I usually hear things at night but I didn’t hear things last night. I didn’t hear a window being broken.

I didn’t hear a neighbor screaming for help.

##

The dry day’s burning heat had carried into a hot night. Ninety at nine PM, I kept the windows closed and the A/C humping. My wife retired to read at 10:30, leaving me to finish watching Inspector Lewis (consultant) and Hathaway on my own. A cat joined me, per the Cat Rules. I settled onto the recliner. Tucker curled up on my lap.

Lewis ended. Silence ruled as I considered, “What next?” Then I turned on an old sitcom. They usually knock me out faster than light.

Noise arose outside.

That’s not unusual. Nature abounds, and with it, raccoon skirmishes, deer foraging, cat fights, dogs barking, or an infrequent bear or cougar. Besides them, people often walk up and down the street, talking and laughing loudly. That’s what this kind of noise sounded like.

Tucker jerked his head up to look. I muted the television and listened. “It’s Barb,” someone shouted. “Help.” The voice was outside my window and rising.

Tucker and I leaped up. Someone hammered on my front door. I rushed out, flicking on lights as I went, unlocking the door and throwing it open to Barb, my eighty-eight year old friend and neighbor from across the street. Tears hiding in her eyes’ corners, voice quavering, she said, “A man broke into my house. He showed me his penis. I think he’s chasing me. I think he wants to rape me.”

##

My wife arrived from the bedroom. We hustled Barb in. I grabbed the house phone to call the police and headed outside, thinking, if he’s chasing her —

No one was outside. Dogs often bark well into the night. Nothing tonight. Reaching the police dispatcher, I stood on my front walk and began a dispassionate explanation of who I was and why I was calling, answering questions she injected them. As this transpired, astonishingly, a man left Barb’s house and trotted up the street.

I watched, torn between pursuing him and remaining where I was, deciding on the latter as I told the dispatcher what was happening. Moving out toward the street, I watched him go up into the darkness forty yards up the street. I swiveled back to my house. Our phone is VOIP and needs the Internet and the wireless connections. The dispatcher was telling me, “You’re breaking up, sir,” so I headed back for a better connection.

The streetlight up the street is motion activated. As I repeated where I thought the man went, I was looking in that direction. The streetlight came on. A second later, I heard running foot steps. Watching with amazement, I saw the intruder run back down the street and return to Barb’s house.

WTF?

I told this to the dispatcher. While doing so, the man left the house and trotted back up the street as I watched and relayed the information. He’d just reached the street light as a police car arrived. The dispatcher and I said good-bye.

By my guess about eight minutes had passed. How different it was from television and movies, the writer’s partition of me noted.

##

I told the officer everything and answered his questions. Another police car arrived. Spotlights illuminating the night, the second car headed down the street where I’d seen the runner disappear.

Amazingly, no other neighbors had opened their doors, turned on their lights or looked out. No dogs barked. No cars, runners or walkers passed.

The night remained quiet, save our ongoing drama.

##

The first officer took my statement, clarified information and then inspected Barb’s house, walking around it with a flashlight while I went back to my walk. Knowing the neighborhood configuration and worrying, I went into my backyard, turned on the outside lights and looked around. Finding nothing amiss in the backyard, I left the lights on. Returning inside, I checked our rooms and ensured all the windows were shut and locked. Then I visited with my wife and Barb. Barb was calmly telling her story. I headed back out.

The officer returned to me and asked to speak to Barb. I took him in. Barb gave her statement.

“I was in the bedroom, on my bed, with my check book, when I heard a loud noise. Not sure whether it was the television on or something else, I went out into the hallway.

“A man was walking down the hall toward me. He had his penis in his hand. I gave a little shriek. He said, ‘How would you like me to give you some of this?’ He waved his penis around. I looked him in the eye and said, ‘No, thank you. I don’t believe I would. I was married and my husband took very good care of that.’

“The intruder said, ‘Well, how about if you suck it for me?'” Barb said she replied, “I don’t want to do that, either.”

She said he then turned. Thinking he was leaving, she rushed about, locking doors. Then she heard a loud noise and realized he’d returned. Now feeling frantic and scared, she ran out the front door and across the street to my house.

##

They didn’t find the man. I guessed he was slender, wearing black shorts, white, with short dark hair, about five foot nine inches tall. I guessed he was in his twenties. Barb agreed.

While I stayed at home, the police, my wife and Barb returned to Barb’s house to determine if anything had been taken. Later reports said nothing was missing. A great deal of blood and broken glass was in the living room. He’d thrown a ceramic planter through a window and climbed through, cutting himself. Bloody palm and fingerprints were on several walls and surfaces.

The police recovered a cell phone from Barb’s backyard. Our theory is that the intruder left, realized he’d lost his phone, and returned to find it, but didn’t, fleeing again as the police arrived.

I’d called Barb’s daughter and told her what happened. She arrived about 11:10, about thirty-five minutes after it seemed to begin.

##

Barb accepted an invitation to stay the night in our guest room, and was shown to her room at midnight. This morning, talking over coffee at seven thirty, she was remarkably calm, cheerful and graceful.

It was all sobering, frightening, thought provoking. Barb realized she’d left her patio door unlocked, and that’s how the man entered. He’d later broken the window attempting to re-enter the house.

A lot of lessons were reinforced. Never let your vigilance lapse.

Never.