Carim had never known a moment when he did not feel like he was being watched. Early years seemed to accept the sensation and took for granted that there was something always watching him. He had heard about god and made the assumption that it was this over-arching being observing his every moment. But later he developed the conviction that it was more than one pair of eyes, and took to believing that this god had sent a number of his angels to cover him.

This was acceptable enough when a child, but became harder to bare in his adolescence. No strategy - at first, a total commitment to conviction, followed by a dramatic renunciation of all religion, then a kind of half-understood “spirituality” - seemed to explain the phenomena, disperse it, or mollify it. In his early twenties he followed the advice of a university counsellor and took these feelings to a professional, initiating two years of therapy during which the feelings would fluctuate, abating slightly somewhat to the point of being bearable to an over-crushing paranoia that there were things with eyes right outside the windows of whatever room he was in, staring unblinking at him constantly and viciously. 

One episode of the latter saw him half-voluntarily placed in a psychiatric establishment, in which he could compare notes with other lunatics, and found that the conviction that there were those who always watched was shared by others. In fact, it both surprised and disturbed him to hear the details matching his own feelings and suspicions almost exactly. He had expected other paranoiacs, of course, but had expected a varying degree of symptoms and delusions. He found that, as well. But he found others who, like him, merely but firmly believing against all proof and argument that there were hosts of watchers - what they were could not be affirmed - who would always be outside buildings but always peering in, as a group, through the windows and whatever curtains and other obstacles were put in front of the windows to, at the least, give some appearance of privacy for those who suffered this delusion. 

In this place, there was little he could say to the psychiatrist who was assigned to his case, who only saw him for a few minutes once a week at the time of that stay any way. In one of those sessions, he asked the psychiatrist how often she had heard her patients make the same claims of a group of beings that did nothing but stare at their victims, through whatever windows and coverings, on whatever floor of whatever building, constantly staring without moving or communicating or blinking, staring until the the victim would beg to be shredded to death with the razors of the watchers’ merciless sight. The psychiatrist excused herself by hewing to the professional policy of not discussing other patients’ conditions. 

After his stay, he was at large in society with little to assist him, apart from prescriptions to medicines that, in his pensioned financial state, he had difficulty affording alongside rent, bills and other requirements of independent life in society. The precariousness did nothing for his condition. Even when homeless, sleeping rough in the doorway of a shop, he could not shake off the utter conviction of being stared at, through the glass of the shop’s doors and windows, or even by such staring beings surrounding him as he huddled himself under a sleeping bag and blankets, not to keep out the cold but the piercing stares of these oppressive watchers. 

He never saw them. He knew they were there, watching him from somewhere, usually from the outside when he was inside, or from various positions around him when outside. Sometimes far away - but that did not lessen the sensation of their stares. And often enough almost right up close enough to him that he wanted to strike out and start fighting them, were it not for the anxiety that even touching these creatures would result in some torment worse than that they afflicted him enough with. 

He was, he knew by the time he reached thirty, doomed to be a constant spectacle for these watchers, whatever they were, who would never stop staring at him. He believed that when he died, his soul, wretched and depleted, would simply be deposited in some post-cosmic room in which he would be stared at for the rest of eternity, stared out without remit, and he would frighten himself to physical sickness trying to comprehend what sort of feeling that would be like. Changing over time, or constantly static beyond time - he knew it would be hell, a hell worse even than his current life. He was doomed, he knew, beyond help. 

He did not communicate this to his housemate, one Rojet, who he was paired with in a programme of assisting mentally ill people with supported community housing. The two of them shared a two bedroom unit, part of a block of six such units, in a nondiscript and featureless suburb close to the city, but not so close that it had been overrun by the up and coming. Such places were becoming rarer, but this town had a long reputation as being almost un-gentrify-able. Not that that kept rent prices lower, just less justifiable. 

For his part, Rojet had a lifetime habit of uncontrolled violence, having already hospitalised a previous housemate and sent the man before him fleeing back to the relatively safer park benches to sleep on. It made it difficult for the agency responsible for Rojet to find suitable housemates to put with him, and Carim’s case manager kept his doubts that Carim would last long from Carim, although he and Rojet’s case manager had no problem agreeing that it was a matter of time before Rojet went too far, again. They just hoped that Carim wouldn’t get too badly hurt. 

