“OPEN THE DOOR. NOW”
The voice jars me from sleep, thoughts rush to fit. My door? Mine? Me?
Chunka-chunk. The sound of a door being tried. Locked.
“NOW.”
Not my door, another’s. The voice is demanding, authoritative. Male.
Voices boil up, subside, boil up, withdraw. They trail down the hall and away. I hear the unbothered ding of the elevator. Silence.
I lie still, let consciousness catch up. Should I call the police? Wait, I decide, Go look.
I tiptoe as if thinking the concrete floor will creak if I don’t, it won’t, and draw to one side the tiny metal disk that covers the peephole in the door. The hall is empty, expressionless doors shrink away toward their vanishing point at the far end as usual; oblivious to my winking inspection. Nothing.
The street, I’m now mostly awake. Whatever was going on may have moved outside. I cross the living room, stop short of the window, crane my neck. Peer. Any closer and I’ll be visible to those below through the curtainless expanse. Police cars. They line the street facing backward and forward. Lights blue. Red. Flashing. A van. As if on cue two people issue from the vicinity of the building’s entrance to the left and below me and go down the steps and across the sidewalk and onto the street, one escorted by the other. The latter’s hands are secured behind their back. One ushers the hoodied other to the nearest police car, opens the back passenger door, and guides them in as if managing a helium-filled balloon, gingerly.
404, I think to myself, It’s 404.
404’s door is kitty-corner to mine. He’s an enigma. 401 and 403 are friendly, self-possessed. We talk when we meet. Together we four form the sum total of occupants at our end of the hall. An enclave. Cozy and not, 404 keeping to himself as he does. His choice.
But 401 and I roll our eyes about 404 because every weekday at around 7:30 am the same sound pierces our respective idylls:
Chunka-chunka-chunk, chunka-chunka-chunk, chunka-chunka-chunk.
It’s the sound of 404 preparing to leave. He’s locked his door with his key. The one-by-two inch steel deadbolt is now firmly in its hole in the commercial grade steel door frame. We see it in our minds’ eyes: he grasps and vigorously shakes the door handle to make sure it’s locked. Three times. Everyday. Monday to Friday.
OCD, 401 says when we reconnoiter.
We don’t know whether 403 hears the chunkachunk or not, it isn’t something that rises to the level of conversation. It doesn’t warrant that much attention. Physical security. Emotional security. Psychological security. 401 doesn’t even lock his door but for 404 security is clearly a matter of the highest, regimented importance.
Lying in bed after “OPEN THE DOOR. NOW” I think of 404 and his door-shaking and his cloistered way and grow more convinced, It was him. He was the balloon.
Did you hear anything last night, I text 401 in the morning. I’ve gone back to bed following the disturbance and now I’m awake for the day.
Like what, he texts back.
I describe it. He’s curious but he’s heard nothing. Let me know if you find anything out, he says. I have no number to text 403 and ask her and it’s news to the building manager when I message him; no one’s contacted him during the night, the police seem to have gained access to the building on their own. I see 411 in the elevator. Did you see police cars out front last night? They did not.
It’s a leisurely investigation on my part: whoever crosses my path. The weekend unfolds. I continue to posit my theory that 404 was at the centre of things, flesh it out. I involve friends, fan the conjecture. Otherwise, I go about my business. One last thing though. It occurs to me that 404 might need help if he’s been detained. He has no family in town, 409 told me so. She used to stand and chat with him at his door, workmates, but she moved away. I should let her know, I think, and do. I text her. I also run into 407 and he tells me he regularly sees police reports in the course of his work and he’ll check to see if anything was called in for our building on Friday night.
That’s it for my investigation. I see no one else. A day or two passes. I run into 407 again: there was no report of the police having been here Friday night. More confusing still, 409 gets back to me and says 404’s fine. He’s in there. They’ve spoken. The week proceeds, chunka chunka chunk; yes, he’s in there. All appears to be well. The trail has more than run cold. Between what 407 and 409 contributed I can no longer even be sure anything happened.
Two weeks pass. Three. The story has since stopped making the rounds; I’ve stopped telling it. I let it go. I move on. The building moves on. The building never stopped moving on, of course. The building is inscrutable. Maybe the police hadn’t been inside at all. Maybe their apprehension of an individual out front was coincident with a noise in the hall, the two unrelated. Or maybe neither ever happened.
Coming off the elevator I see 403’s door propped open, the sign of a place either receiving or disgorging its contents. I stop at the threshold. She’s inside. You’re moving, I say surprised. Going home, she says. That’s great, I say, I’m glad for you and the kids. She’s been separated from them, living in town to nurse at a local hospital, shift work, and otherwise making the drive to see them when she can. We talk in her kitchen as the movers come and go.
The disturbance, I think, This is my chance. She’s the only person I haven’t asked. A long shot given how little she’s here but maybe. A couple of Fridays ago, I say, middle of the night, voices in the hall. I tell her everything I heard and saw: “OPEN THE DOOR. NOW,” police cars everywhere, a person in restraints. It’s as if I’m back in the moment, reliving it.
That was me, she says.
My eyes bug. I’m caught between wanting to yell YES! I was right! and What the fuck, I’m so sorry. I lead with the latter and eventually confess to the former. She’s disarmingly forthcoming. Someone she describes as a boyfriend had called 911 to report that she was assaulting him. The police came, she refused them entry, relented, and they burst in. They bent me over the island, she said, gesturing to the flat expanse of countertop, Zip-tied my hands behind my back, took me out, disbelief tinging her words.
So yes, she’d more than heard it, she was it. I could, now humbled, put my sorry powers of deductive reasoning to rest.
Both of these stories are mysteries. You're a mysteries-of-everyday-life-writer! You had me in both. But shouldn't we call Moxies to find out who ordered the food?