CHAPTER FORTY-NINE: Ceilin' and Cussin'

Soon after Daddy and Brenda had returned to the sunny climes of South Africa, Giselle called me at work.  "I just wanted to let you know," she said, "that my son’s bedroom ceilin' has fallen down on top of him, and I'm goin' downtown to report it to the authorities."

"Wait, what?" I said, surprised.  "Is he okay? Why are you reporting it, though?  Wim will come and fix it."

“It ain’t safe, and they should know.”  Before I could answer, Giselle hung up in my ear.

I called Wim at his maintenance job at Vacationer's Inn.  He promised he would go over to Schemmerhorn straight after work.

When I arrived home that night, Mummy told me Wim had gone to Schemmerhorn at about 4:30 p.m. but no one had been at home.

"He did peer in the window, though," she said. "The ceiling fell down in two parts. One was resting on a computer-game-type thing.  He doesn't think it would have hit Giselle's son if he was in bed, but it had nothing to do with the walls he just put up."

Giselle called later on, very upset.  "I phoned you this morning at ten o'clock and Wim didn't even come!" she yelled into the phone.

I tried to remain calm.  "Giselle, he went to your place straight after work but you weren't home.  He did look in the window, though, and saw the ceiling."

"He can't see anythin' through that window,” Giselle retorted. “The ceilin's in the way."  She'd  obviously forgotten that Wim was six foot four and could easily see in the window.

"Anyway," she continued. "How come he came so late? This is serious.  I had to take my son to the hospital an’ now he's scared to go in his room again. Wim has to come over now. I reported it to the building inspector, and they came and looked at it and said you should’ve got a #permit to put those walls up."

"Not for #renovation and #repair."

"Uh, huh, yes you do.  They'll be sending you a notice pretty soon 'bout the violation."

"Okay, whatever. Wim will call you when he gets home."

"Fine, but he needs to come first thing in the morning and get this mess straightened out!"

"He won't be able to til he’s finished work.  He just started a new job.  He can't just take time off --"

"I don't give a f___ what Wim's got.  I want him ova heah first thing!" Giselle screamed hysterically.  "This is all Wim's fault! He was the one put them walls up an’ did a f__g job!  The ceilin's just layin' theah, and . . ."  A string of expletives followed, every other word beginning with the letter "F."

I held the phone away from my ear while Giselle ranted on.

When she eventually paused for breath, I broke in, ever so calmly.  "Does it make you feel better to swear at me like that?"

"Wh . . . what?  Let me tell you somethin'!  It's the #landlord's responsibility to provide a safe place to live.  Well, this ain't safe!  I tol' you, my son's scared to death to sleep in that room. Ever again!"

"Maybe he should see a psychiatrist," I suggested.

Giselle fairly exploded.  "A psychiatrist!  My son don' need no psy-chi-a-trist!  He needs a safe place to live!  You in big trouble, Lady!"

"Why am I in trouble?"  Still oh-so-calmly.

"Wh . . . what?  Because-the-ceiling-fell-down!"

"So, we'll fix it.  It's an old #house.  These things happen."

"Yeah, but it's Wim's shit job putting the walls up that made the ceilin' fall down."

"He says the walls have nothing to do with it."

"Well, he's lying to you, Stace, 'cause they do."

"As I said," I repeated, "I will have Wim call you when he gets home."

"Fine!" And with a few more choice expletives, my angry #tenant hung up the phone.

By now I was shaking uncontrollably.  Mummy tried to comfort me, but I was seeing visions of red dollar signs and lawsuits floating before my eyes.

Wim came home and called Giselle, who treated him to another incoherent, expletive-interspersed barrage of dialogue.

He told her firmly that he would be over at five o’clock the next evening and no sooner. After warning her she'd better be there this time, he hung up the phone and turned to me.

"Agh, she's just trying to scare you," he said in his usual, dismissive manner.  "Being all dramatic and hysterical.  Her son didn't get hurt.  She's always taking him to the hospital for migraine headaches."

"Yes, well, she's probably going to sue me," I said. "You know what people are like … any chance to make a quick buck. Anyway, I have to go pack."

