The man

After a busy morning of making space for her new clothes, vacuuming and other general household cleaning Abigael had completed refreshing her apartment and was ready to slack off for the rest of the day. It was slightly drizzling outside and the temperature was cool, so it was a good day to get her favourite fluffy blue blanket out and curl up on the couch. She grabbed a bag of crisps and some flavoured mineral water from the kitchen before turning on the TV, ready to binge watch some movies and drama.

A couple hours in and she was laughing along at the antics of the actors and denouncing the vindictive antagonist as she wiped the crumbs of her third packet of crisps from her mouth. It had become a full thunderstorm outside so she had turned the sound up, not caring that her neighbours could hear it through the thin walls.

The sound of the TV must have been too high however, and the sound of tapping at her window went unnoticed for some time. It wasn't until the ending credits when she got up to put her empty crisps packet in the bin that she heard the faint sound coming from her bedroom. Concerned at the thought that she might have accidentally left her window open and her bed would be ruined by the rain, she quickly threw the empty packet on the kitchen bench and dashed across her apartment to her bedroom doorway.

The flash of lightning blinded her for a split second as she looked though the open bedroom doorway across to her window. Abigael gasped in fright and took a few involuntary steps back, backing up against the hallway wall just as the power went out. Her hands trembled and her whole body was frozen in shock staring at the silhouette of a human figure crouching outside the glass.

The music from the ending credits immediately went silent and the lights went dark, leaving only the sound of the heavy rain and her own rapidly beating heart in the otherwise silent apartment. The dim light filtering through the window seeped past an indistinct and sinister looking figure of a man. He was crouching somewhat awkwardly on the rim of the window, his right hand bracing him against the frame as she raise his left hand to knock against the glass.

Tap, tap tap

Abigael's heart was in her throat and her body seemed confused, both trembling uncontrollably and completely unable to move from her position. Who was that? Was he a stalker? Or maybe a fugitive or a burger? What was he doing out there? She slowly regained control of her body as the initial shock subsided into a lingering and powerful fear of the unknown. She slowly slid her body across the wall and out of sight of the window, hoping against her luck that the man hadn't noticed her. As soon as she was behind the corner of the wall she ran to the kitchen bench and grabbed her phone, her fingers tapping the screen wildly as she immediately thought of calling the police. Pressing the phone to her ear, she closed her eyes tight and tried to block out the persistent sound of the tapping, frighteningly loud and piercing through the silence of her home and the ongoing thunder that seemed to only be getting louder.

'Emergency services. Police, fire or ambulance?'

'P-police.' she managed to whisper out past the lump of air stuck in her throat.

'One moment.'

She heard the sound of the line changing and a new voice spoke into her ear.

'Police, what is the emergency?'

'I-' Abigael hesitated, what should she say? That there was a stranger hanging out on her window ledge and frightening her by tapping on her window. He apartment was 5 stories up, would they believe her?

'Hello, are you there?' came the voice again.

'Yes. Um- I think there is a burgler-' no wait that isn't right, why would a burgler tap on her window? Wouldn't he have just smashed the window and come in?

'Um, I mean a stalker-' But that wasn't right either, a stalker wouldn't give her the option of letting him in. She'd heard about those guys before, once they made their move they did so decisively and without giving you the option of running away. And how would a stalker even get five stories off the ground in the middle of a thunderstorm in the first place?

'Ma'am I'm having trouble understanding you're situation. Where are you at the moment?'

After giving her address Abigael tried to explain more clearly. 'There's a-' a deafening burst of thunder boomed right at that moment and a flash of blinding white light completely filled the apartment as a strike of lightening came down just outside. Combined with the sound of a window smashing it was enough to send Abigael's tightly strung nerves over the edge. She screamed loudly, curling into a tight ball in the corner of the kitchen as she threw whatever was on hand, which happened to be her phone, in the direction of her bedroom.

The phone hit the floor and the screen went black as spiderweb-like cracks spread across the glass.

She put her hands over her ears to block out the deafening noise of the thunder and scrunched her eyes tight. The ringing in her ears after the strike was over wasn't loud enough to completely block out all the sound though. As she recovered from the blast she could hear the sounds of movement coming from her bedroom.

Abigael shivered, her mind going blank as she tried to work out what to do. She grabbed a rolling pin from out of a drawer nearby and her eyes fell on the ever present watch on her wrist. This thing didn't have any way to make a phone call did it? It was far fetched but her phone was half a room away and probably dead and in her terror and desperation Abigael would take any way out she could.

She quickly tapped the screen and swiped through the different options. It was still the same, there were no options to contact anybody, she didn't even have the promised app for personal defence as the mission wasn't completed yet.

{Goal: Unlock app}

{Choice 1: find a hiding place}

{OR}

{Choice 2: Tell them}

Is this what it meant? That she should hide from the guy who broke into her home? But there wasn't really a choice because who could she tell? Her phone was broken...

The sound of cursing came from the direction of her bedroom and Abigael was about to give up and cry when the screen of the watch flashed again. She looked down, wondering if the universe had heard her prayers and it would be downloading an SOS app or something.

It turned out her pitiful hopes were just wishful thinking. Her expectations, which were low in the first place, were crushed to new lows as the watch updated {Daily}

{Goal: GC/BC}

{GC: clean it up}

{OR}

{BC: make it worse}

[What the hell?!] she screamed mentally at the watch, [How could this possibly be made any worse? And what's with that ambiguous 'it' can't it be more specific?] She gave up on the watch and held the rolling pin in front of her more tightly, her hands shaking as a human silhouette slowly and rather unsteadily tottered from her bedroom and into the hallway.

The flash from another lightning strike lit up the room and for a brief second she could see the intruder as clear as day. His shoulder length black hair was clinging to his face and his skin was pale with cold as rain water dripped from his body onto the carpet. Piercing blue eyes stared straight into her own as he leaned against the wall, struggling to stand upright. He was wearing black trousers and a white collared button down top, which was almost completely see-through due to the copious amounts of water that was still dripping off him. He didn't have a jacket, Abigael noticed through her panic, or shoes. She was about to scream for help when he spoke, quickly cutting her off.

'Wait! I didn't mean to do this, I just-' he was cut off suddenly by another deafening burst of thunder.

Pressing her hands to her ears, Abigael watched as the man leaned heavily against the wall and fell to sit weakly on the ground.