CHAPTER FORTY-SIX: The Sarcastic Shoebox

A few days later, Diane’s #caseworker, Mrs. Shoebox, phoned from #D.S.S.

I took the call with no anticipation of the ill to come.  After all, the paperwork was in, and Diane was all set to move into my upstairs #apartment on May 1st.

"Ms. Scuttlebutt? This is Mrs. Shoebox," a crisp voice announced at the other end of the line.

"Yes, hello."

"You sent us a rental certificate for Diane Tanner?"

"Yes?"

"You say in your letter that Social Services should have a #landlord statement already, but I’ve not received one."

A glimmer of doom began to hover at the edge of my horizon.

"Wh . . . what?" I stammered.  "The landlord statement was personally handed in in March!"

"Not to me, it wasn't, and there isn't one in the file."

"I'll make a call right now, and get back to you," I told her.

I disconnected and dialed Giselle's number, since her cousin Diane didn’t possess a phone.

Giselle confirmed that she had indeed gone down to Social Services with Diane on Monday morning in the fourth week in March.  From there, however, things began to get a little sticky.  Apparently, Giselle had waited outside whilst Diane had gone in, so she hadn’t seen to whom Diane had handed over the form.

"She was in there quite a while, though," Giselle assured me, "so she didn't just drop it off with nobody."

I called Mrs. Shoebox back and told her I’d verified with Giselle that Diane had personally delivered the landlord statement to Social Services on Monday morning, the fourth week of March.

"If you still can’t find it,” I added, naively, "She can always bring in another one, right? First thing in the morning, if necessary."

"S’too late for that," Mrs. Shoebox replied. "The rental vouchers have already been prepared." 

"So, can't you put a hold on it?" I asked.  "Just until we sort this out?" 

As if realizing that here might be a landlord who wasn't going to give in without a fight, the caseworker’s cordial telephone manner began to slip slightly. "Nutt’n to sort out," she said with a hint of truculence. "I can't stop the voucher going out. We need to pay Diane's #rent for May to her current landlord.  He'd need at least a month's notice from Diane that she was vacating the apartment, and he hasn’t notified us that that's the case."

Boom!  That was it on my end.  No more Mr. Nice Guy!

"Since when does a landlord have to notify Social Services that his tenant's moving out?" I demanded.  "I tell you again.  Diane gave notice to her landlord the last week of March but ended up not moving out in April because he complained she hadn’t give him enough notice.  Now he’s had over a months' notice, but because your department lost the landlord statement, I have to suffer by losing out on another month's rent?  Since the vouchers don’t go out til the last Thursday of the month, and that is still a few days away, can you not put a stop on it?"

"Madam," came the reply. "It is too late to stop the vouchers.  There is no landlord statement in my file, and I can't just just accept your word for it that it was, in fact, handed in.  If it was not delivered to me per--son--all--y, it does not count.  You cannot leave it with the receptionist or anyone else.  It…has…to…come…to…me!"

“You’re killing me," I wailed, trying not to sound too whiny. "One: Diane handed in the landlord statement. Two: the apartment has been inspected for the security agreement. Three: Mr. Catcher can verify that I told him Diane was moving in on April first. And, four: I sent you the rental certificate signed by the building inspector. What more could I possibly do?"

"You shouldn't take your tenant's word for it that she handed in the landlord statement," Mrs. Shoebox intoned, stubbornly.  "You should have called to make sure we received it."

"Oh, and I suppose I should hold Diane's hand every time she wants to go to the bathroom, too?" I retorted. "There’s no reason why she wouldn’t have handed in the landlord statement.  As I already told you in writing, she's desperate to move because the house she's living in is infested by rats, and her landlord refuses to do anything about it.

"I, on the other hand, am a decent landlord.  I keep my house nice, the apartment's newly painted throughout, I don't have rats, and yet, where are my rights?  Practically every tenant I’ve ever had has screwed me one way or another: moonlight flits while owing rent, tearing the place apart, messing up my life and getting away with it. And now you tell me landlords have to notify Social Services when their tenants are moving out?  Most of the time, the landlord doesn’t even know his tenants are leaving. Not until he finds the apartment empty and trashed, or gets a notice in the mail that Social Services is canceling the rental payments. Why do #tenants have all the rights and get away with shit like this, while the landlord has no rights--except, apparently, Diane’s current #slumlord. Why are you protecting him?"

During this verbal diatribe, Mrs. Shoebox had made several attempts to interrupt with a "but" this or "but" that, but, damn it, I intended to be heard, and nothing was about to stop me!  Each time she tried to break in, I simply raised my British-accented voice another notch and spoke faster and faster.  She didn't stand a chance. Those hateful elocution lessons I'd been forced to endure in my youth were coming in handy right now.

Of course, my verbal spate couldn’t last forever and the curmudgeonly caseworker was determined to have her revenge.  "As I told you before, Ma'am," she said, oh-so-politely when I eventually paused for breath, "the vouchers have been pre—pared al—ready. Plus, I can't discuss what may have happened in the past because I wasn't involved then."

"Okay, fine,” I said, “but how about this? Even if the voucher does go out, you don't have to send the rent check out after it, do you? I mean, if Diane's landlord signs the #voucher and returns it for payment when Diane is no longer living in his #house, that would be #fraud, wouldn’t it?"

