My Neighbors Love Stealing

My neighbors across the hall had a nasty habit of stealing.

This included my food deliveries, my shoes from the cabinet, and even my clothes drying on the rooftop. Nothing was safe from them.

I had enough. One day, I placed a pair of shoes borrowed from my friend, who was battling an extreme case of athlete’s foot, outside my door.

Not long after they stole them, they came banging on my door in the middle of the night, furious about the outbreak on their feet. They even filed a complaint at the hospital where I work.

I was so furious that I invited a few homeless patients to move in.

A muscular man with HIV, an elderly woman with syphilis, and a young man with severe mental health issues became their new neighbors.

The thieves could not handle it and begged the landlord to evict them.

However, the joke was on them. My family owned the entire building. If anyone was leaving, it certainly was not me.

It was midnight. I was sound asleep when loud, aggressive pounding on my front door rudely woke me.

Groggy and annoyed, I barely cracked the door open before a bucket of foul-smelling water splashed all over me.

The icy shock jolted me awake. The stench made me gag before I looked up in fury.

Standing in front of me were my neighbors from across the hall.

The face of Vera Morri, an old woman, twisted into a horrifying scowl as she planted her hands on her hips and shrieked. “You wretched girl! How dare you try to kill my precious grandson! Let me tell you something, if anything happens to him, I’ll kill you!”

Next to her, her son, Gregg Morri, a beer-bellied man holding the empty bucket, glared at me with rage. “You left those shoes that were infected with athlete’s foot at your door on purpose, didn’t you? You’re trying to make my wife lose the baby! You better compensate us!”

Behind them stood a woman, Kerry Morri, whose face flushed and contorted as she desperately tried to bend down to scratch her feet. However, with her swollen belly in the way, she could not do so.

In the end, she simply glared at me with resentment.

I gasped for air. I was trying desperately to suppress the urge to throw up. My chest heaved as I pointed a trembling finger at them. My voice was shaking with rage. “You… How dare you throw filthy water at me! You thieves got what you deserve, and you have the nerve to blame me for it? Do you have any idea…”

Before I could finish telling them to leave my property, Vera suddenly took out a toilet plunger and lunged at me with it.

Her eyes bulged with fury as she dropped into an exaggerated fighting stance. She shook the plunger wildly and jabbed it toward me like a weapon while yelling, “Back! Back! Back! You wretched girl, how dare you insult us! I’ll teach you what real manners look like!”

For a moment, terror overtook my anger. Shaking all over, I slammed the door shut and locked it as fast as I could.

Behind the door, I could hear the plunger thudding against the wood and their deranged voices hurling insults.

“Get out here and pay us, you little witch!”

“Just you wait! We’ll make your life hell! I know you work at Riverstone Hospital!”

“You’re a venomous woman who’ll never have kids, and if you do, they’ll be deformed little idiots!”

…

I leaned against the door. My whole body was trembling with rage. A surge of fiery anger burned through me.