THE MAN NEXT DOOR (standard:drama, 680 words)
Author: Fanny11	Added: Jun 12 2009	Views/Reads: 3172/3	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
THis story is about a woman who feels frightened of the man next door, because of his odd ways. After having a conversation with him she finds out he is just different from society.

I had lived on this street for only a few months when I noticed the man
who lived in the apartment building next to mine. I never paid much 
attention to the people who lived there. I did noticed  (however) there 
was a turnover of tenants moving in and out. The building wasn't 
maintained very well some of the tattered old shingles were missing, 
the window frames and front porch needed a fresh coat of paint and the 
grass in front always needed cut. Most of the apartment buildings on 
the street were once large beautiful houses they were built in the 
middle eighteenth century and were later remodeled into apartment 
buildings. Some of the buildings had as many as six apartments.  This 
was probably done because it would be too costly to heat a house that 
large today. Since this building was not maintained very well, the rent 
was affordable for the people who lived there. The people who lived on 
this street were prepared to hear loud music late at night coming from 
the apartment building and the woman on the third floor would start 
screaming when her boyfriend beat her up. The police would come and it 
would be quiet for a couple of days. I first noticed the man who lived 
in that building when one morning we passed on the sidewalk.  He was 
dressed in a pullover shirt and walking shorts. Over these clothes he 
wore a sweat jacket with a hood that was always up.  The jacket looked 
worn. He always wore a pair of ratty gloves that had no ends on the 
fingers. This seemed to be odd since the temperature that day was 
ninety degrees. I saw the man often always wearing the same outfit. 
When we would pass on the sidewalk I would always avoided his glance. I 
always thought him to be an older man. The people who lived on the 
street didn't know where the man worked. But when he came home in the 
evenings he always drove a new car. Sometimes the cars were different 
colors, but they always looked new. The man never parked in the first 
parking place he came to.  The man pulled into a couple of different 
ones before he found the right on.  He would open the passenger door 
first, and then sat in the car smoking cigarettes before getting out 
and going into his apartment. I never spoke to the man. I had recently 
moved to town and was not used to odd behavior. One sunny morning I was 
sweeping the sidewalk in front of my apartment building. The man was 
standing on his porch smocking a cigarette, as I often saw him do. I 
suddenly heard someone say,  “How are you today”.   I looked up to see 
who had spoke to me. I then noticed how young the man was. He looked at 
me from inside the hooted jacket. He was fair skin with light blue 
eyes. I thought maybe that is why he wears the hood because of fair 
skin. He looked to be in his late twenties or early thirties the man 
continued to make conversation. You know, he said you have such pretty 
flowers in your yard. I first noticed them this morning I wish we had 
nice flowers in our yard. I asked him how long he had lived there he 
said a couple of months, I like it here he said, the rent is not high. 
Some of the tenants litter the hallway with beer cans and I don't think 
that's right. During our conversation he told me he worked as a 
maintenance person for an airline cleaning the planes after their 
flights. His mother and father lived about an hour from his work. He 
had one brother who never visits him he said sadly.  He seemed like an 
intelligent man, but different from the rest of society.  We talked for 
a few more minutes he went into his apartment building and I went into 
mine. I no longer felt frightened of the man next door. 


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