Chapter Text
Eridan immediately knew something was wrong when he pulled into his driveway.
There was this unsettled feeling, like a brush up his neck or the physical sensation of a gaze. Eridan read an article sometime in college that posited that "gut feeling" was a real thing, although not the paranormal sense others assume it is. Say a woman walks into a hotel and gets her key from the attendant on shift, but before she can get into the elevator, she has a gut feeling something's off. She didn't notice the man in the lobby, within hearing distance of her conversation with the front desk attendant, nor did she notice him surreptitiously move towards the elevators before she could, but her brain did. It noticed a pattern. One that ends not so well for her. Gut feeling, it's called, when your brain screams at you to notice the signs, and avert their natural conclusion.
It's with that in mind that Eridan took a moment to observe his surroundings. Instead of pulling straight into his garage —dark, close quarters, lots of spots for someone to hide until the right moment— he parked in his driveway, scanning his surroundings for a hint of why he was suddenly so paranoid.
Eridan always had a keen eye for the details. He designed his house himself, poring over blueprints with an architect he met at a dinner party for the privileged few. He decorated the interior himself, buying vintage pieces that reminded him of home, and painting the walls dark colors that made him feel at home. Though the gravel road that led to his house was long and winding, he was always keen on keeping it in perfect condition, neither potholes nor random bumps had the chance to propagate themselves. He even had his wisteria tree's health checked annually. People had used many words to describe Eridan over the years, but 'inattentive' was not one of them.
Once he was sure there were no murderers out and about in plain sight, Eridan finally exited his vehicle, still scanning for any sudden movements. So far as he could tell, the front of his house looked just the same as it had when he'd left. The grass of his lawn was standing at a perfect three inches up until the perimeter, where yard turned to dense forest. His wisteria tree perched in the middle looked just as serene and young as it always did. Stepping up onto the porch, everything there also looked to be in it's intended place, the rocking chair unperturbed as well as the trashy welcome mat that boasted 'GO CLAM YOURSELF' that Feferi had bought him all the way back when he started construction on his place. Eridan took a breath before jiggling the doorknob. Still locked.
Circling around his house revealed nothing more, Eridan occasionally glancing into his house from the windows, trying to see if he could catch any burglars red-handed, but eventually came back to his car, at a loss for what was off. He even walked a bit down the gravel road, stopping just before a bend would have led him out of sight of his house, but so far as he could tell, there were no tire marks aside from his own, not that he expected anyone to have gotten past the metal gate at the start of the drive.
Just nothing.
When Eridan finally entered his house, it was through the back door, which had wide, wall length windows on either side. Easier to see if someone were waiting for him there. It led into his kitchen, the pale marble countertops clean and smooth, and the onyx appliances free from any smudging.
Eridan slowly cleared every room, checking them from crown molding to the clean surface of his hardwood floor, leaving no room for error. Kitchen, dining room, living room, half-bath, library, trophy room, foyer, all frustratingly in order. Upstairs had about the same results.
The final room Eridan ended up checking was his own room.
He kept a firm grip on the doorknob for a moment before turning it and swinging the door wide open. No one. Nothing. He checked his closet, underneath his bed, and behind the frosted glass shower door in the attached master bath. Perfectly empty, untouched.
Eridan stomped through his house a second time, upset that he hadn't found the source of his gut feeling, but also somewhat unsurprised. Of course, Eridan had installed a security system for his home, mostly motion sensors on the outside, in case the natural wildlife in his neck of the woods decided to encroach on his land, but also a few security cameras for personal assurance. There were three in total: two were outside, front and back, and then another in the garage. He had considered having some inside, but it felt like an encroachment of his own liberties, and also a reminder of when he lived with his parents. The cameras were high quality and could hold footage for up to a month before recycling the internal storage, they also had an app for Eridan to conveniently spy on his own home with.
Taking a seat at his dining table, Eridan pulled up said app. Of course, he had not received any notifications about motion being detected, let alone any break-ins. He started with the front, camera speeding through the footage from the moment he left that morning, all the way to the moment he had gotten back, his beautiful Maybach slamming to a halt just as he was about to open his garage door. Skimming the footage only revealed the subtle movement caused by wind, and on two occasions some squirrels. The back camera had about the same report, and the garage camera had the least to say of all of them, essentially a still image, with the only indication of time being the timestamp on the bottom left.
