Man of the Hour

4

I woke up to the sounds of muffled movement coming from upstairs, but something was different this time. The sounds above wasn't music, but more like footsteps. It was floors creaking on my ceiling, not the horrendous music usually heard this time of the day. Still, it was enough to make me curious. What's with the loud footsteps but no music? Has a new leaf turned over for this guy?

I rushed out of bed to dress in an oversized graphic tee and maroon sweatpants before heading upstairs to see the hullabaloo. Turns out, as I headed up the stairs to reach his floor, there was a caravan of movers packing what little there is left in the apartment into boxes and bags. What is happening? Was my neighbor moving away?

Out of the corner of my eye, another neighbor emerged from her own apartment and shooed her cats away from the husky movers carrying appliances and furniture away from the room. She was draped in glamorous caramel mink furs, pairing it with a pleather mini skirt and fire-engine red stilettos. I think her name is Mellie or something, probably short for Amelia. She's a middle-aged niche lawyer (meaning that her clientele wasn't based off wealth but exclusivity) who looked really good for her age. Her face was free of age spots and wrinkles, for godsakes. However, instead of spending her time having a social life, she chose to spend the majority of it with her Siamese kittens at home, tending to them while she works from home. The only times I see her is within the lobby, and she once told me that she finds her "babies" to be her only best friends, not the snakes out there that intend to steal her money and slander her reputation. I mean... I'm not here to pass judgement, so whatever works for her, I guess. Otherwise, she's a pretty cool gal.

She stood next to me for a second while we both drank in our synergy together. Honestly, whether or not she had something loose in her brain, I was glad for her presence there. Something bizarre was happening; my upstairs neighbor would not just evacuate his space like a loser and give up. Even as he broke down on my shoulder, angry at the world for being so cruel and unfair, he had a determined look on his face about finding his family. While he was defeated and broken down, he never lost faith that he would find his wife and two children. So to suddenly turn around and leave? That was uncharacteristic cowardly move on its own. I was glad for Mellie's aid in this confusing situation.

"Mellie," I whispered, a condition I was surprised to find myself doing. Why am I whispering in my own apartment complex?

"Oh my, thank goodness someone's here to witness this debauchery!" She wailed in a dramatic tone. "One minute, Mr. Fong was enjoying his dish of milk out by the windowsill, and the next minute, there were a bunch of charlatans out there making too much unscrupulous noise at this time in the morning. Oh I mean, I could tolerate it from the former lad because the poor bloke was suffering from losing his entire family, what a catastrophe! And you must understand that, my dear, see I lost my husband in the war many years ago..." she continued on and on, switching and blending regional European accents together until she created her own indistinguishable dialect, probably "Melglish". This was getting me nowhere.

"Excuse me, Mellie, I'm sorry to interrupt, but I would really love to know where he's moving off to, I thought he was gonna hire a private investigator or something like that. What happened to him?" I interjected. As I talked, she faded off from her own thought process to understand and answer my question.

"Oh, my dear, I'm afraid I don't know exactly where he went, but maybe one of those strong, burly men can ask you," she said lollingly as she eyed those same movers she labeled charlatans a second ago. What an icon.

I walked over to one of the men loading a futon onto a ramp and said, "Hey, if you don't mind me asking, where are you guys going?"

He looked over and gave me a gruff look, which I didn't mind. I was used to those all my life. "Look kid, what's it to ya? Your friend went crazy up here," he whinged as he pointed to his head, "and he's going off to some nutcase or something, if you can believe it. Your landlord wanted peace and quiet in the place, so he offered your friend a stay at this place uptown. Now if you'll excuse me, you're distracting me from my job." And with that, he walked away to lug the futon down the stairs.

I dawdled back to Mellie, where she held a piece of paper in her hands. "Dearie, I might have found something to be in your interest. I saw it when I looked at my mail slot on my door, but I'm pretty sure he got the same thing as well," she somberly said. She handed me the flyer.

Tired of your mental abilities bringing you down? Your loneliness on the rise? Are your dreams plaguing you like... well, the plague? Here in Tinker King's Acclimated Assistance, we promise you the best service in hospitality and caretaking, while providing a cutting-edge memory and brain technology to help alleviate you from daily stressors that life can bring. Why wait? Your rest and relaxation is right around the corner. Our callers are standing by and occupancy is getting scarcer and scarcer by the minute. Call now!

Looking at the grand mansion that's supposed to represent "Acclimated Assistance" along with all-too-happy senior citizens dancing in a circle on the cover, it was like looking at an uncanny valley version of an advertisement. It was somehow too cheerful to describe what can effectively be called mental rehabilitation, but despite that, something clicked within me; I found myself being alluded by its promise. My dreams haven't affected me this much since I was a kid, and I was desperate to learn something, anything, about my dreams. Specifically, why you were always the subject of my dreams. Why did you wait until now to come back to me, even ethereally?

I turned back to Mellie to talk to her once again, but she was gone. Her door was closed shut and the movers who had come to take away my neighbors belongings had left as well. Once again, it was just me, holding an integral piece of the puzzle that held a clue about my neighbor. What is happening with the world, I thought, and why is it coming down like hail? I glanced at the flyer once again and scanned to the bottom of the page, where gold foil encrusted the phone number listed underneath. I dialed the number and hoped for the best.