What's the Matter You?

I have an friend I hadn't seen for a while.  I saw some differences that puzzled me.  First of all, I was aware that he had started sleeping at completely different times than most people, like staying up all night and sleeping from 8 am to 4 pm..  Well, I figured it was a sleep disorder.   Most people don't do that.  

After talking to him a few times, I felt there was more to the story.  He was off kilter somehow.   I wondered if he was suffering from food intolerances.  Well, probably.  McDonalds I supposed.  Was he schizophrenic?   He just wasn't running on all four cylinders.  What had happened?   He looked a lot like the guy in the photo.   

I had thought in the past that we were on good terms, friends.  Now he just didn't seem to be connecting that way.  He didn't smile. No sense of humor like he used to have.  He didn't seem to enjoy my presence.   I was seeing red flags.  Why?   I wondered if he had heard some weird gossip about me.  

Well, maybe the years have gotten to him, I thought.  He was about 45.   Not so old, but sometimes there are health issues that can show up.     

I spoke to my hair stylist about him.  She asked me if I was afraid of him.  "Yeah, sort of, I guess."   Goodness.  I remembered one friend that I had wondered about in a similar way a few years ago.  Suddenly one day, Jim was reading the paper and noticed that there was an obituary for him.  "Oh no.  No, no, no.  That has to be a mistake."  No mistake.   We attended his funeral.  I never actually found out what happened.   

And then the bizarre.   I started being woken up at night by banging on the walls of the house, very loud, like with a sledgehammer.  Bam bam bam bam.  Always four times.  Starting around 3 am.  Then I would fall back asleep.  Then again, four times.  And this would go on every few minutes.  I kept ignoring it and falling back asleep.  Until finally it was right next to where my head was while I slept.  Finally I was awake.  It was 4:30 am.  So what else should I do?  Call the sheriff?  Well, surely, I thought, whoever is doing that will get tired of it.  And I had an idea who it was.  The "night owl."  I checked the next day for damage, but didn't find any.  It happened a few more nights.  I suppose I felt brave since I am armed.  For some crazy reason, it just didn't disturb me, other than interfering with sleep.  I just supposed it would run its course    

Oh, one other wild thing about him.  He was sitting in the living room, and I was walking into the kitchen, when something that looked like a cat rushed me at the door of the kitchen.  But there was no cat.  ??  I looked back at him.  He looked at me oddly as if he had sicced an animal on me.  OK.  I'm not afraid of hexes or siccing some spirit on me, because of the protection of Jesus.  But maybe I had imagined this, I thought.  I mentioned it to Mom.  "I've seen your cat," she said.  

Mom mentioned a strange dream about someone coming in the house like they owned it.  She had had it several times.  

Finally in January it started getting dreadfully cold at night.  And the banging stopped.  I thought it might start again when the weather warmed up, but so far so good.   

I did have one idea that occurred to me about what caused the change in my friend.  His expression reminds me of meth face.  

End of story I hope.