Eridan tossed the phone down on the table, rubbing his fingers on the bridge of his nose. Maybe Kar was right, and Eridan needed to get laid or something to unwind.
The rest of his evening proved much more relaxed. He pulled his car into the garage finally, and went about making dinner. Seared steak and roasted asparagus paired with a large glass of Cabernet Sauvignon. The type of meal that would have Karkat tutting and shaking his head, or Kanaya giving an appreciative nod. A long bath helped unwind his earlier stress, and by the time he was finishing his entry for the day in his journal, Eridan had all but forgotten the earlier disturbance he felt.
It was just as he had tucked himself into bed, silk purple pajamas donned and heavy duvet pulled around himself, that he caved to his gut feeling once more. Eridan, in an effort to cross his 't's and dot his 'i's, pulled his phone up to his face, opening his security app once more.
He skimmed through the footage a bit slower this time, carefully speeding through the footage, looking for any sign of abnormalities. The front camera once again showed nothing but serene nature, the back mirroring the same. The garage once again appeared to just be a still image.
Except.
Zoomed out, it's no wonder he missed it the first time. It only looked like a single pixel popping into existence. Closest to the interior wall, the weather seal on the bottom of the garage door seemed to do... something, just a couple of hours before he got back home. Eridan zoomed in and replayed the moment. One second, the weather seal was perfectly flush with the ground, then in the next, it had a gap between it and the ground, like someone had shimmied something under his garage door and accidentally bent the rubber out of shape.
Eridan replayed it, once, twice, thrice, before throwing his covers off, jamming his slippers on his feet and marching straight to the garage. Slamming the door open, he made a beeline for the crinkled portion of the weather seal. Crouching down, he saw that, sure enough, the seal had, in fact, somehow been bent out of shape. Not only that, but the security footage had to have been somehow doctored to hide what actually took place.
Somehow, Eridan had an incredibly competent home invader that afternoon, to the point that not only did they manage to edit his security footage, but also managed to somehow circumvent his entire security system. Not once did he get a notification that the motion sensors had been triggered, nor the front or back door opening, nor even an alert that the wifi had gone down. Nothing, but a single broken seal that Eridan himself had missed.
From there, Eridan walked back inside, straight to his trophy room where his gun safe was. He didn't have much reason to use it nowadays, but he knew the combination for it by heart. The heavy door swung open, revealing a wide array of firearms. Though it was far from the most deadly thing in there, Eridan pulled out his old Winchester model 70. A hunting rifle.
Walking back, Eridan made sure to turn off all the lights in the house, and traded his slippers for hiking boots. He dragged an armchair to the corner of his living room, the wall on its right leading to the front door, the wall to its left leading to the hallway that connected to the garage, and with the back door in clear view ahead.
He took a seat and laid his rifle in his lap, waiting there until the sun peeked back up the next day.
—
"I'm not fuckin' crazy Kar, someone broke into my home yesterday and fucked with my damn security system."
"You live in the middle of goddamn nowhere, Eridan. And you admitted yourself you were drinking and didn't go to bed all night. I just think you're working yourself up too much for what is ultimately a single fucked up garage door seal."
"I'm only a 45 minute drive from town, and my house is only 20 minutes from the attached road. I ain't sayin' it would be an easy hike, but it's not impossible, not if someone knew how many valuables I have."
Eridan only partially stopped before pulling out onto the backroad, his own driveway soon becoming unidentifiable in his rear view mirror.
"Listen, I'm not saying some couldn't have done it, I'm just saying it could've been anything. For all we know, it might've been some weird manufacturing defect, or the wind even. I understand you seem to be dispositioned towards paranoia, but you really should learn to take it easy."
"...It wasn't the wind, Kar. The video's clearly doctored," Eridan grumbled. Of course he knew others would find it hard to believe, which was why he was driving straight to the police station with the video on a USB, as well as many pictures from the inside and outside of the weather seal. Then, after he was done filing a report at the police station, he was heading straight to Karkat's suburban home to strategize.
"And yet you yourself said the timestamp never stuttered."
"Yes! Whomever did this obviously did not want me to know they had managed to infiltrate my home! To be frank, this may not have even been the first time they did such a thing. For all I know, this is just the first time they screwed up, however..."
"However what?"
