Restless Night

Sherry startled awake. The alarm clock showed 1:22. She’d only been asleep for an hour or two, but something had alerted her. She tried to remember what she had been dreaming about. No details emerged, but there was a chilling sense of danger. She wanted to go back to sleep, but a nagging thought suggested that she’d heard a sound, and she should investigate it.

She switched on the bedside light. There was nothing unexpected about her bedroom. The door was closed, and the drapes were pulled across the window. Sherry swung her legs out of bed, pushed her feet into slippers and wrapped herself in a dressing gown. Pulling the drapes to one side, she looked down at the front yard. There was nothing to see there. The streetlight illuminated the driveway and the grass. The window was firmly latched shut.

Sighing, she picked up her phone, using it as a flashlight as she walked through the rest of the apartment. It was the same story in each room. Her door and windows were all locked; nothing was out of place. Everything was quiet. The next-door apartment was empty, she knew. Her neighbor Max was away on a business trip. Just to be on the safe side, she stuck her nose out into the shared corridor. Nothing was moving. “Must have been a bad dream,” she muttered, going back to bed.

She played a quick card game on her phone, to rid herself of that feeling that something was amiss. She’d just checked everything, and it was all fine. When she finished the game, she put out the light and snuggled into the covers. She was asleep in just a few minutes.

When she woke up the next time it was nearly 3 o’clock. Her mental alert was going off again. She still couldn’t remember what dream might have caused this reaction. For a few minutes, she lay in bed hoping that she would fall back asleep. No sleep came. Frustrated, she turned the light on again, pulled on the dressing gown and slippers, and went to make herself a cup of chamomile tea. She re-checked the lock on the apartment door. It was fine. Sitting at the kitchen table, she drank the tea and thought about her workday. Was something bothering her about what happened yesterday, or what was going to happen tomorrow? No, there were just the usual meetings and tasks. Nothing that should be keeping her awake.

She rinsed out the cup and took a couple of squares of kitchen paper, drizzling cold water onto them. In bed once again, she put the kitchen paper poultice on her forehead and settled back to sleep.

At 3:37 she sat up in bed, thoroughly annoyed. “What the heck is wrong with me?” she shouted at a silent apartment. “I have to get up in three hours, and I’ll be too tired to focus at work!”

The front yard of the building was still quiet. The windows were still latched. There were no dripping faucets. The heating was working normally. Sherry laid out her clothes for the morning, then went to the bathroom and repeated her nighttime ritual, hoping that would fool her brain into thinking that it was time to sleep. Then she returned to bed.

A few minutes later, she stirred again. She thought she saw a figure by her bed, holding something in his hand. “Just a dream,” she murmured in satisfaction, “I knew it.” In her dream, she closed her eyes, rolled over, and fell back to sleep.

The alarm woke her next. It was 6 o’clock, and she had managed at least five hours of rest. There was time for a shower and breakfast to get her fully awake before heading out to work. She reached out for her phone but couldn’t find it. “Great! All that up and down during the night, I must have knocked it on to the floor.”

Not bothering with the bedside light, she stepped over to the window and flung open the drapes. Light streamed into the bedroom. She looked down and saw a police car on the street outside. Maybe she had heard something from another building during the night. Turning back towards her bed, she stopped dead. Something was wrong.

At first, she couldn’t place it. She looked around the room. Her laptop was missing. She always plugged it in overnight on the dressing table. It wasn’t there. Maybe she’d left it in the living room when she went to bed. She went to find her phone – looking beside the bed, underneath it, on top of it – there was no phone. Her clothes were still set out for the morning, but her purse had been taken.

In the bathroom, everything looked normal, until she opened the medicine cabinet. All the prescription drugs were gone. Whoever had taken them hadn’t even bothered to check what they were, he’d just taken them all. She hoped he’d find a use for the estrogen tablets.

She looked in the other rooms, but nothing seemed to be missing. The intruder had opened some drawers, rifling through them, but she didn’t keep anything of great value there. With great relief she noted that her coffee maker and air fryer were both still there. Her apartment and car keys still hung on their hooks in the kitchen.

