Where the Walls Are Thin

Taking a glance at his bathroom floor, his ears still listening to the screaming that came his downstairs neighbors apartment, Nathan Wipple saw he'd been eavesdropping long enough for his fifteen pound cat Sir to fall asleep on the bathroom tile floor.

Nathan only smirked at the cat, not letting his ears disengage from the eavesdropping he'd been doing for what felt like the last three hours. Reaching down he put a hand to Sir's ear, scratching the animal. Sir only sighed heavily as he wiggled his head, turning in a way that made Nathan move his own hand and rest it back on his knee.

Moving his left hand he put his cigarette back to his mouth, taking a drag as another laugh came from below him. Nathan didn't even know his downstairs neighbors names, though he didn't honestly care enough to make the effort to ask them. He'd lived in the same apartments for the past seven years, and the same neighbors had lived below him. They'd been there since Nathan had first exited his apartment after needing a carpet cleaner for a dark stain in his living room, and had seen the man who lived below him leaving his own place of residence. A shinning bald head, black glasses and clothes that hugged his not fat but football-line-backer build as if he wanted the clothes to almost strangle him. Nathan had never seen the man's wife, but he could always hear them both.

Now Nathan, having always been an introvert and someone who only ever kept to himself, wasn't going to pass up an opportunity to listen in on his neighbors yet again. It was a weekly thing for them to shout at one another, and if that wasn't happening, one or even both of the small black dogs they owned were outside, loudly yipping and yapping at anyone who got to close. Nathan didn't dislike dogs, but he disliked his downstairs neighbors dogs a great deal.

From below the voice of Downstairs Man's wife came now, muffled as she was probobly in another room, but still loud enough to hear snatches of whatever she was using as a retort against her, Nathan assumed, husband.

"...haven't seen it, have?!" came her voice.

"Well your always in this fucking bathroom! Huh?" yelled back the husband.

Nathan's face took on a sharp look then, the cigarette smoke curling in front of his face.

More muffled quips from Downstairs Woman gave the husband a cause to all but scream back,

"SO YOU THINK SO?!" at the top of his lungs.

Now Nathan bit his teeth and put the back of his hand to his mouth, head shaking side to side.

"Fucking Jesus," he muttered to Sir, who still slept on the floor.

Now the husband from downstairs shouted a swear out, a dull thud being the cause of his shouting now. Nathan turned his head some, listening.

"...You wouldn't dare asshole!" the wife's voice called out, albeit a bit hard to hear.

"Listen to you, thinking you know everything still!" Downstairs Man's voice shouted back, "you always got something to say!"

"Shut up!" demanded the wife, "Shut the fuck!"

"You shut the fuck up!" shouted back the husband.

Nathan held his cigarette in his mouth, his hands on his knees as he listened to the two berating each other downstairs. Another uncatchable yelling came from the wife then, and then a sound that made Nathan almost jump up from the edge of his bathtub.

A bang, then a sound like stumbling, or even falling. The bang sounded like metal against metal, and the sound of somehting hitting the floor very, very hard seemed to shake the floor of his bathroom.

Nathan swallowed then, his face suddenly feeling peeked.

"What the fuck?" he whispered to himself.

With a growl from the bathroom floor, Sir was standing up now, his ears twitching as he listened with his small cat ears.

"Whatcha think it was buddy?" Nathan looked down at Sir.

In response Sir only looked back at Nathan, then turned around and briskily trotted out of the bathroom, giving Nathan silence in response to his question.

Standing up then Nathan grunted, his face still feeling cold. He swallowed, taking his cigarette that had whitled down to the butt. He took the butt and dropped it into an ashtray outside of the bathroom, in his bedroom where there was an ashtray on the desk agaisnt the left wall. Nathan took a breath then, still listening for any sounds downstairs.

He stood there, still, and kept listening. From below in his neighbors apartment, Nathan swore that for a moment all he heard was the sounds of soft, muffled crying. He took another swallow, then moved from the bedroom to the hallway. It late at night, maybe past 8:00 if Nathan had bothered to look at the digital clock projected on the ceiling in his room.

From the bedroom Nathan walked down the hallway, one hand in his pocket and the other hand trailing along the left wall. He walked slowly, and took an extra large step so he didn't step on a patch of carpet next to the laundry room door, where it always seemed to creak under his weight.

Coming to leave the hallway Nathan stepped into his living room, the room dark thanks to the curtains hung in his window and all the lights being turned off at the current time of night. He paused to listen then, his ears on the ground but his eyes on the front door, where he looked at the locks. They were both set in place as to keep anyone from kicking the front door in, and as Nathan took a breath, he kept listening.

Standing still, Nathan could hear sounds of things moving around below him. Nathan took a step closer to the black leather couch in the middle of the living room, thinking he would end up falling asleep if he kept listening around like he had been.

From the downstairs apartment again came another noise, this one soudning like something had hurled a lamp at the wall and shattered it. Still listening Nathan heard a shout of,

"Fuck!" from down below.

The young man was on his couch now, laying down to put his hands under his head. He squeezed his eyes shut once, then opened them again to stare at the ceiling.

Nathan, closing his eyes again, began to tune out the sounds of what was going on downstairs. He heard another bang, then what sounded like multiple somethings being dropped to the floor, one thud, thud, thud after the other.

The sounds faded as Nathan started to fall asleep, then he fell asleep for good, and stayed asleep. He sleep until, as he snorted himself awake to the sound of what could have been someone knocking on his door. Nathan opened his eyes, the world blurry as he started blinking.

He sat up, listening to see if the knock had come at the end of the dream he'd been having, or if it had come from real life. Nathan swallowed, his mouth dry from the cold air in his apartment.

Sitting up on the couch Nathan stood himself up, then jumped as the knock came again, very much in real life, and not his dream. Behind his front door a voice called out,

"West County Sheriff! Can you come open the door?"

Nathan felt his blood get cold as he looked at his door. What the hell could he have done in the last twenty-four hours that would have given the cops cause to show up at his apartment at.... he looked at the clock on the bar... 6:35 in the morning.

Walking from the couch Nathan rubbed a hand on his face, trying to wake himself up as best he could so he could talk to the sheriff who was supposedly at his front door. He crossed the full length of his living room, and as he reached it he pulled down the chain on the door, then turned the deadbolt with a snap.

Nathan turned the doorknob and pulled open his front door then, and saw there was indeed a sheriff standing at his door. Living in a country rather than the city limits it was a more common sight to see, and Nathan said,

"Can I help you?"

"Yes," the sheriff nodded, his face wearing a thin black stubble and his hair combed over to the right side of his head. He almost looked like he'd just woken up himself.

"Do you know the residents that live below you, in apartment 1666?" the sheriff asked Nathan.

"Not well, no," he shook his head.

"Right," the sheriff nodded, "I'm here becuase another resident called about an altercation that happened earlier in the night. Said they heard a gunshot at one point, and it came from downstairs."

He paused as Nathan was looking at him, then asked,

"You mind if I come in and ask you a couple questions?"