"I get the impression this is the first time. I'm tellin' you, Kar, I got this feelin'-"
"Look, Eridan, listen to me. I think you're just really stressed out. File the police report if it makes you feel safer, but when you get here, we can get to the actual root of whatever's got you flipping your lid, okay?"
"...'Kay."
"Good. Drive safe and I'll see you in a bit then," and with that, Karkat hung up.
Unfortunately, when Eridan did try to file a report at the police station, they had essentially told him to piss off.
"Yeah, so, like I said, this isn't really enough by itself. I mean, you said nothing was taken, and there weren't any other signs of an intruder so, you don't really have a case here."
"You haven't even seen the damn video, I want a record a' this!"
"Not to be rude, but a record of what exactly? A couple dead pixels? I'm sorry, but you just don't have anything I can do anything with."
Thus concluded Eridan's effort to make an official report.
By the time Eridan had pulled into Karkat's clean driveway, his heart was hammering with frustration. He knew at this point that convincing Karkat was going to be an uphill battle without the police report to sway him. He was sure if he cried, Karkat would at least offer to let him spend that night, but that wasn't what Eridan wanted, nor was Eridan even in the mood to cry in the first place. More than anything else, Eridan was pissed off. First, that some asshole managed to break into his home. Second, his best friend was totally treating him like some neurotic idiot. And third, Vriska had texted him earlier that day announcing some stupid party he now had to attend, as if partying was even remotely appealing to Eridan in his present state.
Karkat was opening the door just as Eridan had managed to step foot on his porch.
"God, you look like shit,” were the first words out of his best friend's mouth.
Eridan ducked through the doorframe, eyeing said friend up and down with the most judging face he could muster. "Kar, your robe has gunk all down the front."
"Touché."
While Karkat fetched a cup of coffee for himself and Eridan, Eridan followed him into the kitchen, taking a seat on one of the barstools at the island separating the kitchen from the dining room. “Did you get Vris’ invite, too?”
The mugs Karkat picked out clinked as he roughly deposited them on the wood countertop. One was black, with some indecipherable text across the side, and the other one was white, simple, elegant, the one Karkat usually offered to Eridan when he came over. “I try not to make a habit of checking all my texts in the morning. You’re lucky I even bothered answering your call.”
“Well you’ll probably see an invite here soon then. She’s having another one of her ‘get-togethers’, the excuse this time being some planetary conjunction or whatever.” Eridan waved his hand in dismissal. “The last thing I want right now is to be puttin’ myself in situations where any number of strangers could get the jump on me.”
“No one’s gonna jump you, you lunatic. Now just spit it out, what’s really bothering you?” Karkat poured hot coffee in both their cups, leaving Eridan’s black and adding a truly nauseating amount of cream and syrup to his own. “How’d the date go yesterday?”
In his own home, Eridan never bothered to keep coffee in stock. If he wanted something warm to drink, he’d prefer a fragrant Jasmine tea. If he needed to shake the drowsiness from his mind, an ice cold shower usually did the trick. Coffee had just never been his thing, even back in college. Still, the coffee Karkat would make for him to drink over the various chats they had over the years always had a certain appeal to it, the bitter scent making him somewhat nostalgic. “Garbage, per usual. Nobody in this fuckin’ town has any taste.”
“What was this problem this time?”
Eridan held the mug in both hands, peering down into the dark liquid as he spoke. “You remember what I said about the last one?”
“Uh, Avery?”
“And you remember how they were a total tool? Talkin’ down to me of all people?”
He looked up to see Karkat lean his elbows down on the island, his own cup of sugar-coffee in both hands as well. “I have to admit, I’m still surprised they had the balls to criticize you of all people on historical politics.”
“Well, it was like that but the inverse. Instead of trying to correct me on the topic of military warships, they were tryin’ to flippin’ educate me. Me, Karkat! As if I hadn’t fuckin’ minored in goddamn World War I tactics! What a fuckin’ joke.”
“So you stormed out?”
“No, I yelled at them until they left, and then finished my glass of wine.”
Karkat let out a bark of laughter at that. “And so you think they would have broken into your house to get back at you?”
