My husband and I have been living in our house for almost three years. We live in a quiet neighbourhood where nothing unusual ever seems to happen. We know most of our neighbours, we have never had any serious disagreements with anyone, and we have always felt safe in our home. That’s why what started happening recently has left us both confused and genuinely frightened.
It all began on a Monday morning. I was getting ready to leave for work when I noticed something hanging from our front door handle. At first, I thought it was a piece of rubbish caught on it by the wind. But when I got closer, I realised it was a small used teabag, carefully tied around the handle.
I found it strange, but I didn’t think much of it. I removed it, threw it away, and went about my day. When I told my husband that evening, he laughed and said it was probably some children playing a silly prank.
The following morning, however, there was another one.
Exactly the same thing. A used teabag hanging from our front door handle.
This time, I wasn’t laughing. What made it even stranger was how carefully it had been placed. It wasn’t simply thrown there or left on the doorstep. Someone had deliberately tied it around the handle.
On the third day, nothing appeared. We thought perhaps whoever was doing it had stopped. But on Thursday morning, there were two teabags instead of one.
My husband started getting uncomfortable. He suggested that perhaps someone was watching our house or trying to send us some kind of message. I told him he was overthinking it, but deep down, I was beginning to wonder the same thing.
We decided to ask our neighbours if they had noticed anything unusual. Nobody knew anything. One elderly woman who lives across the street looked particularly uncomfortable when I mentioned the teabags. She paused for a moment before saying, “That’s strange. Very strange.”
I asked her what she meant, but she quickly changed the subject.
That night, neither of us slept properly. Every little noise outside made us look towards the window. We even considered installing a security camera, but we couldn’t understand why someone would choose something as ridiculous as teabags to frighten us.
Then, on Saturday morning, something happened that completely changed everything.
There were three teabags hanging from our door handle. But this time, there was also a small folded piece of paper underneath them.
My hands were shaking as I opened it.
There were only six words written on it:
“You should have left them there.”
My husband immediately checked the front garden, the driveway and the street, but nobody was there.
We still don’t know who is leaving the teabags or what they are supposed to mean. But one thing is certain: we no longer remove them when we find them.
Because yesterday morning, for the first time, there was no teabag on our door.
There was a photograph of our house instead.
And someone had circled our bedroom window in red.
