About this time last year, a mysterious chirp could suddenly be heard from where I stood within my kitchen. Was it coming from upstairs? No, it was still a distant echo as I stood in the hallway after a brisk hike up. Nay, it was now more distant, almost muffled. Rushing back down towards the foyer, racing against the sweet silence parsing the mysterious chirps, I was met with its most crisp and chilling chirp at my front door. The screen door, left to its lonesome apart from its sturdy wooden sibling had been tasked with allowing the passage of crisp and chilling autumn air, not this infernal chirp. Peering straight yonder, what did I see? The empty house across the street also bared a lonely screen door to make passage for the sweet autumn breeze.
'Of course,' I realized in that instant 'the real estate company managing the property hired several hands to gut and remodel that house. Surely their dust proof safety gear worn overtop their clothes, heads and faces is stifling. They must enjoy this cool, delicious air even more than myself. The battery should be replaced routinely this day. The chirp will be gone before dusk.'
Alas, I endured the chirp for many hours through the day, and then through the evening, and then through the night. I saw no workers or signs of their ongoing labors all those hours. Not when I passed to and fro with the laundry. Not when I ventured forth to retrieve the daily correspondence deliveries. Not when I greeted my husband at the door. Not any of the many times I passed by that half naked front door. Never a soul to be seen cross the way, only a mysteriously persisting chirp that followed me to any and every crevice of my home. So haunted by the chirp were we, that the wooden door and all of the windows had to be closed all day and all night, even if only to muffle that horrid chirp.
It was on the third or fourth day of not a thing changing, save for an increase in the frequency of the insipid chirps, that I could tolerate no more of this. I rang up the phone number provided by the real estate company, and was answered by an elderly woman with a kind lilt in her tone.
"Ma'am," I pleaded gently into my phone "could you please make sure that your hired hands bring a nine volt to the unoccupied dwelling at 123 on This Street? The echoing chirp, it follows me all the day and all the night. It is akin to Chinese water torture in my ears, and it cannot be escaped. It's haunting grows harsher each day, for at least three days now."
The real estate secretary knew of which house I spoke, yet began searching current documents with a curious confusion in her voice that was most contagious.
"123 This Street has occupants now, as of four days ago. Their moving truck must not have come yet. I'm sure their nine volts must be stored away among their things."
I stood there in the foyer, rigid and cold. Chirp. I thanked the secretary quietly and ended our call. Chirp. Opening the wooden front door to the cool, crisp October air, I immediately saw the evasive new neighbor struggling out of her sedan. Chirp. A voluminous, dark and hulking thing she was, with an infant and two toddlers in tow. Chirp. It was then that I knew this was going to be an awkward greeting. Chirp. But I really ought to get to baking something to make it less so.
CHIRP.