Eridan shook his head tersely. “This and that are totally different, that was just par for the course when it comes to my datin’ life. This was… insidious, and premeditated. Look,” Eridan pulled out his phone and brought up the video camera footage of the garage door. “Here, look, it just,” he zoomed in, pointing at where the pixels suddenly shifted in what could only be the result of cut footage. “It just cuts to the new frame. You can’t tell me that ain’t evidence a’ sabotage, Kar.”
Karkat looked at the camera footage with a hesitant look. “I mean, I guess it is weird. I’m just saying coincidences happen. For all we know, this could just be your camera’s having a glitch the exact moment a mouse or some shit decided to invite itself into your home. It could also be a burglar, but I think there’s a lot of conclusions to come to before that one. If it makes you feel better, I could call Sollux up and see if he could take a look at your system. If some guy really did fuck with your electronics, Sollux would definitely be able to find that out, possibly even who.”
Eridan groaned. “No, you know he and I don’t get along. Besides, he’d probably skim the code and tell me I’m crazy regardless”
“You sure? I got the impression you guys had grown a bit more tolerant of each other in the last couple years.”
Eridan scoffed. “‘Tolerable’ being the key word there, Kar. We leave each other alone and that’s that. We’re not in college anymore, I don’t have to energy to be gettin’ into it with that ass, and I’m sure the feelin’ is mutual. I’ll just get a new security system altogether. Until then, I’ll be sleepin’ with a hatchet under my pillow.”
—
The new security system was fully installed by the last day of that month. It was late enough in the season that Eridan’s once verdant green yard was now yellowing. Orange leaves from the surrounding trees littered the grass and his driveway, and his beloved wisteria tree had turned a distinct golden hue.
Come the start of the new month, Eridan had all but put the incident out of his mind. Maybe Karkat had been right, and his paranoia from that day had just been a result of a date gone awry.
Eridan preferred to get his groceries in bulk. Eridan also preferred to get his groceries with someone. Usually, he’d convince Kanaya to go, for her pragmatism and good taste. If she was otherwise unavailable, he’d ask Karkat, for his humorous commentary. Eridan tried not to ask Feferi, since her rope of patience with him had been waning for a good decade now, and he was reluctant to push it any farther. However, that day neither Kanaya or Karkat were available, and the thought of doing his errands alone had him feeling quite lonely. Too lonely, so he ended up calling Feferi anyway.
When they had met up, she seemed more cheery than he remembered her. Their time together was wholly pleasant, suspiciously so, to the point that Eridan had to keep checking himself and making sure he wasn’t ‘projecting his own feelings’ as Karkat had once put it. Despite his disbelief, Feferi seemed to enjoy their day trip together, almost like she had missed him. It had been a while since he had last bothered his childhood friend. Perhaps it was only an instance of distance making the heart fonder, but Eridan chose to keep his thoughts to himself, still burned from her hateful words the last time he had pestered her too much.
His mind was still on that when he came home, lost in thoughts of how serene their afternoon had been, and much he missed their friendship.
Eridan had his groceries in his left hand and fished out his housekeys with his right. Just as he was about to insert the gold key into the bolt lock was when he noticed the ‘gift’ left for him on his doorknob. His mind reeled a bit, looking down at it, uncomprehending. When it finally did click, his grocery bags hit his porch with a thud and a crack .
“Oh my fuckin’ god.”
A used condom.
Why was there a used condom on his doorknob?
Shaking, he brought out his phone, took a picture for evidence, and then called the cops.
—
When Karkat arrived, they met with a hug.
“Holy shit, I saw the cops leaving on my way in. Did they find anything else?”
Eridan gave a quick shake of his head. “Not even any goddamn fingerprints. A’ course my camera footage showed fuckall, so that’s great.”
“Holy fuck. Are you alright?”
Eridan shook his head again, but said, “I’m fine. If that creep left shit outside this time, then I suppose that means he couldn’t get in this time.”
“You think so?”
“There was nothin’ messed with inside, then again, neither was there last time.”
Karkat gave him a look. “So you think what happened last month was…?”
“Naturally. This prick is gettin’ more confident. I’ll have to set up an offline camera system, since this one was hacked just as easily it seems,” he gestured towards the useless front camera. “Maybe even wrap it in tinfoil or whatever the fuck. Once was weird enough, but it happenin’ a second, and with… such a crude gesture… It’s sick, Kar. I’m gonna have to buy a new doorknob too, maybe even replace the whole fuckin’ door while I’m at it.”
“Eridan.”
