[ WP ] You 're babysitting an infant and you 're getting irritated because it kept staring at you the entire time . but when its gaze changed slightly , you realized it was n't staring at you , it was staring behind you .

I sat in the hard-backed wooden chair in the nursery. I should have been in the living room watching television or something. But the baby would not go to sleep. It just sat staring at me with wide, impassive, dark eyes. 
 
 There was something disturbing about the baby. About the whole house, actually. It was all distantly familiar, like something encountered in a dream or a fading memory. 
 
 It was a nice place. Just a little outdated. The television in the living room as an old CRT, the top covered in dust. The microwave was a big bulky model. The tupperware in the cabinet was burnt orange and avocado green. I had heart for the kid; my parents had been just the same. Always a few years behind the times. 
 
 And perhaps that was the problem. The familiarity and unfamiliarity of it all, working at the same time. It reminded me too much of growing up. We moved when I was one-and-a-half. I barely remembered my first home. Then again when I was five. And again when I was ten. 
 
 Dad was some sort of government scientist, and his work had us moving to government labs all over the country. Different versions of the same house. Different versions of the same people. Different versions of the same us. It seemed like it had gone on like that forever. Like we had been dislodged from time. Resetting every few years. Popping up somewhere else. Somewhen else. 
 
 The baby was still staring at me, its dark eyes a reflection of my own. And then its gaze shifted, looking just behind me. 
 
 I turned, and saw, unmistakably, an older version of myself standing in the doorway. He gazed at me in mute irritation, his wide, dark eyes a mirror of my own. I sat, my breath caught in my chest, unable to speak or scream, staring wordlessly, trying to piece together my fragmenting reality. 
 
 I was just about to say something, when my gaze shifted to a form standing behind him. 
 
 He turned to look....
