CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: . . . and Garbage Galore

There was no sign of impending removal from the #apartment. 

Wim was right; the place was an absolute mess, and there was food everywhere.

I gingerly picked up a paper plate that was lying upside-down on top of the fish tank.  Lots of disgusting #cockroaches scattered in all directions. 

Ugh! 

The paper plate had dried macaroni stuck to it.  I dropped it in a hurry.

The kitchen looked terrible.  The sink was full of dirty dishes encrusted with unidentifiable lumps; probably dried food, though it was difficult to tell because the lumps were hidden beneath a furry layer of whitish-turquoise mold. 

The stove was caked with its own crusty, burnt-on lumps and a layer of thick, brown grease. 

I didn't dare open the fridge or oven. 

An assortment of garments had been yanked half out of the washing machine and dryer.  More items of clothing were scattered all over the filthy floor or draped across the backs of chairs. 

The garbage bags on the back landing had increased in number and were now encroaching on the kitchen. Their suppurating contents were leaking out, so that each bag stood in its own little puddle of stinking liquid. 

The stench was palpable. 

 Cockroaches ambled about on every surface and wall, as if they had all the time in the world. 

I shivered in revulsion, suddenly experiencing a horrid, creepy sensation, as if the bugs were crawling all over me. 

Yuck!  I couldn’t wait to get out of there! 

"C'mon, Wim.  Let's leave," I said. 

He needed no encouragement.  Without further ado, we hot-footed it down the stairs.

Miz James was lying in wait on the front porch. 

"Found out something," she fussed importantly. 

"When Natasha weren't here, she were in jail.  Thas right.  J-A-I-L.  An' her kids have been taken away from her because she went to New York City one day and left them here alone.  Someone saw ’em wanderin’ the streets and called the cops."

I’d never met a real live jailbird before! 

"What was she in jail for?" I asked.

"Dunno," said Miz James, looking crestfallen that she hadn’t been able to discover this fact. 

However, she soon perked up again. 

"Apparently Natasha been inside a few times in the past coupla months.  Most likely for prostitution or drugs, I’d say.  That business still all goin' on.  People comin' an' goin'.  The guy working on the house next door told me he even saw some men comin’ in heah wit guns!"

"Ooh," I said.  "That's scary."

"Darn right, Stace.  You know there's a drug house down the street?  They found syringes.  I heard Natasha often took her kids there. 

"An’ that motel at the end of the street?  Well, most a their clee-on-tell are prostitutes and johns.  Don’t know if they got no air-conditioning there, or they don’ ’ave no more vacancies, but quite a few a those prostitutes bring their johns past here to the graveyard.  I bet you a lotta kinky sex goes on behind those gravestones, whoo-eey!”

Miz James blew a gusty sigh of disgust. 

“What kinda place is this to bring kids up in, you know?  This neighborhood . . . I tell you!”

Shaking her head, she went back into her apartment and slammed the door.

The next day, I was sitting in my office, chewing over the wording of a #City #Court #petition for #eviction, when Miz James phoned.

"Natasha returned a few minutes after you left yesterday," she panted.  "Think you'd better get over here."

"Why?"

"Got a notice for you from the #Code #Enforcement Office.  They giving you seventy-two hours to #fumigate the house and exterminate these 'roaches.  Natasha must a reported you to the authorities."

"Great," I sighed.  "She's retaliating because of the three-day notice I gave her.  She should be responsible for paying for the #exterminators.  Not me."

I called Schemmerhorn’s #building #inspector and explained the situation to him. 

He could see where I was coming from.  After all, he probably saw this kind of thing every day. 

I told him I was in the process of evicting my upstairs tenant and asked if the extermination could wait until after Natasha had vacated the premises.

"After all, what's the point in doing it now if she's still living there, making the same mess and inviting more infestation?" I suggested. 

A reasonable request, I thought.

 A young, go-ahead-sounding Mr. Bray sounded sympathetic.

“I agree," he said. "If it wasn’t so bad, I could let it wait until your tenant moved out.  However, I inspected the place myself, and it's one of the worst cockroach infestations I've ever seen.  I mean, I’ve seen a lot of them, and this?  This . . . is . . . bad!  You really have to deal with it immediately."

 I had been growing steadily more upset as I listened to Mr. Bray.  It just wasn’t fair!

"According to the lease, Natasha's supposed to keep the apartment clean and pay for any pest control herself if the #infestation is her fault," I tried.

Mr. Bray laughed incredulously. 

"Good luck with that!  I doubt you'll ever get the money from her.  No, really, you gotta get this done now, within three days, and show us proof that a reputable company has performed the extermination.  Otherwise, we'll appoint a company on your behalf and send you the bill. 

“And as far as your tenant continuing to create the filthy conditions that brought the cockroaches in in the first place?  Well, she's probably gonna keep right on doing that til she moves.  You'll just have to keep exterminating every month until she's gone.  Probably long afterwards, too.  'Roaches are very hard to get rid of." 

By this time I was practically sobbing.  I felt an intense hatred toward Natasha at that moment.

After we said goodbye, I sniffed hard and tried to compose myself enough to return to my desk. 

One of the law partners, a portly gentleman named Larry, tried to comfort me and offered to call the building inspector himself. 

I declined.  It wouldn’t be any use.  His hands were tied.

I looked in the Yellow Pages and called some #pest #control companies.  Apparently the whole #house would have to be #fumigated, and it would require three or more follow-up visits to get a good handle on the #extermination process. 