"Again," Mrs. Shoebox said, her voice betraying the beginnings of desperation, "as I told you, Diane's landlord is entitled to rent for the month of May because, as far as we're concerned, he has not been given enough notice."

"And I told you," I persisted, "that Diane’s landlord has had one month and one week of notice. The only reason Diane is moving out in May now is because he kicked up a stink when she told him, in the third week of March, that she was moving out on April first.  Again, I'm being penalized because you lost a piece of paper!"

We both paused in mutual acknowledgment of the seeming impasse.

"Did she give her landlord written notice?" Mrs. Shoebox finally ventured in an “Ah-hah!” voice.

"Probably not," I said. "These Social Service types never give notice in writing.  At least, none of my tenants ever have.  I’m lucky to receive any notice at all."

"Well, then, Ma’am, there's nothing I can do," Mrs. Shoebox announced, triumphantly. “You’ve got no proof.”

With an exasperated “Rrrrrrgh!” I muttered a grudging “Goodbye. Thanks for nothing,” and slammed the receiver down in its cradle but not before Mrs. Shoebox snuck in a final “Have a nice day,” her words literally dripping with sarcasm.

I phoned Giselle.

"That’s ridiculous!" she exclaimed when I reported my conversation with Mrs. Shoebox.  "I've never given landlords written notice, and I often drop off papers at D.S.S. with the receptionist."

Not willing to concede defeat quite yet, I telephoned the office of the D.S.S. Commissioner. Unfortunately, he was out but his secretary suggested I speak to Mr. Catcher in the Fraud Department.  She put me through to his extension.

Mr. Catcher came on the line and I explained everything to him. “It's like I’m beating my head against a brick wall," I finished.

Mr. Catcher was his usual sympathetic self, especially since he remembered my telling him in the middle of March that Diane was moving in on April 1st. His advice was for Diane to go ahead and move in.  At least then I would have more ground to stand on in the eyes of D.S.S.

“I can’t say when you’ll get your rent for May, though,” he continued. “If her landlord signs the voucher and sends it in, we'll try to get the money back, but it’ll take a while.” Mr. Catcher then suggested I call a Mrs. Forester—a more senior member of the caseworker department—to see if she could offer some assistance.

After thanking Mr. Catcher and bidding him farewell, I called Mrs. Forester and received a cool reception.  Mrs. Shoebox's supervisor was obviously aware of the situation and simply repeated, practically verbatim, what her underling had already told me.  The fact that Mr. Catcher was on my side swayed her not one little bit. 

I’m sorry to say, I even tried turning on the waterworks.  "I've been screwed so badly for so long by D.S.S. and your horrible clients,” I sobbed pathetically. “The bank’s threatening to #repossess my house because I'm behind on my #mortgage, and …” 

My tears had no effect, but Mrs. Forester did concede that she would investigate the file further to see if there was anything she could do.  I suspected this meant she’d just repeat the same old shit but on a different day.

"Okay, but pleeeeease call me?" I wailed.

"I will," she promised.  But, of course, she never did.

I determined to lay out the whole story in a letter and deliver it personally to Mrs. Forester the next morning.  If I got to the Department of Social Services by 8:00 a.m., I’d have plenty of time to get to work by nine o’clock.  I spent my lunch hour composing the letter.  After much editing and rewriting, I figured it was about as good as it was going to get and printed the final copy.

Bright and early the next morning, I drove to Schemmerhorn, arriving a few minutes after 8:00 a.m. Mrs. Forester wasn't there yet but after searching through my purse for guns and other weaponry, the security guard suggested I drop off the letter at the Commissioner's office where Mrs. Forester was located.  I wasn’t too keen on the "dropping off" idea, but at least it would be inside the Commissioner's office.

The Commissioner secretary was a very friendly, pleasant woman with a Southern drawl. I gave her my letter and stressed that it was very important that Mrs. Forester get it as soon as she came in.  The woman smiled and assured me she would take care of it.

I walked around the outside of the building to the parking lot.  Once inside my car, however, a thought struck me. Why not give the Commissioner a copy of the letter too?  It might give me an edge.  I took out my copy marked "File Copy," crossed out the word "File," and added "cc: Commissioner" at the bottom.  Then I jumped out of the car and hurried back around the corner to the main doors of D.S.S.

Halfway there, I had a horrible thought.  Did I just lock my keys in my car?  A frantic search through pockets and purse revealed an absence of keys.  I ran back to the parking lot and peered in through the window of my car.  Sure enough, the keys were lying in plain sight on the passenger seat.  Naturally, both doors were locked.

I muttered an expletive, then added, “But first things first,” and hurried back to Social Services.

"I'm so glad you came back," the secretary gasped when I darted into her office, having succumbed to another search for the M16 I habitually lug around with me.  "Ms. Forester called. She won't be in til next week.  Her mother-in-law just died."

"Oh, I’m sorry," I said, attempting a rueful pout of sympathy.  “I just came back to give the Commissioner a copy of the letter I wrote to Mrs. Forester, but maybe he can deal with it now?"

"Sure," smiled Ms. Friendly. "He's in a meeting at the moment, but I'll be sure to give it to him just as soon as he's done."

I thanked her warmly.  "Oh, and I'm afraid I've done a very stupid thing. I’ve locked my keys in my car."

"Oh, dear," Ms. Friendly fussed, bouncing to her feet. "Let's see if one of the guys opposite can help you with that," and she escorted me across the hall to "Fraud and Investigations."