“It’s sick, Kar, downright perverse. Who even does such a thing? I’m rackin’ my fuckin’ brain tryin’ to think of who could do such a gross display. Or why. It’s unthinkable. I-”
“Eridan!”
He looked back up to Karkat, who seemed to be looking at him with a concerned gaze.
“Do you want to stay at my place tonight?”
Eridan stared back at Karkat for a moment, before stealing a glance back towards his house.
“That’s very kind a’ you to offer Kar, but-”
“Oh, no, no, don’t pull that shit. A fucking creep left his dirty condom on your front fucking door, you’re not spending another night here until they catch that creep. I’m serious.”
“As am I! I’m not gonna let some perverted loser keep me from the comfort a’ my own home! If I do that, he’ll win!”
Karkat threw his hands in the air. “Win what? This guy’s clearly out of his mind! We don’t know what he’s capable of! What if he tries to hurt you?”
“Hurt me? Who exactly do you think you’re talkin’ to, Kar? ‘Cause I don’t think it’s the guy with a fuckin’ trophy room full a’ his kills.”
“This isn’t some random bear you found in the mountains, Eridan! This is someone who knows where you live and clearly isn’t sound of mind! And on top of that, if anything were to happen, it’d take at least an hour for an ambulance or any police to reach your place!”
“I’m plenty capable a’ protectin’ myself! A police report has been made, I’m sure they’ll be able to find the guy in their systems with all the spunk he’s left behind. An’ once they find him, it’ll be a short while until he’s apprehended.”
“And if he’s not in their systems.”
“Then I have a gun.”
“That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, Eridan. He could have a gun too.”
“I can guarantee I’m a better shot than he is.”
“Eridan,” Karkat broke off in a huff, drawing a hand down his face, as if the thought of Eridan being fully capable of defending himself was about as likely as pigs flying. “At least tell me you have a safe room.”
“Go home, Kar. I appreciate you checkin’ in on me, but there’s little else to do now aside from wait.”
Eridan watched from his porch as Karkat turned his car around and drove off, quickly disappearing into the trees. He didn’t want to go inside just yet. He had gone in with the police to make sure the place was vacant, and to check for any signs of forced entry. They had found none, but it was little comfort to Eridan, who was still keen on how little evidence there had been the first time. Still, nothing else had seemed to be disturbed, but he couldn’t shake the feeling of his things being tainted somehow.
He really should replace the whole door.
And also invest in some discreet cameras.
—
A week went by before Eridan heard from the police again.
There was no match for the DNA found in the condom, crushing whatever little hope Eridan actually had for this matter being settled out of sight. He still slept with a hatchet under his pillow, and his rifle under the mattress. When he came home from work or running errands, it was now standard procedure to check his house thoroughly for signs of entry, or perhaps more ‘gifts’, but for the time being, there was nothing.
Eridan found some good quality, discreet cameras, and went about securing them in several locations within his home: the porch, overlooking the front door; his living room, again facing the front door; another in the hallway by the door that led into the garage; another in the upstairs hallway; and finally one in his room. He tried his best to conceal them, but perhaps because he was so familiar with his own home, Eridan couldn’t help but feel the stuck out like sore thumbs. The one in his bedroom was the worst in terms of making him feel physically uncomfortable, but he merely considered it a sacrifice in the name of catching whomever was harassing him.
They did have the added benefit of helping him at least sleep better, comforted by every time he came home to check their footage, only to find nothing. There was no way to access the footage on them as well, until you physically took the microSD card out of them, so any chance of hacking seemed entirely improbable.
On the matter of the door, Eridan was able to replace it the day after the incident. He didn’t even bother with calling a handyman or one of his friends to help, eager to get the task over with as quickly as possible.
Eridan took to hiking in the forest surrounding his home, a rifle strapped to his back, bear spray on his belt, and a machete in hand. He looked for signs of recent breakage, litter, footsteps, anything to help him figure out in what manner the stranger was trespassing onto his property, but continued to pull up nothing.
Karkat promoted the idea that perhaps nothing else would come of it, especially as the season turned colder. If anyone had figured out how to bypass the gate with a car, the soon-to-come snow would make it obvious as well. The appeal of doing something so crude and getting away with it would become vastly more difficult, and likely drive them off.
Eridan still worried.
