She always appeared wherever I went, and I couldn’t figure out how. Later, I found out she’d put tracking software on my phone. I felt trapped, like I couldn’t escape no matter where I went. It was like she was watching me all the time.
UNSEEN ECHOES - Objects of Domestic Abuse | Photography Project & Exhibition

Map

She always appeared wherever I went, and I couldn’t figure out how.

At first, I thought it was just a coincidence. A twisted kind of luck.

I’d go to the café, and she’d walk in five minutes later, acting surprised. “Fancy seeing you here.” I’d take the long way home, cut through side streets, and there she’d be, waiting at the corner, arms crossed, watching. Even when I didn’t tell anyone where I was going, she somehow knew.

It made my stomach tighten every time I saw her.

I started questioning myself. Maybe I wasn’t as careful as I thought. Maybe she just knew me that well. Maybe I was imagining it.

But then one night, I went somewhere I had never been before—somewhere I knew she’d have no reason to expect me. And still, she found me.

That’s when I knew.

Later, I found out why.

She’d put tracking software on my phone.

I don’t even know when she did it. Maybe one of those times she snatched it from my hands to “check something.” Maybe while I was asleep. It didn’t matter. The damage was done.

It was buried deep in the settings, hidden where I’d never think to look. Watching me. Logging my movements. Every step, every stop, every place I thought was mine—she knew it all.

It wasn’t just my imagination. I wasn’t being paranoid.

I felt trapped, like I couldn’t escape no matter where I went.

She was always there, just out of sight, just close enough to remind me I was never alone.

No privacy. No freedom. No safe space that was really my own.

It was like she was watching me all the time.

Because she was.

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