Dressing hurriedly, she left the apartment, went downstairs and walked out of the building. She crossed the road to the police car. It was empty, and she looked around to see where the police had gone. The front door of her building opened and two uniformed officers stepped out. Her downstairs neighbor Fred was with them. Fred pointed to her and spoke to them. One of the cops came over to her. “Do you live in this building, ma’am?”

“Yes, upstairs, apartment 202. What’s going on?”

He nodded and wrote a note on his pad. “Can you tell me your name, please?”

“It’s Sherry Kincaid. Look, what’s happening? Were Fred and Jeannie burgled as well?”

The cop stopped writing on his notepad. “As well? Was someone else in the building burgled?”

“Yes, there is stuff missing from my apartment. I-I woke up during the night and thought I saw a man in my room, but it was just a dream…”

The policeman nodded again. “Let’s go and look at your apartment. We’ll need to fingerprint it. Do you remember what this man in your dream looked like?”

Sherry was wracking her brain for anything she noticed about the man in her dream, but as she passed Fred, she saw his eyes were red. She didn’t know Fred and Jeannie that well, but seeing that he had been crying, she reached out to him. “Fred, are you OK? What happened? Did you get burgled too?”

Fred startled, then gave her a look that seemed both dispassionate and uneasy. “Jeannie interrupted an intruder. He stabbed her with a knife. She’s in the hospital now…”

His voice trailed off, and he stood there, looking completely lost. The policemen led them away from each other. Sherry tried to make sense of last night. “I don’t think I heard anything, but I did wake up several times. The one time I didn’t wake up properly, that was when he was there, in my apartment, next to my bed.” She collapsed into tears now, belatedly aware of the danger.

The policeman took her arm and led her into the building. They went upstairs in silence except for Sherry’s sobs. As she took out her key to open her door, he asked her, “Was the door locked when you woke up this morning?”

She stared at him for a moment. “Yes, it was. And it was locked before, when I got up and checked. But… But Fred and Jeannie have my spare key – they have keys for all the apartments.”

Then, coming to her senses, “Is Jeannie going to be OK? Oh, I’m sorry – would you like a cup of coffee?”

The cop steered her to the sofa and sat her down. “You need to touch as little as possible. We’ll go around in a minute, so you can tell me what’s been disturbed and what’s missing. But first, what do you remember about the man you saw?”

Sherry wasn’t really listening to him anymore. What if I had woken up fully? Would I be in hospital like Jeannie? Would anyone even know I’d been hurt? I could be lying here dead or dying, with no phone to call for help.

The questions kept going around in her mind. The policeman tried to speak to her, but she had gone to the same place Fred had gone to when he stopped speaking. The world just wasn’t making sense, and she felt completely lost.

The policeman put on a pair of nitrile gloves and walked to the kitchen. He returned with a glass of water, which he set in front of her. Automatically she picked it up and took a sip. The action brought her back to reality, and she thanked him.

“I know this has been a shock, Ms Kincaid. In your own time, please tell me anything you remember about the man.”

Sherry shook her head. “I don’t think I can trust my memory. I see him with a knife now, but I expect I’ve invented that because I know he stabbed Jeannie. He was holding something in his hand, I think. But it was dark, and I didn’t see what it was. He just looked average. Normal height and weight. Maybe five feet nine to six feet tall, adult, 200 pounds. Not especially young or old. I didn't notice his hair. I couldn’t even tell you his skin color or whether he had facial hair. My gut feeling is that he was white, but I can’t give you a reason why I think that. He was wearing what you’d expect – probably jeans and a hoodie. Oh, and he didn’t seem to be wearing glasses. And I didn’t hear him moving around at all.”

The policeman stopped writing. “You’re sure you didn’t hear him?”

She was absolutely sure. “If I’d heard anything, I’m sure I’d have woken up fully. He was there and silent, so it really seemed just like a dream. And I’m sensitive to the smell of smoke, so I’m fairly confident he’s not a smoker. I’m sorry, I’m afraid I’m not much help.”

The other policeman walked into the apartment. She realized belatedly that they hadn’t closed her door when they walked in. The second policeman introduced himself as Sgt. Rodriguez. He was also wearing gloves, and he told her that someone would come up shortly to take fingerprints.

The first officer (she squinted at his name tag, but couldn’t quite see it) said “Ms Kincaid stirred in her sleep and thinks she saw the intruder. Unfortunately, it was dark, so she can’t give us much of a description.”

