Chapter 4

Dan cautiously opened my room door and shut it behind him. Why the fuck would Dan go into my room? I went over to the opened balcony door and stepped outside. Unlike Dan and Suzy’s room, my balcony door was always closed when we left the room. The curtains, however, would be partially drawn. I kept away from the field of view from my sliding door and my eyes widened when I saw the fleeting shadow of curtains being drawn. Nothing I could think of could explain why Dan would go into my room and draw the curtains. There were no cameras in my room and I wouldn’t know what he was up to, but this was a good opportunity for me to get away. However, my work bag and my work clothes were still in my room, and I couldn’t possibly run anywhere except try to hide in the house until Dan was gone. I took a deep breath and quietly opened Dan’s room door. If I ran out the moment Dan came out of my room, it was also a game over moment for me. I exhaled twice and stepped out. I closed Dan’s room door with a trembling hand and I ran down the hallway, jumping down the last few steps of the stairs. I barely got to the kitchen when I heard my room door open. Diving behind the kitchen island, I hugged my knees and held my breath. Clutching my phone in hand, I watched the camera, tracking Dan’s movements. He was walking down the corridor and coming down the stairs. He was holding onto something in his hand.

When I saw what he was holding on to, my blood was boiling. It was money. Dan had a stack of dollar bills in his hand and I knew exactly where those came from. It was from my wife’s stash. She never kept track of her loose change, and lately, she had been complaining that her stash of Chinese New Year notes and red packets seemed to have gotten thinner. I wanted to rise up and confront Dan, but he was not done. He went right into my in-law’s room on the ground floor. The camera in the living room clearly captured Dan going in. At that point, I decided to take another gamble. I needed to change my hiding position, so I crawled towards the stairs. After taking a deep breath, I ran back up to level two. Heading straight for my room, I quickly shut the door. I knew Dan had not noticed my work bag and clothes in the corner of the room. The first thing I did was to take in the room’s layout. Everything seemed to be in order - not that I deliberately positioned things in a certain way to see if anyone came into my room. At least it didn’t look like it was ransacked. I didn’t know why, but I took a look at the laundry basket and saw my wife’s pyjamas and lingerie at the top of the pile.

Unlike Dan and Suzy, who separated their laundry, my wife and I didn’t really care. We just threw everything into the same basket. I clearly remembered putting mine in after hers, which meant my clothes should be on top of the pile. Upon inspection, I realised that not only were my wife’s pyjamas up on top, her work clothes, the dress she wore the day before, her blouse, her bra, even her underwear were brought right up to the top of the pile. There could only be one reason to that and it was rather obvious. Dan was doing the same thing I was doing with Suzy’s clothes.