Wednesday's Words on a Friday

On Wednesdays, assorted people have been taking monthly turns at putting up a selection of six (or twelve) words which is called “Words for Wednesday”.

We have taken over this meme from Delores, who had been having computer problems.

This month the meme continues here, at Riot Kitty’s site.

Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write.   

Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or images.   What we do with those prompts is up to us:  a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore...

Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog.  We would really like it if as many people as possible joined in with this fun meme.

If you are posting on your own blog - let us know so that we can come along and read your masterpiece.

I’m hopeless at poetry so I always do a story.

It’s a fun challenge…why not join in?

This week's words are:

1. coffee

2. profanity

3. cats

4. flowers

5. cards

6. writing

and there are two images, which I have not used.

Here is my story:

The profanity heard from the upstairs neighbour isn't entirely unexpected, although I had wished he would be away a little longer.
An incident three days ago had caused another neighbour to phone the police, they'd arrived quickly and brought an ambulance with them.
The upstairs neighbour was taken away to hospital. His mental health is suspect, but most of the time he is very quiet, keeps to himself, rarely even ventures outside. When rational, he is polite to anyone he sees.

There'd been a similar incident last year, but then he'd had three people "visiting" him who wouldn't leave when he asked them to and tormented him to the point of breakdown. He came to my door, begging me to call the police and stayed huddled in the corner of my kitchen, convinced "they" were going to blow up his brain with their laser beams. The police took him upstairs, settled him down and left, but shortly after, he had a full blown breakdown and left his flat, saying he was going where "they" couldn't find him. He was eventually found wandering in the parklands and taken to hospital where he spent three weeks getting bathed, fed and sorted out mentally. 

This time, however, there are no extra visitors, yet he is again unstable. The voices in his head are tormenting him. His "friends" stole something from the downstairs neighbour and he knew they'd done it. When the stolen object was found, burnt and mangled, by police last week, his guilt tipped him over the edge. The heavy tread pacing began, the yelling, the "f... off" shouting, (to the voices), all of these progressed to where he took a knife, saying he'd had enough and was going to end it all, and threatened to cut a hole in the neighbour's screen door if she didn't let him in to use the phone. She told me this herself the next day. There was an almost funny moment when he realised the knife he was holding wouldn't do the job and he told her he'd go upstairs and get a bigger one. While he was upstairs, she bolted her wooden door and called the police who arrived with the ambulance.

Neighbour and I spoke at length the next day while he was in hospital, in between discussing cats, flowers and her budgie, we hoped this time he might get moved to a supervised care facility, but that very night, she came knocking on my door, saying she thinks he's home again already. His door was open. I invited her in and as I finished my coffee we spoke in soft voices about how unusual that was, he never leaves his door open. I suggested perhaps it was a carer, getting things to take to him in the hospital? I could see she was frightened, she is elderly and not strong, I was a bit scared myself. We agreed to both keep our doors locked and she would call the police if she felt threatened or just plain scared at any time. 

So here we are, two days later. There is music coming from upstairs, either his flat or another neighbour, it's hard to tell, but every few hours, there is the heavy pacing and the profanity. As I sit here writing this, things have become quiet again, possibly he has fallen asleep. Or remembered to take his medication.

I really don't want to get involved again, last time was scary enough. If he's going to start carrying knives around, I'm going to pretend not to be home if he knocks at my door. And while I'm pretending to not be there, I'll be phoning the police.

*** addition Neighbour came again when it was quiet upstairs, I thought he'd fallen asleep, but she'd called the police while I was in the shower, so I didn't hear anything, but he has been taken away again.