Sgt. Rodriguez said “What time do you think this was?”

Now Sherry did know something. “I’d woken up twice already. One thirty, three, oh, and three thirty. Three times. And my alarm went off at six. If I had to guess, I’d say it was about four, but it could have been later.”

Rodriguez nodded. “It sounds as if you didn’t dream it. The time fits.”

The other cop – she finally read his name tag, Wilson – said “You’ve been very precise in what you remember. Do you usually remember details so clearly?”

She smiled, glad to change the subject. “You think I’m making stuff up? No, I’m a graphic artist. Noticing details is part of my job.”

Rodriguez jerked his thumb towards the next-door apartment. “Do you know the person in 201? He’s not answering his door.”

“Oh, Max is in Mexico City on business all week. Jeannie has –“ she stopped abruptly, then gathered herself together. “Fred has a spare key to his place. I have Max’s cell phone number somewhere if you want to talk to him.”

Rodriguez grimaced. “The intruder took all the spare keys from the downstairs unit. We assume he still has them. Once we’ve finished here, you should get a locksmith in.”

Sherry sank briefly into the abyss again. Will I ever feel safe here now? Recovering quickly, she walked to the kitchen drawer, then remembering about fingerprints, she called the policemen over. “There’s a spare key for 201 in this drawer. Max and I had a relationship for a while.”

Oversharing, Sherry. These guys are just trying to do their job. They don’t need to know about your private life. She watched as Wilson flipped through the items in the drawer. “That one, with the green cover. I’ll ask Max if he wants his lock changed as well.”

Rodriguez took the key and walked out. When he returned, he handed back the key. “This guy’s a very tidy thief. We can’t tell what might be missing without talking to your neighbor. Let’s take a look at what he took from here.”

Sherry retraced her steps from an hour earlier. She pointed out where the laptop, phone and purse had been, and the medicine cabinet in the bathroom. “I don’t think he took anything else. He’d moved things around in the kitchen and the living room, but nothing seems to be missing.”

Wilson said confidently “He’d be looking for money, portable electronics, firearms and drugs. Anything that’s quick and easy to take, and he can sell easily. That’s why you still have your monitor, sound system, and kitchen appliances.”

That cheered her up a little. It sounded as though he would have no reason to come back.

After the crew had been through and taken fingerprints and presumably looked for other clues, the police left, asking her to come to the station later in the day to sign her statement and provide any identifying information for the phone and laptop. They hadn’t offered any advice on her next steps, except for the locksmith.

She headed into the office to tell them she was taking a couple of days off and make a lot of phone calls. Everyone was very understanding, and reminded her about her bank, insurance company, driver’s license replacement, and so on.

She called Max to let him know what was going on. He was appalled, and asked her if he needed to come back early. She said there was no urgency, but he could help by telling her where he kept the things the police had mentioned. Then she asked if he wanted her to get his lock changed as well as hers. He accepted gratefully. “There’s one other thing, Max, and it’s a bit of an imposition. Feel free to say no. I’m not sure how well I’ll sleep tonight. Would it be OK if I called you when I have trouble sleeping? Last night I woke up four times, and I think I’ll be very nervous tonight.”

Max was silent for a moment, and Sherry thought he was going to refuse. But then he said “You’re staying there alone tonight? Of course you can call at any time. I’ll read you bedtime stories if you need me to. Tell Fred I’m happy to do anything for him too. He must be in a hell of a state.”

By the time bedtime rolled around, Sherry was exhausted. She’d set up a new laptop from work, picked up a replacement phone and new number, canceled all her cards, changed locks for Max, Fred and herself, requested new prescriptions, and dealt with the bank and the insurance company. With all that done, she had made dinner for herself and Fred. Jeannie was still in the hospital, where the doctors said it was likely that she would make a full recovery. But being stabbed when you are over 65 is a big deal.

With all that done, she prepared for bed, She checked the lock on the door, and made sure all the windows were firmly latched. Then she crawled into bed, leaving the bedside lamp on, and fell into a dreamless sleep.

She startled awake at 1:22. The light was still on, which was good. She reached for her phone, and with shaking hands, dialed Max’s number.