Nuisance

SUMMARY:  After a lifetime of sacrifice, Willie and Rebecca finally reward themselves with the retirement they've always dreamed of—a luxury condo high above Philadelphia's Riverwalk, where everything they could want is just steps away.  It seems like the perfect place to enjoy their golden years.

Then the noises begin.

Every night, thunderous crashes shake the ceiling.  Blood-curdling screams echo through the building.  Something enormous races across the floor above them, and an increasingly hostile neighbor refuses to explain the terrifying disturbances.  As complaints go unanswered and sleep becomes impossible, Willie and Rebecca begin to wonder whether they're living beneath a madwoman...or something far more dangerous.  

What starts as an all-too-familiar nightmare about inconsiderate neighbors spirals into a shocking mystery with a finale that proves the truth can be far more horrifying than anyone imagined.

***

Fifty years.  That’s how long it had taken.  A lifetime of hard work, saving, sacrificing, budgeting, and living below their means.  But once they retired, Rebecca put her foot down.  “Willie, I want you to put this house up for sale.  We’re moving downtown.  I saw some great condos along the Riverwalk, and that’s where I plan on dying.”

“Becky, talk sense, why would we do that?   This house is paid for.  Besides, the City is so congested!"



“Fine, Brother Man.  I’m moving with or without you.  You’re a thousand years old, and if you want to stay here another ten years, shoveling snow, scraping gutters, cutting grass, and raking leaves, knock yourself out.  But I’m going to leave all that to someone else and enjoy a little convenience before I kick the bucket!”



Willie smiled.  He had no intentions of staying in that house, but he did enjoy teasing the wife now and again.  And he, too, reasoned that after sixty-seven years and a lifetime of labor, they’d earned the right to take life a little easier.


The new condo was on the forty-fifth floor with breathtaking views of the river and Philadelphia's glittering skyline.  Plus, everything —everything — was within walking distance—Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell, great restaurants, museums, the theatre district, shopping, excellent jazz clubs, and their hospital.

One day, a year or so after moving into the condo, they heard something above their heads in unit 4609 that sounded like someone wrestling with a bear or tearing down walls.  And that evening, around 7 pm, they heard a piercing, blood-curdling screech that sounded remarkably like a terrified person in distress.  Then there came the sound of something galloping across the floor.  This went on until well after midnight.  Willie and Becky looked at each other, called the police, and huddled close together.

Thus began a saga of complaints, anger, calls to security, and to the Philadelphia Police Department, who didn’t bother to respond.  But the noise only got worse.  The condo owner in unit 4609, Alicia Cole, had only recently moved into the building and was defiant, refusing to abide by the City’s quiet hours ordinance, much less the condo board's rules and regulations.

After she was notified of the violation of the quiet hours law, Alicia Cole became even more obstinate.  Rather than complying, she ensured that the noise occurred before the hours stated in the ordinance.  And she increased it.   

Becky had seen the woman many times carting what appeared to be enough meat to feed an army.  What on earth is she doing with all that meat, Becky wondered.  The woman was a menace, pure and simple.  When she walked, it sounded like thunder rolling or like someone beating a bass drum.  The condo board had a strict no-smoking policy, but the smell of cigarettes and marijuana smoke constantly filtered through the vents into Willie and Becky's place.  And there was always the sound of things hitting the floor—incessantly, even in the dead of night.  They even heard her when she opened doors.  It seemed like she was tearing them off the hinges.

Instead of moving around her apartment, she tore around it.  It was like she'd been raised in a jungle—an ape wildly swinging from tree to tree.  For she had no regard for the peace and quiet of others.  And no respect for boundaries.  The only time Willie and Becky knew any quiet enjoyment in their home was when Alicia Cole went to bed.  It was so bad that Becky, who was usually a very reasonable person, fervently wished that Alicia would become the victim of a violent crime.  Hell, truth be known, she even prayed for it.

