Hallway Hank
Disclaimer: This text is a work of fiction. All characters and events are imaginary. Any resemblance to the period when the artists lived together is purely coincidental.
It’s 23:39. PUM PUM PUM. Stomping. Every. Single. Night. That ceaseless stomping! What are they doing up there? Dancing on my grave?
Walking full force on their heels. How uneducated, how vile. This is on purpose, I’m sure. They want to drive me nuts. Almonds, Pistachios, Peanuts. Each step makes a crack in the ceiling, it will soon collapse over me like confetti.
I can’t with this cacophony. I take another handful of Kneipp melatonin gummies and swallow them whole with water from my bottle. I infused the water with rose quartz for good energy, but why is my energy so cursed? Can’t these crystals fucking work?
23:52. I toss and turn in bed to the rhythmic sound of their mischief. Are they moving furniture? Rearranging the room in wooden clogs, are they? Just redecorating? Drilling into the walls and into my brain? Sometimes, I see them leaving the house; dressed as wild animals, returning with clinking bottles of beer, hooting in owl-speak.
00:03. I have to put an end to this, it’s time to intervene. I collect myself and put on my robe, for I am vengeance in terrycloth. I step outside, the hallway light is off and everything is spinning. I am so drowsy from the gummies, Kneipp did me dirty.
Holding onto the cold iron handrail, I go up, step by step. Quietly. Intently. I count the steps. I lose count of the steps. I have finally made it onto the first floor, I’m out of breath and need a minute, my heavy breathing imposes itself to the sudden silence.
00:07. Regret settles in. Why did I embark on this mission? I am in no way prepared for confrontation, with my half-dressed wet dog look. It’s quiet now and my mouth is too dry to make a sound. I’m not going to knock, I’m just going to look. All I want is a plain assessment of my opponent. I peep through their peephole:
Not the debauchery I had expected, but something else entirely. Mutilated animals jammed in cabinets. Nature contorted, bent to a man’s will. Primitive art. A tower PC humming, a swarm of bees inside, its fans spinning as loud as wind turbines. More Billy bookcases than books. Faux wood veneer grain undulating in sound waves, in sync with the heartbeat pounding in my throat. A swollen skeleton of a table where moss is growing. Stacks and stacks and stacks. The scene keeps expanding, stretching and wrapping outwards. Speckles of dust, fireflies twirling, lodging themselves between the grimy floor planks. The bedroom in the back emanates a radioactive glow, it remains imprinted on my retina as I blink. A curtain hasting in the draft.
As it all ooooooooozes and pulses, the peephole starts to swallow me, pulling me in headfirst, slowly consuming me into their lair. My screams are muffled by the sucking motion.
02:46. I wake up drenched in sweat. Tomorrow, I’ll let them know they were being too loud.
Text: Sofia Mascate