In my mind's eye I can "see" the goings-on of the interiors of my neighbors' dwellings and it disturbs me.
Upstairs, the Wacko Dysfunco Mom (single mother with only occasional visitation rights to her irritatingly-noisome baby-daddy's brats due to the divorce settlement based on her mental instability*) paces incessantly throughout the day and night. Her footfalls are like a hyper-enthusiastic Russian soldier goose-stepping in a May Day parade. "Is it our regular afternoon thunder storms or is it HER again?" I wonder wearily and woefully in my half-awake nightmare thoughts.
*All back story information on my neighbors is entirely fictionalized, of course, since I don't actually know them. I only hear them.
The bed head wall emits a very faint and very rare subtle noise. A muffled thunk. I "see" it as a small cabinet door with a slight spring back action hinge. The hinge allows the door to shut closed flush to the little felt pad pressure points with a gentle tug. The door is part of a larger cabinet made of fairly nice quality pressboard or MDF covered in a smart-looking wood grain veneer. The eerie part of this is, true to this topic as I've never really seen it, I've heard this very same thunk ever since I moved in here two and a half years ago. And that's at least four different tenants! Was the cabinetry installed by the apartment complex? I don't think so since I could swear I heard it getting electric-screwdriver fastened to the wall shortly after I moved in. Why is it still there?
From the other wall, Apartment Number 17, I hear the most disturbing of all my early evening noises: nothing. Only once in a blue moon, so to speak, do I hear anything. And that's only the front door to that apartment quietly and fleetingly opening and closing, no doubt someone entering or exiting quickly. And stealthily. I never hear what goes on in there, even when I have my ear pressed firmly to the wall. Not a peep.
They're terrorists. I'm sure of it. They're plotting something. Not enough traffic for drug pushers. And no muffled cries from hapless victims as if they were serial killers. So they must be a terrorist cell. Quietly assembling bomb vests. Right here next door to me.
Or maybe I just need to get more sleep?