Willie had spoken to the woman's neighbors on either side of her, and they, too, had complaints.  One of the neighbors was convinced the woman was taming a bear.  He and Willie shared a good laugh over that, because, of course, she didn't have a bear in her condo.  The other neighbor said ominously that it might not be a bear, but whatever it was, it wasn't human.



None of them could imagine what was going on in the woman's condo, but they knew it wasn’t normal.  Sometimes there’d be complete silence for a week at a time, then it would start up again.  The constant sound of something thumping and bumping into the walls, the blood-curdling screams.  Not being able to sleep and the sheer disturbance of the peace at all hours of the day and night took its toll, and after about three months, Becky and Willie decided to sell the condo and move on because Willie was concerned that the constant noise would cause Becky to have a stroke or a heart attack.

The Cole woman knew it was Willie and Becky who were complaining about her.  Everywhere she'd ever lived, the people below her complained about her heavy footsteps and the noises coming from her apartment.  She was sick and tired of it and decided to get even.  "These are old people, easy pickings.  I'm going to put the fear of god into their geriatric asses and teach them a lesson that might even kill them if I'm lucky," she thought to herself. 

Late one night, around 3 am, she crept down to Willie and Becky's floor.  Her plan was to hit their door with a metal baseball bat several times in quick succession to scare the hell out of them.  She reasoned that they'd be asleep and that it would take them a few minutes to realize what was happening.  By the time they did, she'd be long gone.  When she arrived on their floor, the door to their unit was ajar, and it was dark inside.  Pushing the door, she gingerly stepped in and looked around.  

Suddendly from out of the darkness, she felt something hit her hard in the back of her head.  It felt like she was the one who was being hit with a baseball bat.  Alicia Cole screamed and tried to run from the apartment, but it was like moving through quicksand.  She tried to get a good grip on her baseball bat to fight back, but when she looked down, the bat was gone.  With every step she took, she'd get hit again.  And the blows became harder and harder.  They rained down on her head, her back, but the worst was the blow to her groin.  Then she heard bone crack when the bat was forcibly brought down on her shoulder.  The cry that tore out of her throat was so agonized that she vomited.   

But the bat kept walloping her.  And it struck her with a force that would have taken down a grizzly bear,  but no matter how hard it hit her, she did not pass out.  And she prayed for oblivion.  After what seemed like hours, Alicia's scream for help woke her up.   Sweat poured off of her like water, and she was trembling so hard that her bed shook.  And even though there was puke all over her sheets, she was relieved to find out that it had only been a dream.  

But the nightmare was so vivid that for the rest of her life, she was only able to sleep two or three hours per night, and her first thought every morning was, "How long can I go on like this?"  

"Not long," answered the little voice in her head.  The voice startled Alicia Cole, and she jumped.

Meanwhile, Becky and Willie had received an offer on their condo and were moving forward with selling it when, in one of those strange coincidences that happen in life, the noise from Alicia Cole's unit stopped.  There was peace and quiet for over two weeks.  Willie finally succeeded in getting the condo board to enter the apartment to figure out just what was going on.  When they opened the door, what they saw made them quickly close it again.  This time, when they called PPD, they came on the run.



"So, that's why she would scream like that.  It was hair-raising screams." Said Becky.

"No, that wasn't her," the officer said.  "Those screams you reported?  That was him.  Their screams can sound almost human.  Well, Philadelphia has evened the score with New York.”


“What does that mean?” Asked Willie.


“Don’t you remember the story of Ming, a 425-pound Siberian-Bengal tiger who was kept as a pet in a New York apartment  back in 2003?”


"Dear God in heaven, what is wrong with people!" Said Becky.  "Well, yes, I'd say the score is even."  For there, hunkered down on the floor, a mountain lion was contentedly eating the face off the body of Alicia Cole.




And just like that, the nuisance was eliminated.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ming_of_Harlem

The End.

 

© 2026 Jade Love