Shadows in the dark

Loud voices in the dark startled the sleep out of me.  A woman's guttural retort shot through the darkness.  The cuckoo clock downstairs struck to announce the hour. I counted to four and was pleased for it meant that morning was near.  But the clock continued to strike. Five is good, I thought. It is a good hour to rise, drink some water and read the text messages on my phone.  I frowned when the clock continued to strike the seventh for it certainly did not match the darkness outside my window. I stilled my mortification as the count continued until it finally stilled at 12.  - Midnight!  How utterly disappointing to be awaken long before morning, and how annoying to have to initiate the whole process of getting to sleep, all over again.

The woman's angry retort sounded nearer. I deduced that the voices came from Eddie's (not his real name) house.  He lived in a house directly across the road from the window of my bedroom upstairs.  Unable to return to sleep, I walked towards the window and peered into the darkness.  The neighboring houses were in complete darkness.  A little light illuminated Eddie's porch where a small sedan was parked. Outside his gate was a sinister looking black SUV.

I was right, but of course I was right.  The drama came from Eddie's house.

In my books, Eddie and his family were a dubious lot.  There was the middle-aged man with the permanent snarl and an unfriendly gait who stared fixedly at me when he made his first appearance outside my gate where he parked his car and crossed the road towards the house.  All my warning bells rang. This was not a pleasant man, I thought, as I looked away. Then there was the middle-aged woman with the domineering mien and haughty condescension who would not look at me as she directed her maid to climb up a small ladder to reach the papayas I planted outside my house.  Such a contentious couple, I thought and thought no more of them.

And then, there was Eddie.  He was a young man who wore many faces. There was the smiling face who gave us the Ambarella shrub now growing outside our house.  Then, there was the angry face starring daggers at the sweet young thing who left his house one hot afternoon in another man's car.  Eddie was also the amicable face with the toddler in his arms who stopped outside our gate to exchange goo-goo-ga-gas with our dogs.

Call me curious when I stood at the window peering out into the darkness at this unearthly hour.  The angry exchanges had intensified.  The middle-aged couple was out in the garden not that I could see them clearly.  It was dark so all I saw were two silhouettes arguing at the outer corner of the garden.  Suddenly the woman raised her right hand and smacked the man across his cheek.  His reaction was instant. He struck her. She collapsed onto the garden ground.  I was shocked beyond words.  The woman remained wailing on the ground.  The man extended his hands to lift her up.  She stormed into the house wailing as she went. High above them, at a small window on the adjacent house, a blue light blinked in the dark.  It continued to blink for about 30 seconds after the incident.

More indecipherable sounds came from inside the house.  The black SUV previously parked outside the gate left the scene and then returned.  It did this two more times until finally, for the third time, it rested opposite the gate on my side of the road.  Then the gate of Eddie's house was thrown wide open, the little sedan parked at the porch rolled out into the darkness and out of sight.

I did not understand what had happened and was of half a mind to check with the family who lived adjacent to Eddie's house but the blue blinking lights stayed my curiosity.

This had been a most peculiar night.  The non-closure of an inconclusive drama accompanied by little blue blinking lights had a numbing effect on me. I turned and tossed in my bed, the usual precursor for the slumber which wouldn't come ...

... thanking God in His benevolence, for the serendipitous mediocrity in my simple world.