The Baby next Door

Am I losing my mind?

Why on earth was I the only one who was experiencing these weird occurrences, why was Kate not seeing the things I was. Why was she not hearing the things I was hearing. Why was I the only one here who had to go through these events. These questions ran through my mind constantly. 

It was the next morning after I had heard the exact same shriek I had heard before. I was perplexed. For some reason, I was unable to remove the question Kate had asked me last night, when I had asked her if she had heard it too - "hear what?"

It made absolutely no sense what so ever - to me, it was a horrific shriek, but to Kate it was merely nothing more than the wind outside. The wind you hear every night, as it brushes the leaves outside to make a rustling noise outside your window.

I poured my coffee into my cup as I mindlessly sipped down the warm liquid, which I had hopped would give me some sort of energy to make it through the day. I still had that very important meeting today, and Kate agreed to drive her parents around town. She basically did not want to spit another word, as she had enough of my nonsense for one day.

I was determined to get some sleep after those traumatic events unfolded like dominoes - one after the other. First, it was seeing the horrible, shadow - like figure in the garden, then Ben scaring the living s**t out of me and now that shriek.

The question continued to flow through my mind as I sipped the warm coffee down my throat. It warmed my chest and allowed my to gain enough strength to make it to the bathroom and take a shower. I still had two more hours before I had to make my way to the office.

Mike, my boss, had bought this house for Kate and I as part of the perks of becoming the CEO of the company. Mike was a good friend of mine, and has been for quite some time now. We used to hang out on the weekends back in our old town.

Kate, Ben and Karen had already left the house for the carnivals and the fairs. They were going to take a full sweep of the city and see all the fun things the beautiful city of Townsend had to offer.

I drank the last drop of coffee out of my mug and sat at the end of the Kitchen counter and as I stared blindly across the room. I sat there wondering what on Earth was going on. Since nothing had occurred since I had gotten up, I presumed that it indeed that my paranoia was purely based on lack of sleep. My sleep depravity made me understand that I had not lost my mind, but instead, it was just me being tired.

I looked at the bottom of my cup and saw nothing but emptiness. I sat there in silence as I pondered on my life, and how I had gotten to where I was.

After a few minutes of nothingness, I realized that I was going to be late for work - and the very important meeting I expected to attend. I got up from the kitchen counter and walked towards the kitchen sink so that I could place the cup into the sink. I placed it into the sink and made my way up the stair case so that I could take a shower.

I grabbed my clothes and walked up the stairs. Upon opening the bedroom door, I was greeted to the cold breeze that gad filled the room. This was the result of the bedroom window being left open. I wobbled round the bed and closed it shut.

I walked back around the bed and walked into the shower. After a quick shower later, and walked back out of the bathroom and into the bedroom. I faced the mirror and just stared into it. I looked terrible.

My first thoughts were that there is no way that the CEO of a major company can attend a meeting looking like a piece of s**t. I smacked myself in the face a couple of times in hopes to make me a bit more attentive - and hopped that it would make me look a bit better.

I got dressed in a gorgeous black suit with a bloodshot red tie. Mike supplied the suit and was hosting a welcoming lunch in my honor. That was the agenda of the 'very important meeting.'

I trotted back down stairs and grabbed my suitcase. I made my way towards the door. I grabbed the handle and turned it. Upon swinging the door wide - open, I was greeted by yet another traumatic instance. It was in that moment that I realized that - since Kate was driving her parents around town so that they could go sight seeing, she took the only car that we had.

I had ordered a new car, but I was still awaiting the delivery to arrive. So now I faced a predicament - I had no neighbors to drive me to work and I had no car to drive myself to work either. I sat on my front step with my head in my hands - and I still had just a little under half an hour before my welcome meeting had commenced.

"What on earth am I going to do?"

I frantically walked up and down the street in search of an answer, before finally coming up with one.

I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and quickly dialed the number that belonged to my boss - Mike.

"Come on Mike, please pick up."

The phone rang for a couple of seconds before Mike finally picked up.

"Miles, where the hell are you man? I have a dozen guests here and well, you are the reason they are here."

"Yea man listen, I am kind of in a serious problem, and you might need to pick me up."

"What problem, and why do I need to pick you up. And from where on earth do I need to pick you up from?"

"Cut the questions alright. I am at my house. I will explain in the car just, hurry up man."

The call was silent for a second.

"Mike? Hello? Bro what is going on? MIKE!"

"Yea, yea I am here chill man. My gosh. Okay listen, I am not going to come to your house, meet me on the highway, I will pick you up from there."

I wondered why he was not able to pick me up from my house, it would literally save time for both of us, and I would not sweat.

"Hey wait why not pick me up from my house? It legit saves the both of us so much time."

"I said I would pick you up from the highway, and that it final!"

Before I could respond to that, Mike ended the call. I was so confused but decided that I would just be wasting even more time if I had dwelt on it any longer, so I began to walk towards the highway so that I could catch Mike.

The highway was not too far off from my house, since we were located in a high end area. The thought of our residential area being that of high class, had brought back a question i thought was completely forgotten - If this house was indeed upper class and that off the lavish life style, then why was it so cheap?

It was not too long before I had arrived at the entrance of the highway. I sat on the railing of the road and awaited Mike's arrival. It was about a minute or so and I heard the roar of an engine racing down the upper part of the road. I would recognize that engine sound from a mile away.

It was Mike. I watched as he turned the corner rather sharply. He came to a complete halt right beside me.

"Look at that, a man in a rather expensive attire, hitch - hiking, that is not something you would see everyday. Now come on, we have got to get out of here man."

Those words stunned me - why did he not want to come here, and why did he want to leave in such a hurry? What was his reasoning behind all this. I did not have the brain power to continue thinking about this, so I just hopped into the car and sat there in silence for a bit. It was not too long before I decided to inquire about his actions behind not wanting to pick me up from my house.

"Why are you so much in a hurry to get out of here?"

Mike sat there in shear silence for about a few seconds before finally being able to string together a few sentences in response to my inquiry.

"We were already late man and I have guests waiting for myself but more importantly you. Which brings me to the elephant in the room - why did I have to pick you up in the first place?"

"Well, Kate's parents are in town and she wanted to take them sight-seeing. We did not really think through the idea of her taking the car, because I shortly realized the stupidity behind it. The only problem is that I realized too late."

"Right. Idiot."

"I had a long weekend alright."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kate finally arrived back home with Ben and Karen. They were exhausted from the amount of activities they had taken on that day. Ben and Karen had gone to take a shower, while Kate sat at the kitchen counter in silence. She was thinking about why Miles was behaving so weird. Something was not adding up.

She was too tired to even think about it. She had her head in her heads and took a deep breath. It was a minute or two that had passed by when she finally picked her head up. She looked into the passage way and saw something that rocked her soul.

Standing, in the darkness of the hall way, was a shadowy figure. It just stared at her. Kate stared back at it in horror before Ben appeared from the bathroom behind the figure. As he exited the bathroom, the shadow had disappeared.

Kate could not help but think of one thing - "Am I losing my mind?"