Almost Next To Be Murdered

Almost Next To Be Murdered

He seemed ordinary. Harmless, even. The man in the flat upstairs smiled politely in the corridor, sometimes held the door for me. He never played music, never laughed, never had visitors. Just that low hum from his flat — a fridge, I thought, or maybe a fan. No one ever went inside. Not neighbours, not cleaners. No one.

He was tall, tidy, careful. He carried his shopping slowly, bags swinging without a spill. I told myself men like him were rare. Safe. Trustworthy. I often lingered in the corridor after passing him, studying his movements, trying to see anything unusual. But there was nothing, only ordinary gestures — polite nods, soft smiles, the faint sound of a hum behind closed doors.

Then the sirens came. Wailing, urgent, shaking the windows with their noise. My door rattled in its frame. I opened it just in time to see officers storm the stairs. He didn’t run. He didn’t argue. He simply stood at his doorway, watching, calm. They pushed him back inside. An hour later they took away the body bags containing 5 womens chopped up bodies.

later, it was my turn to give a statement. My stomach twisted when the police laid photographs in front of me. All of them were of me. Shots I never knew had been taken: me in the corridor, me unlocking my door, me outside, sitting at a garden table. That last one stopped me cold.

How long had he been watching me? How close had I come? The officers didn’t hide the truth, I was next.

I was told the day after the arrest the full horror. He had done it for years. Women chosen at random: a smile, a glance, sometimes nothing at all. He took them upstairs, killed them, cut them into pieces. His flat was a morgue. A massive freezer crammed with human flesh, the hum of machinery masking the unimaginable. Every drawer, every shelf, lined with evidence of crimes no one could have imagined.

The day I found out, I packed a bag and left. I went back to my mother’s house and never returned. He was given life, his name splashed across headlines, mine was kept out of the public eye. But I knew. I was almost number six.

Neighbours whispered in the stairwell. Everyone claimed they’d suspected nothing. Everyone said they had passed him in the corridor, smiled back at him. Ordinary kindness had covered something monstrous. He was the perfect neighbou. Helpful kind, a very sweet man to all who knew him.

They said, the neighbours I bumped into when in town, the flat upstairs went silent. No hum. No smell. No footsteps overhead. But the photo stayed burned into my mind. I could see the garden table, the way the light fell, the angle of the photograph and the terrible thought that had been fixed on me. I thank god for letting me live and protecting me.

Even now, I can’t stand the thought of that place. In my sleep, the door creaks open, shadows shift, knives glint. I feel the rush of cold air, as if he’s still there, waiting, counting, watching. Taking my photograph.

I will never forget him. The nice man. The smiling monster. The neighbour who almost made me his next victim. The evil one from the flat above that planned to cut short my life.

No one expects evil to hide behind such ordinary faces. But sometimes, it does. And I live with the knowledge that I was almost next to be murdered. It’s a thing that I can either live with or let it destroy me.