This session was about blurring the boundaries between fact and fiction. I took the prompt "spying on someone."
Watching the neighbours became an evening entertainment. By now, she knew their schedule. Light went on in the living room when darkness fell, and they turned it off between 9.30 and 10 pm. Then the light went on in the kitchen before they retreated to the bedroom in the back. A very ordinary life, it seemed, wasn’t it for the fridge. You see, the fridge wasn’t at its usual spot in the kitchen. Don’t you think that a fridge in any other place than the kitchen is suspect? She knew it was a fridge because of the blueish light flashing up from the hallway into the living room. But who would put a fridge in the hallway? she wondered. It smelled of crime. No other furniture piece, besides maybe the bath tub, could evoke such a sense of mischief. It was the place where cut-up body parts were stored. A second thought was drugs. Maybe they needed to keep the stuff cold for when the customers came at the door. You don’t want to turn your back and go fetch the package in the kitchen. She googled “drugs” and “fridge” and found out that LSD and cocaine could last for years in the fridge. Speed and crystal needed to be refrigerated. But there was too little action happening in the flat for it to be drugs traffic. At 6pm the couple sunk below window level into the sofas to disappear for the rest of the night. From the distance, she couldn’t make out their features but she knew they were old because of the grey hair and the leaning body posture. No criminal types, but wasn’t that the perfect disguise for any crime? A lovely old couple watching TV. She moved closer to the window, peering to the other side and asking herself if she should order binoculars. But before she could do so, a few days later, the couple came up to her on the street. She didn’t recognise them at first sight but then they presented themselves as the neighbours of the other side. They had seen her at the window, he said, and were wondering if she was alright. “Oh,” she blushed, “I love to dream, I’m not looking at anything in particular.” “We didn’t think so. We’re not very interesting to look at!” The man laughed cordially but his eyes were cold, the kind of pale blue coldness that a fridge would emanate. Silence fell and they turned away without saying goodbye. The encounter made her stay away from the window that evening. The next day she gathered courage and looked out. It was the usual scene of two old people sitting in front of the TV. She waited in vain for the blueish light to flash up. But the fridge was gone.