I need to tell you about the walls.
I've been trying to figure out how to bring this up for a while now because I know how it sounds. I know. I told Gigi and she gave me the look she gives me when she has decided to reserve judgment but wants me to know that judgment is available if needed. That look. So I've been careful about who I tell.
But you're here and you seem like a reasonable person and I think you can handle it.
There is something in the walls.
(I realize I'm burying the lede. The lede is: scratching sounds, inside the wall, multiple nights in a row, at 2 AM. I just had to explain the context first because otherwise it sounds like I'm overreacting. I am not overreacting.)
HOW IT STARTED
October 11th. 2:38 AM. I know the time because Dad's clock glows green and I looked at it right after the first scratch. (The clock is on the desk in the office. Dad sometimes leaves the door open. I was sleeping on the couch in the living room, which is my designated couch, which I am allowed to be on, which is different from the bedroom situation that I am not going to go into right now.)
I heard it.
Scratching.
Not from outside. Not from the Purina Pro Plan bag (I know that crinkle: specific, two-beat, different frequency entirely). Not from the radiator doing its radiator thing (the radiator makes a specific double-click when it kicks on, like pressure releasing, I know the radiator). Not the Eufy bumping its way around in the dark somewhere. This was scratching. Behind the wall by the bathroom. In the wall. Inside the wall.
I woke up completely.
I stared at the wall.
The wall stared back. Walls do this. They give nothing.
I waited. It happened again. Scratching. A pause. Scratching. It moved slightly and then stopped.
I told Dad immediately. I told him by going to the office doorway and meowing and then looking at him significantly. Dad said "hey buddy" and went back to looking at his glowing rectangle. This wasn't the response the situation called for, but Dad processes things slower than I do. I've made peace with this.
WHAT I KNOW SO FAR
I've spent a lot of time near the bathroom wall going over what I know.
Times: the sounds happen most often between 2 AM and 4 AM. (This window is already a complicated time for me for separate reasons that I can get into another time. The point is I'm often awake during it and that's how I know the timing is consistent.) They also happen sometimes in the early evening, around when Dad gets home from the office and starts food preparations. The sounds seem to increase when there's ambient noise in the apartment. This could be coincidence. I don't think it's coincidence.
Locations: primary scratching zone is the wall between the bathroom and the hallway, behind the middle section, roughly where the soap dish is on the other side. But I've also heard something from the section of the living room wall behind the couch. That one concerns me more because that's near where I sleep during the day. The idea that while I am sleeping on the Crate & Barrel couch something is on the other side of the wall doing something is deeply unacceptable.
This building is over 100 years old. I know because Mom mentioned it once. I think about this more than I would like to.
Sound quality: it's specifically like someone drawing a comb across a textured surface, then stopping. Then doing it again. It's dry. Not wet. I think this matters. I don't know why yet.
Pattern: the scratching comes in clusters. Three or four instances close together, then silence. It does not go on all night. Stops. Starts. Stops. If it were random, it would be more random. It is not random.
THEORIES (four of them)
Theory #1: a small animal.
The classic explanation. Mouse, rat, something of that nature. Gigi finds this most credible. She says I should "stop catastrophizing" and "accept the simple answer." Gigi has many virtues but she sometimes underestimates the value of not accepting the simple answer. Also: I don't know what a mouse smells like. I was raised indoors. I've never seen a street. If a mouse is in the walls and has a particular smell, I can't confirm or rule out that smell because I have no reference point. Adding to the list.
Theory #2: the pipes.
Okay so (aksjdfh) sorry. Paw on keyboard. I heard it again just now (3:21 AM, for the record) and startled and my paw hit the keys. I'm fine. The keyboard is fine. Everything is fine.
Pipes. Dad mentioned once that the building's pipes make sounds sometimes. Settling. Expansion and contraction. I've considered this. Pipes do not scratch. What I'm hearing is a scratch. Not a click, not a groan, not the radiator's double-click. A scratch. With the texture of something with fingernails or the equivalent. Pipes do not have fingernails. Theory #2 is weak. I'm keeping it in case I need to revise.
Theory #3: something else is in this building.
This is the one that keeps me up at night. More up than I would be anyway. This building has many units. Many residents. I know almost none of them. I've never been outside this apartment. I have no idea what has gotten into the space between the walls from one of those other apartments, from outside, from wherever things come from when you don't know where things come from. This is a gap I can't close from my position. I can only hear what comes through to our side.
Theory #4: it knows I'm here.
The sounds have changed slightly since I started sitting by the wall. They seem (and I want to be careful with this word) responsive. Like the scratching is aware that there is a listener on this side. Like whatever is in there is adjusting its behavior based on my presence the same way I adjust based on it.
I want to be clear about something: a sound you can understand is manageable. The Purina Pro Plan bag. The radiator. The Eufy. I know these sounds, I know what they mean, and so they don't bother me. But a sound you cannot locate, cannot explain, and cannot trace to a source — that is a different category of thing. That is the worst kind of sound. I've been trying to turn it into the first kind. That's what the investigation is.
This might be anthropomorphization. (I learned this word from a program Dad watches. It means attributing human qualities to something that doesn't have them. I think it also applies to cat qualities. I am anthropocatizing. I made that up. It's accurate.)
Or it might not be anthropomorphization.
Still open.
WHERE THINGS STAND
Last night: 3:18 AM. Scratch scratch scratch. Pause. Scratch. Moved to the left approximately six inches along the wall and stopped.
I sat there for forty minutes.
Then I had to do zoomies because the 3 AM zoomies are not optional and I can't explain it but sitting by the wall for forty minutes had built up a lot of energy that needed somewhere to go and the wall was not accepting any more of my energy so the hallway got it instead. (I knocked over the broom again. Scared myself again. I'm leaving this in the report because accurate documentation requires honesty about one's reactions to environmental stimuli.)
The point is I heard it again last night. The point is it has not stopped. The point is I am building a case.
I went to the closet afterward.
The closet is safe. I have checked the closet walls. The closet is quiet. It has Dad's hanging clothes and the heavy boxes, and nothing has ever come through from the other side, and I've been checking since March. It is the one place I am confident about.
If you hear something in your walls, I want you to know: you are not alone. I am also hearing it. I've been hearing it for months. I don't know what it is yet but I'm looking into it and I will report back and I just want you to know that some of us are taking this seriously.
Some of us are always watching.
aaaaaa
(Sorry. It just happened again. 3:24 AM. I have to go.)
Cosmo
Written at 3:24 AM
Currently: actively investigating