Things kept appearing in my room overnight

It had been three weeks since my wife took our baby and left me, and honestly, I didn’t blame her. I had brought another woman into our home and slept with her. I completely understood why she hated me and why she wanted to get away.

Three weeks, and not a word from her.

At this point, I had to fight for my parental rights, and I had a court date coming up in a couple of weeks. Everything was horrible, yes, but I was actively trying to fix it. I figured I’d show my wife just how much I loved her, how much I was willing to change and fight for her, and seeing my child in court seemed like a good first step.

Around the three-week mark, I realized random things were appearing in my house overnight.

At first, I didn’t think much of it. A pen. A towel. A notepad. Strange things to suddenly appear overnight, sure, but nothing alarming. That is, until I woke up one morning to find a brand-new 65-inch flat screen TV, still in the box, sitting right beside my bed.

I called my wife repeatedly until she finally answered.

“God damnit, Nelson, what!?” she snapped angrily.

“Hey, s-sorry, but… have you been coming into the house at night?” I asked, my voice trembling.

“I’m going to make this very simple for you, Nelson, okay? Do not contact me for any reason.”

Then she hung up.

Got it, I thought. Not her.

My mind spun in every direction, and over the next few nights, more brand-new electronics appeared in the house. Eventually, I decided to install a camera in my bedroom. I was going to get to the bottom of this. And if it was my wife messing with me, maybe trying to set me up with stolen merchandise or something, footage of her breaking into the house would look great in court.

After buying the camera, I installed it in the corner of my room and downloaded the app it needed. I was so eager to catch whoever was doing this that I couldn’t sleep that night. I stayed awake the entire time.

No one came.

The next night, though, I fell asleep easily.

When I woke up, there was someone else’s dog sitting in my room.

A dog? Really?

And on top of that, whoever had broken in had written my wife’s name all over the walls in red paint.

I was nervous, but excited to finally check the footage. But after bringing the dog to the local pound and returning home, I discovered the footage was corrupted. Worse, the camera itself had been smashed.

I’d had enough.

And now I knew it was my wife. Who else would write her name all over the walls?

I was completely lost, with no plan at all, until my friend Frank called me. That’s when I got the perfect idea.

“Frank,” I answered quickly, “Frank, buddy, I need your help. This is going to sound weird, but…”

“Nelson, what do you need, my friend?” he replied.

After I explained everything, he agreed to stay the night at my house so we could catch whoever was breaking in.

That night, Frank came over with his gun, and I made him a bed on the floor of my bedroom. I was finally going to catch this intruder, and this time I’d have a witness.

But the next morning, it wasn’t what had been added that terrified me.

It was what had been taken away.

Frank was gone.

The bed on the floor was still perfectly made, but he had vanished.

I called out for him. Nothing.

His car was still parked in my driveway, but his phone wasn’t ringing. Finally, I decided to call the police, something I had been desperately trying to avoid because of all the stolen stuff filling my house.

That quickly became the least of my worries.

My phone rang.

It was my wife.

“Hello?” I answered numbly.

“You seriously couldn’t even show up for court? Shows how much you care about us, Nelson.”

“Wait, no—I—”

I checked the date.

“Fuck. No, no, no, no… Janet, I’m so sorry. I’ve been going through—”

She cut me off.

“Even before the baby, back before we got married, you would sometimes slip out in the middle of the night. I should’ve known then that you were always going to be who you wanted to be, not who we needed you to be.”

Her voice sharpened.

“You’re always so wrapped up in your own bullshit that you didn’t even notice the goddamn nanny cam I hooked up to the laptop in our room. That’s how I caught you cheating, you know that?”

My eyes slowly drifted toward the laptop sitting on the desk in my bedroom.

Beside it, a wire ran up to a small webcam clamped to the bookshelf behind a plant.

As my wife’s muffled voice continued through the phone, it slipped from my hand and hit the floor while I staggered toward the laptop.

At the bottom of the screen was a small tab labeled with archived footage from over a month ago.

It had been recording the entire time.

Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw.

It was me.

Me doing all of it.

Leaving in the middle of the night. Returning with random items. Writing my wife’s name all over the walls. Destroying the camera I had installed myself. Everything.

I couldn’t move.

I sat frozen, staring at the screen in horror.

Then came the footage from the previous night.

Frank.

The video showed me choking Frank to death before dragging his body out of the room.

As I watched myself in the video disappear down the hallway, there was suddenly a loud knock at the front door in real life.

The police.

My eyes scanned the room until they landed on a trail of blood leading down into the cellar.

The knocking grew louder and more aggressive as I sank deeper into fear and confusion.