I’ve been walking dogs in Camden for about three years now. It’s decent money, honestly, and I like being outside instead of stuck in some office. I’m twenty-four, dropped out of uni, and this pays my rent while I figure out what I actually want to do with my life. Most days are pretty routine—pick up the keys, walk the dogs, return them tired and happy. Simple.
Maple Street is part of my regular route. Narrow Victorian terraces, those typical London houses all pressed together like books on a shelf. I walk it maybe four, five times a day with different dogs. And about three months ago, I started noticing something weird.
The dogs wouldn’t go past number forty-seven.
I mean, at first I thought it was just Biscuit, this nervous whippet who’s scared of everything. He stopped dead on the pavement outside, pulled backward, whimpering. Fair enough—Biscuit freaks out over bin bags. But then it was Mabel, this massive German Shepherd who doesn’t fear anything. She dug her paws in and refused to move, staring at the house with her ears flat. Then Roger, then Luna, then every single dog I walked.
Every. Single. One.
Looking back, I should have paid more attention to that. Dogs know things, you know? But I just figured maybe there was a cat they could smell, or another dog that had marked the territory or something. I started crossing the street before we reached it, taking the longer way round. Problem solved, basically.
Number forty-seven itself was nothing special. Dark red brick, windows that always seemed to have the curtains drawn. I’d never seen anyone come or go. The front garden was overgrown, full of weeds pushing through the cracked paving stones. One of those houses that just looks… empty. Forgotten.
It was last Tuesday when everything changed.
I’d finished my morning walks early—two cancellations—so I decided to grab coffee from the café on Maple Street. I walked down alone for once, no dogs pulling at leads. And I walked right past number forty-seven without thinking about it.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. Then again. And again.
I pulled it out and felt my heart sink. Notifications were flooding my screen. My photo storage was full, it said. That didn’t make sense—I’d had loads of space that morning.
I opened my camera roll.
Photos. Hundreds of them. Thousands, maybe. All downloading from somewhere, filling up my phone faster than I could scroll. My hands started shaking as I tried to make sense of what I was seeing.
They were all of me.
Me walking Biscuit. Me with Mabel. Me crossing the street with Roger and Luna together. Me checking my phone. Me tying my shoelace. Me looking directly at the camera without knowing it.
Every single photo was taken from inside number forty-seven. Through those curtained windows. I could see the fabric edge in some shots, the angle looking down from the first floor.
Someone had been photographing me. For months.
“Oh god,” I whispered. My coffee cup slipped from my other hand, splashing across the pavement.
I looked up at the house. The curtain in the front bedroom twitched.
I should have run. Obviously, I should have just run. But I stood there frozen, watching as the curtain moved again, more deliberately this time. A hand pressed against the glass. Pale. Too pale, like something that hadn’t seen sunlight in years.
My phone buzzed again. A new photo appeared.
It was me. Right now. Standing on the street holding my phone, coffee spreading around my feet.
Taken two seconds ago.
“Fuck,” I said, and then I was running. I didn’t look back, didn’t stop until I reached the main road where there were people and cars and normal things. My heart was pounding so hard I thought I might be sick.
I pulled up the photos again, hands trembling. There had to be thousands. I started scrolling back, looking at the dates. Three months’ worth. Every single walk. Every single day.
Then I saw something that made my blood turn cold.
In some of the photos—maybe one in every twenty or so—there was someone else. A shape in the background, always a bit blurred, always partially out of frame. Walking about thirty feet behind me. In every single shot where this figure appeared, I was alone. No dogs with me. Just me and whoever was following me on foot while someone else photographed us both from the window.
There were two of them.
I reported it to the police that day. They went to number forty-seven. The house was empty, they said. Had been for years, apparently. Owned by someone who died in 2019, still in probate. No signs of forced entry. No cameras, no equipment, nothing.
But my phone was full of those photos. The police saw them, made copies. Said they’d investigate. I don’t know what they found. They stopped returning my calls after two weeks.
I’ve moved my routes now. Don’t walk in Camden anymore at all, actually. Working in Islington these days, different streets entirely. But the thing is, last week my phone storage filled up again.
New photos. Just five this time.
All taken from inside my flat.
I haven’t slept properly since. I mean, how can I? I’ve changed the locks twice. Checked every window, every door. There are no cameras, I’ve looked everywhere. But somehow they’re still watching.
The dogs always knew. I wish I’d listened.
To this day, I still walk past houses and watch how the dogs react. If they stop, if they pull away, if they refuse to go forward—I don’t question it anymore. I just turn around.
Because if the dogs won’t go somewhere, there’s usually a very good reason.
