I didn’t do it, I’m exactly the kind of subject they were looking for. They want to see if I can be moved to do otherwise. Their goal is to pummel me into pressing down until the eyes come out. Any eyes. Even my own.

I stare at my reflection in the TV screen. The streetlight and blinds paint a barred trapezoid over me. One bright strip falls across my left eye. It haloes, and I see the floaters inside my eye, little watery amoeba shapes drifting through the glare. When I blink, they swirl like patches of sea foam in a rocky inlet. I keep my eyes as still as I can and the floaters calm, pushed by the subtle throb of my heartbeat. Then, when this is the only movement, I blink again.

I take the smoke detector from the counter. Into the grille I say, “I want to try something with you guys.”

“Oh, yeah? Audience participation?”

I lean over the recorder, there’s a thin bar left in the battery. “You could call it that. But I want to see…” I sit on the couch. “…how long it takes… for this to become so incredibly annoying… annoying… annoying… annoying… annoying…” and I don’t finish the sentence; I stick on the word, “…annoying… annoying… annoying…” Rhythmic. Three syllables and a pause, each the same length, said in 4/4 time, the most monotonous time signature there is. The word itself has a bend in the middle like whiplash on an old wooden roller coaster. An—then it levels and rounds a turn—noy—then dips back down and speeds up—ying.

I say it faster, and it morphs into “anoing anoing anoing anoing anoing…” When I have to inhale, I do so quickly to keep pace.

If I change the sound in any way, it’ll become too interesting. They’ll wonder how it will change next. For my idea to work, I have to make it clear they’ll get nothing else from me. I’ll line this word up like bricks in the mud as far as I can, then work my way back, stacking another layer, back and forth, until I’ve built a wall.

I want to cultivate an allergy or phobic response to my voice. I want to make their ears bleed with one word.

“…annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying…”

I lie on the couch with the smoke detector on my chest. I fold my hands behind my head and stare at the ceiling. I feel myself smile occasionally, and hear the smile creep into my voice—a change I consciously allow, a torturer’s glee—while imagining the crystalline silence that will envelop me when this is over.

Teleportation would be a dream. I could disintegrate before their eyes, then materialize somewhere far away and go on living my life.

But the viewers of this “show,” whether it’s just the idiots next door or a vast audience, would be fascinated by the “teleporting guy.”

It’d be an adventure for them—every episode they’d tune in to see me disappear, and then try to track me down. The observers might offer a reward for the person who finds me.

The winner would get to mess with me as punishment. The punishment would be shot on whatever camera, webcam, or phone the winner had at their disposal, and broadcast for the others to watch and froth at the mouth, eager for their turn.

The one rule would be that I’m kept alive and physically mobile, in the spirit of the hunt.

The only way I could rid myself of them would be to zap somewhere they’d never guess to look. Once there, I’d either have to dig a hole and stay put or continue moving from unthinkable place to unthinkable place for the rest of my life. My teleportation ability would have to be at the ready to get me out of split-second scrapes.

When powering up, it might sound like an old flashbulb charging in my head, that high-frequency rise. Maybe it’d be audible to others around me, so I’d have to be careful where I did it. It might sap my energy to reach that level of charge, so I couldn’t maintain it all the time, and they’d catch on and coordinate to ambush me in moments of weakness. Maybe while I slept. I’d grow to distrust even those who seemed to want to help me. I’d only trust people who didn’t look at me, who ignored my voice, and who seemed not to care. But I’d wonder about everyone.

Of course, as news broke about some guy zapping himself here and there all over the world, eventually everyone would care.

---

I should’ve looked at the clock when I started. I didn’t think of it until now, long into saying the word. I say it once per second. That’s 3,600 times per hour.

“…annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying…”

This is Chinese water torture—I have to hit the same spot on their forehead with the same size drop every single time.

I lift the smoke detector in front of my face to approximate where it was on my chest while I walk to the bedroom. The foil on the window makes the bedroom very dark, so I use the flashlight to find a pen and Post-It pad in the desk drawer.

“What’s he doing?”

“I don’t know, but if he doesn’t stop fucking repeating over and over, I’m gonna flip out.”

I return to the living room, put the detector on the coffee table, hunch to keep it the same distance from my mouth, and in the streetlight I write on the pad: 3,600 x 24.

If I keep this up for a whole day, I’ll have said the word 86,400 times.

If I say it for a year, it’ll be… 31,536,000 times.

I’d have to sleep. Lack of sleep makes a person go crazy. But I imagine showering and saying it. Driving to and from work, muttering it under my breath. It’d be hard to keep it up while trying to listen and type at work. Part of my brain might partition off and become solely responsible for speaking the word from the moment I wake to the second I fall asleep. Maybe even while I sleep. It would become a thing about me that I’d have to explain to other people. How would I have conversations? I couldn’t go to the movies—people in the theater would beat the shit out of me.

But none of this will happen. There’s a magic number long before 31,536,000 that marks their breaking point, especially if one of them is already talking about “flipping out.” I can’t imagine them even making it to 86,400, but that’s only because I can’t imagine going that long myself.

Their part is easy. And because they’re at least two people, they could crack at different times. Take turns. Or they could stop listening for a day and check back in later. If they ever noticed that I’d stopped, they’d be back, and probably eager for another “crackup” like that.

Why can’t I just dunk the thing and short it out? There’s no toxic gas waiting to burst in my face. Let’s be honest, the mic is probably waterproof anyway. I can see myself finally dousing the thing and hearing the speaker laugh underwater, “What an idiot!”

Well, they aren’t going to find my next move hilarious.

“…annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying, annoying…” I pick up my phone and turn it on.

“Hey, he’s got his phone again.”

“He does? But is he still saying that shit?”

“Yeah, but now his phone is starting up. Put your headphones back on.”

“It’s two in the morning, dude! Who are you gonna call?”

“Are you gonna tell ‘em you’ve had a nervous breakdown?”

“Ha ha, yeah, he’ll call his mom, and his mom’s all waking up, like, ‘Hello?’ and he’s all, ‘Annoying, annoying—Hi, Mom—annoying, annoying, annoying…’”

“They’ll put you away in a heartbeat, you crazy fuck.”

“And we’ll be rid of you.”

Two missed calls. The phone doesn’t remember who they’re from, but I recognize the number as Dad’s. They’re right; it’s too late to call him back now, and the phone battery is at 7%. It’s probably draining faster than normal with their hacker bullshit running in the background.

“He’s on Google.”

“What’s he looking for?”

I can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier.

“Hello, yes, I’d like to report my neighbors for stalking.”

Next on I Hear You Watching…

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