The least expensive company I could find was an outfit called Greatest Pest Control.  They charged $96.30 for the initial visit and $42.80 for each follow-up. 

Wincing at the cost, I arranged with Greatest Pest Control to provide the service and faxed proof of their hiring to the Schemmerhorn Code Enforcement Bureau.

Then I phoned Miz James and Natasha to let them know that the exterminators were scheduled for the twenty-ninth of that month. 

While I had Miz James on the phone, I asked her to write a letter "To Whom it May Concern," stating that I was a good #landlord and Natasha was a bad #tenant. 

I wanted to gather as much ammunition as I could to take with me to Court.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Floods 'n Bugs . . .

That week, we received two more phone calls from Miz James in the middle of the night.  Wim was not amused.  The police might as well take up residence in Manson Street – one or other of her irate #neighbors called them to complain about Natasha just about every night, it seemed. 

“The cops smelled marijuana a couple of times,” Miz James gleefully informed me when I stopped by.  “And you should have seen the state of that place!  The cops had to climb over about twenty garbage bags to get into Natasha’s apartment by the back door.”

“Why’d they go in at the back?” I asked.

“No one was answering at the front.  They probably couldn’t hear ’em knocking wit all dat racket goin’ on.  I let ’em in the back, downstairs through the basement.  Natasha’s side was open down theah, so they could get to her apartment that way.”

“And you know about the garbage bags how?” I questioned.

“Well, I had to show ‘em the way, didn’t I?” 

Miz James sounded somewhat defensive, though she was obviously enjoying the drama. 

“An’, boy, was I sorry I did!" she continued.  "That place stank to high heaven!  There was people hangin’ out all over, drinkin’ and smokin’.  The place looked a real mess, from what I could see.  Stuff everywhere.  The cops went on in to break up the party, and I came back downstairs.  I could hear ‘em, though.  Clomping about, gett’n all those people outta theah.”

I was still regretting renewing Natasha's #lease, when Miz James phoned one Saturday afternoon.  Breathlessly hyper, she could hardly get the words out, so extreme was her anguish.

"There's water everywhere!" she gasped.  "It's running down the walls in the hall and flooding my bathroom."

Not again! 

I promised Miz James that Wim would be right over.

At the mention of flooding, longsuffering Wim leapt up off the couch and whizzed off to Schemmerhorn, hoping to catch Natasha in the act this time.  He was gone only five minutes when Miz James called again, more distraught than ever.

"Is Wim coming?" she asked, frantically.  "It's still pourin' in here."

"He’ll be there soon," I told her. “It does take twenty-five minutes to drive over to Schemmerhorn, you know.”    

Wim came home an hour or so later, looking somewhat triumphant. 

"I got her," he announced.  "She had her washing machine going.  It was draining into the kitchen sink, but the drain was so blocked up with macaroni that the sink just filled up and overflowed.  Natasha wasn't home, but she came back a bit later, and, yah, she couldn't deny it this time!"

I listened gloomily to the list of repairs required to fix the damage to Miz James’ kitchen: new ceiling tiles, painting, carpet cleaning . . .

"I’d say there’s about $425.00 worth of damage there," Wim added.  "And that's not all.  Two doors are broken upstairs - the front door and one of the bedroom doors kicked in.  These people, I tell you!  The place is absolutely filthy, too.  Worse, this time.  There's food everywhere, and the back landing’s still full of garbage bags.  Of course, that nosy Miz James had to come upstairs and take a look.  Just get rid of Natasha, Stacy.  She’s no good."

I sighed.  "I guess you're right.  Last time I was there, though, her apartment was clean and tidy.  She does seem to go from one extreme to the other, though, in a short amount of time."

To further add to my woes, Miz James phoned a few days later.

"Now there are cockroaches crawling down my walls," she reported.

I gasped.  "Oh, no!"

"Oh, yes.  They're coming from upstairs.  Every time I cook, they appear.  It's disgusting!"

"It is," I agreed.  "I must admit I've never seen a cockroach, but just the thought is horrible enough.  I’ll get it taken care of, don’t worry.

"Oh, and you'll be pleased to hear I'm evicting Natasha."

Miz James breathed heartily into my ear.  “Good.  I don't know how much more I can take, Stacy, and I've only been here a month!"

I sat down at my computer, there and then, and composed a three-day #eviction notice to Natasha.

The next day, I plucked up courage and delivered the notice to her in person.  The street door was unlocked, so I went upstairs and knocked on the door at the top – a mere formality, since it was swinging lopsidedly from one broken hinge. 

When Natasha appeared, I handed her the eviction notice, briefly told her what it was, and retreated hastily down the stairs.

I turned my car round at the dead end of the street, and when I drove back past 51 Manson Street again, Natasha was outside the house flagging me down.  I reluctantly stopped the car and rolled down the window.

"What is this?" Natasha demanded, waiving the eviction notice at me.

"I told you,” I said.  “It's a notice canceling your lease.  You have three days to move out."

"I can't move in three days!  I don'  ’ave no money to move, neither."

"I'll see you in Court, then."  Being a fan of crime dramas, as you know, I'd always wanted to say that line to someone!   

"I'm evicting you," I finished.

Natasha muttered something unprintable beneath her breath, turned her back on me, and went back inside, slamming the door behind her.

Three days later, at 6:00 p.m., Wim and I drove up to Schemmerhorn.  Natasha was nowhere to be seen, though Miz James reported that she had left shortly before we arrived.

"Hmm, avoiding us, no doubt," I said.  "Come on, Wim.  Let's take a look upstairs."