Carim kept quiet, for the most part, allowing Rojet the basic run of the house when he was in. In a way, he almost welcomed the anxiety towards Rojet as a distraction from his usual sufferings, since Rojet, at least, existed and was, in theory, a direct threat. To the point that he would miss Rojet when he was away, on whatever tasks and missions he chose to indulge in during the bulk of the day. He had expected Rojet to be home most of the time - this had been the case with the previous tenants, who’s inability to inadvertently upset Rojet with even the most trivial of non-acts grew to the point of catastrophe both times. 

But, oddly, Rojet seemed to find more excuses to leave and be absent. After a few months, Carim found it odd that Rojet wasn’t even coming home at nights. He knew better than to inquire. But the longer he stayed, the more it seemed Rojet would rather not be at home, than simply demanding Carim make himself scarce as he had with other unhappy housemates. Rojet, Carim noted, had begun Carim’s tenure with the kind of bullying Rojet had perfected over his time. But it got to the point where, it seemed to Carim, that Rojet was actually trying to avoid him. He would glare at him, wordlessly and briefly, in leui of morning greetings, and it seemed to Carim that…he would say to himself, and his case manager, that if he didn’t know any better, it seemed as if Rojet was more frightened of him. 

There had been a night when both men were at home, in their rooms. Normally Rojet dominated the living room with the television at intrusive volume, but this night he was in his room, quiet, not even shouting on the phone or listening to the radio. For his part, Carim was as usual tightly curled in his bed, the cardboard on the windows sealed tightly with new tape, trying to control his breath, trying not to reach a panicked breaking point as he endured another evening of pitiless gazing. 

It was on that night Carim heard disturbance from Rojet’s room, heard the man roar out, followed by some thumping sounds, which led Carim to believe Rojet was having some aggressive turn that could well become dangerous for him. But he was wrong. Rojet was heard leaving his room, running, hurtling through the front door without closing it, pattering down the front path of the unit towards the low fence, which Rojet must have hurdled, before quiet again and the unnerving, insinuating sensation of being constantly watched. 

The next day, police visited the unit to talk to Carim. All he had to tell them was the truth. They told him that Rojet’s had been found in the bushes of a nearby creek, unable to communicate, unable to do anything, and certainly unable to explain why he was there, naked, covered in scratches and cuts, staring wildly, completely helpless. Which had been his state since then. The last Carim knew of him was he was in a hospital bed, not taking food or fluid by mouth, unable to toilet himself, unable to speak, losing weight, and staring constantly in front of him, wide eyed, often to the point of not blinking which required carers constantly administer his eyes with treatment until a doctor decided to put patches over both of them. 

For a short while Carim was in the unit alone, which of course terrified him, and he would leave to simply find and sit around late-night cafes and pubs, never interacting with anyone but simply wanting to be with people, light and sound. Invariably he was dismissed from these places by staff or their managers. Invariably he was picked up by the police, who grew to knew him and would often just take him back to his unit. He had been beaten up more than twice in this period. 

But then another tenant was brought in, a younger man called Den, who was short, soft-spoken and reclusive. Perfect, the case managers had thought, for the two of them together. 

Neither of them spoke much with the other, unless out of necessity. Part of their management was to “enable” them to function more independently in society, and so they were required to budget their incomes, draw up plans for shopping and cooking - simple, stupid things like that. Carim did not ask Dem about himself or his issues and Dem never ventured the information. Carim had been told that Dem also suffered from paranoia, but that had been all he had been told. Both of them, they were given to know, were expected to respect each other, help each other and work themselves up to the stage when they might be considered useful enough for some kind of work. The long term care plan had always been to establish clients as “useful” members of society, to the satisfaction of society’s standards of usefulness expected of its constituents. Carim was never sure who it was in society who established those standards but he was normal enough to assume they were based on wisdom and fairness. 

Den, however, began to falter in his adherence to his care plan, by spending as much time as possible in his room. What he did there Carim never knew. But it was after three days and nights of not seeing him emerge, despite knowing that he was there, that led Carim to knock on Den’s bedroom door, and, when that produced no answer, actually opening the door to see if Den was alright. 

Which he was not. Once again, an ambulance had to take a man, naked, injured with scratches and cuts, staring wide-eyed, not talking or making any attempt to move by himself, to hospital. Once again, police spoke with Carim, this time with some suspicion. 

Carim’s case manager had a tough time of it explaining this to his supervisor and the agency’s manager. She was convinced Carim was harmless - he had no history of violence or aggression of any kind. The manager was not so circumspect, but, as with Rojet, whatever was wrong with Carim was tolerated because there was very little else anyone could do. Carim had been adamant he had done nothing wrong. Neither the police nor his case manager heard any lie in him, but the police, at least, did not shake off professional suspicion. 