Every time he came home, he would begin his inspection, making sure everything was in its place, making sure the camera footage showed nothing outside the usual. He had a large, wall length window in his bedroom. It used to be a luxury, to be able to overlook his backyard and into the forest first thing in the morning. Now it seemed like a technical oversight. Anything could see in, as well as or perhaps even better than he did from the inside. Anything could throw a rock, and crack its security.
The next time was unlike the first two incidents. It was nothing he had discovered immediately awry.
Eridan had been cleaning his guns in his trophy room. Various animals he had taken the life of looked down upon him as he did so, their company better than none these days. In truth, Eridan didn’t find any enjoyment in killing innocent animals, but his father had taken him hunting with him ever since he was old enough to bear the weight of a rifle. It was one of the few times Eridan’s father showed any initiative in participating in his son’s life. Even now, after his father’s death, after realizing how utterly trash their whole relationship had been, Eridan couldn’t shake the fondness for hunting, despite his aversion to killing.
It was after he had put his guns away, the safe locking shut with a loud clang , that Eridan decided to spend some time among his kills. From the door working clockwise, the order of his kills were organized chronologically, starting with a small hare he had shot in the hind leg when he was six, to a rather large elk he had shot clean through its skull three years back, right before his father passed. The entry wound was visible, a clean hole near its right eye.
Eridan had always noted how real the eyes looked. The taxidermist his family usually went to also passed about a decade back, and his son had taken up the trade. Eridan wasn’t sure what materials they used, but the effect was always lifelike.
Except.
The elk’s left eye appeared as usual, dark, almost black in color, but with depth. The right, however, had an odd distension to the surrounding eyelid. As for the eye itself, there was a flatness to it, and at its center, a reflection of light.
There was only a moment of horrified deliberation before Eridan was tearing at the poor elk’s eye, the soft material around it, stiffened from chemicals and age. Eventually, the camera was out, small in Eridan’s palm. There was no antennae, nor any loose wires. Just small and discreet. Eridan didn’t even know if they made spy cameras like this, or if this one had been custom fitted.
Logically, Eridan knew he should probably save it, bring it to the police as soon as he could, but Eridan’s ability to think rationally had always been on somewhat dubious terms with his brain, and so it was with little thought when he threw the offending device on the floor and stomped on it. The crunch beneath his slipper was satisfying, but it did little to quell the sensation of having been watched crawl beneath his skin.
First, he checked the rest of the mounts, not only checking their eyes, but their noses and ears as well. The next camera he found in there wasn’t from a mount, however, but rather the fireplace. The mantle had a complicated design, partially bricked and partially sculpted, and resting atop it were some decorative trinkets, one of which being a small globe. One of the metal arms keeping it in place had one of its screws replaced with another camera, this one much smaller than the first, about the size of a single pea. It got the same treatment as the first.
Eridan worked methodically, going through his home, leaving nothing undisturbed. Eventually, in the entirety of the lower floor of his house, he found fifteen cameras, his hands trembling harder with every find.
Going upstairs was a feat of its own. Eridan had never been one to shy away from hard truths, but the thought of finding out if this stranger had been watching him unclothe was enough to make Eridan want to cover his ears and pretend he had seen nothing.
He started with the upstairs hallway, then the library. He found three more.
The first camera he found in his room was in the screw hole of his doorknob. There was another in the decorative keyhole of his jewelry box, atop his dresser. Another he found in the ceiling light fixture. Another yet stuffed between the decorative grooves of his mahogany bed frame.
By the time Eridan stopped himself, it was four in the morning. Thirty-odd cameras he had found in his room. If his hands had been trembling before, they were now outright shaking.
How long had those cameras been there?
How many times had he undressed in front of them? Totally unaware of his audience?
It had been horrifying enough to have discovered that his moments of privacy had been totally and completely invaded. It was another sort of violation to discover that not only had his most sacred of spaces been intruded upon, but in such a way that left no room for doubt that this stranger definitely had a disturbing and unnatural fixation on Eridan.
The doorknob incident now had an entirely different light painted upon it. Not one of a prank done in poor taste, but a letter of desire.
Eridan didn’t want to check his bathroom.
From his bedroom floor, he pulled his phone out of his back pocket, and called his best friend.
“Hey. It’s me… Yeah, I know… Do you- um, do you mind if I stay over for a couple a’ days?”