As for Carim, the days and nights were just as unbearable as they always had been. Wherever he was, he could feel the laser strikes of staring eyes that never shut, who’s gaze pervaded all and penetrated all obstruction. It was not less or more than it had been. It had become a steady, stifling sensation that he could neither get used to nor get rid of. He was beginning to wonder, one night when he was rigid in his bed after a day of little food and no activity, if he should put his idea that he would spend an eternity in an afterlife of staring hell to the test. 

When there was a knock on the door, it almost killed him. But he managed to collect himself, in a flurry of anxiety and confusion, to put on clothes and attend to the knocking. It was urgent, almost a pounding, with a slight voice accompanying, calling Carim by name. 

It was Den. He was in hospital pyjamas with nothing on his feet but someone’s jacket over him. Both paranoiacs stared at each other wide-eyed for a brief moment, then Den pushed himself past Carim and places himself on the floor of the lounge room. 

Carim closed the door and sat on the couch, facing Den, who for a moment just stared at Carim. Carim found Dem’s stare comforting, though to anyone else it would alarming. Den’s eyes and mouth were dry from constant gaping, hence the thinness of his voice. Finally, Dem asked for a cup of water, which Carim produced. 

Dem seemed to have trouble swallowing, but managed half the cup before putting it on the ground and, for the first time since arriving unexpectedly like this, lowered his eyes from Carim. He breathed deeply, but slowly, as if calming himself. Carim found this, too, calming for him. The sensation of being watched was still there, but in the background. He knew the starers were at the windows around him, which he had covered, as all windows in the unit. 

Den managed to find his voice again. 

“They’re real”. 

Carim paused, then nodded briefly. 

“You haven’t seen them. I’ve seen them”. 

The anxiety began to increase in Carim again with sickening familiarity. He did not have to ask who “they” were. For a while, it seemed nothing had to be said. But Dem spoke again. 

“They tried to get me. I got away”. 

Another pause, and another nod. 

“But I’m…”.

And again, it seemed to Carim that there was no need to ask for extrapolation. The watchers had tried to seize Dem, tried to somehow initiate him into their circle, make him one of them. They had nearly succeeded, but Dem managed to escape. But not before being changed, somehow, changed into something that had to stare. At Carim.

Dem lifted his face to Carim again and stared. Carim started, as if threatened. Dem’s stare was the stark, unblinking, unstoppable gaze that he had felt and feared all his life. Here, in front of him, was one of the starers, or something like them, something close to them. He had not expected to confront his tormentors in this fashion. 

At the same time the tenable, physical feeling of staring eyes intensified from the windows as if radiation was blasting in from nuclear explosions. It was late at night, but the feeling was of a stifling hot day that cooked the air inside as well as out, a heat that no one could escape. 

“Stop it!” Carim demanded. 

“I…” Dem tried to talk, but his mouth was failing him again. His eyes refused to waver. Pupils fixed, the rest reddened with strain and dryness, Dem’s mouth wide and gaping, his whole attention on Carim, compelled, drawn to a spear point that was slammed into Carim’s consciousness. 

Carim lept from the couch, Dem’s stare following him, flogging him. He could feel his mind scrambling, the fear disallowing any rational planning, only forcing him to flee. He ran to his bedroom. 

He locked the door - each bedroom door had its own key - and flung himself in the middle of the room, clutching himself, panting, trying not to scream or die. He could hear a tearing sound coming from the lounge room - Den was ripping down the cardboard and newspaper Carim had blocked the windows with. He was letting them in.

He did yell, screaming “no” and “leave me alone” and other ineffective platitudes. But the burning, stifling sensation of staring was now baring down through the door as well as the windows. The room his was in was blazing with this unbearable heat. He kept screaming, wetting the floor, even discharging some watery feces. The staring energy had reached a crescendo that he always knew it could and one day would. One night, it turned out. 

Could he breath? Could he move? He felt his body had become a single lump of some metal, fixed into a crouching figure hiding its head in its arms, its legs tucked under its torso, mouth open to scream and beg, void of all liquid and seperate organs. An object, in the centre of a room that was bombarded with staring eyes that were not seen but felt all the more intensely. Reaching peak after peak, after peak, here in the eternity he had always feared he would attain, and now had.