The next day I escaped to a rural college, an hour’s drive away, looking forward to a weekend of poetry and creative writing and my very first stay in a college dorm.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: The Flimsy Fence

YEAR TWO

House Account:  $1,338.00

#Mortgage:  $513.48 - $547.29

The letter had little effect on Ray's children's behavior, but Miz James was somewhat mollified when Wim erected a fence so that only she, Princess and Desmond could use the back yard.  She grumbled a bit when Ray asked her if he could host a barbecue in the back yard for visiting friends and family on Memorial Day, but as she wasn't going to be home that day, she grudgingly agreed.

The fence wasn’t anything special: just wire chain-link with posts every few feet.  In no time, it was drooping tiredly between its supports as the neighboring children on the right side of the house – with whom Ray's kids seemed to be very friendly – yanked and leaned on it with a vengeance.

The owner of the next-door house, where said children resided on the second floor, was in the process of gutting the first-floor #apartment in order to #renovate it.  As a result, an alarming heap of trash and rubble was fast accumulating in the alleyway between the two #properties.  Miz James gleefully reported that "them kids" were playing in it and strewing garbage left, right and center.  This fact was borne out when I received a violation notice from the #Code #Enforcement #Bureau ordering me to clean up the mess in 72 hours, or else.  It wasn't even my mess! 

Indignantly, Wim and I went up to Manson Street and piled the mess onto the #renovating #landlord's side of the alley.  Then I wrote a stern letter to Ray, telling him to stop his children strewing trash all over the place.

The rumblings of discontent kept sounding from Miz James until they finally came to a head.  Ray had been living upstairs for five months when Miz James called one night to report that "them kids" had stolen her son's bicycle from her side of the basement, and that she had called the police.  The bike was found a little while later but, nonetheless, the fact remained that Ray and co. had violated their shared access to the basement. 

Thanking my lucky stars that I had only given him a six-month #lease, I wrote to Ray to tell him I would not be extending it and that I wanted him out of the apartment by the end of the month.  I heard not one word of argument from him.  Maybe he was used to being #evicted.

No sooner had I given Ray a month's notice, than Shirley telephoned from next door.  Her buddy Miz James had informed her that Ray was moving out, for which she was undeniably very grateful.  Shirley told me that her friend Bryan was once again interested in renting the place.  Apparently, his job was going well, and he could now afford the #rent; especially since the Department of Social Services had approved his girlfriend Mamie for partial rental assistance.

"Have Bryan call me," I told Shirley.  "It would be nice not to have to advertise and try to find a decent tenant.  He's a friend of yours, so I guess that's a pretty good reference, right?"

"Right," Shirley agreed.  "It'll be him and Mamie and their two young children.  I'll tell him to call you."

Bryan telephoned that afternoon.  "So, I hear you're looking for an upstairs #tenant again.  I'm still interested."

"Yes, I heard,” I said.  “By the way, why do you want to move, and when?"

"Soon as possible.  We’re living underneath Mamie's sister at her mom's right now.  Too close to family is like, you know . . ."

"I get the picture.  How about rent and #security?  The rent is four-seventy-five, as you know . . ."

"Social Services will pay most of it," Bryan told me,  "but we want to pay the security deposit ourselves, rather than do it through D.S.S."

"Okay," I agreed – stupidly, as it later turned out.  "When can we meet to sign the lease?"

We arranged that I would go over to their apartment in Schemmerhorn that evening. I found it quite easily.  Mamie, the girlfriend, turned out to be a pale, thin slip of a girl with a shy smile.  Whilst they perused lease, I looked around.  The room was neat and tidy and looked clean.  The two toddlers were nicely dressed.  All in all, it seemed as if Bryan and Mamie would be good tenants.

The next day I called the building inspector to inspect the upstairs apartment for the rental certificate.  Then I called Mr. Catcher to come and determine how much D.S.S. would pay for any repairs that needed doing.  Unfortunately, his next available appointment was not until the middle of August.

Meanwhile, downstairs, Miz James's lease was due to expire at the end of August.  Always diligent, she called me towards the end of July.

“Can I stay a little longer?” she asked, “I’m planning on buying a house within the next few months.”

I would be sorry to lose her – she wasn’t a bad #tenant – but I had to tell her I really didn’t want to look for a new tenant in the winter.   I knew from experience that not many people moved at that time of year.  Of course, the Jacuzzi was a good selling point, but I figured it would be easier to find a tenant in the late summer or fall.    I determined to place an advertisement in the Schemmerhorn Gazette, listing the apartment’s features and keeping the rent at four seventy-five per month.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: Racial Relations

I arrived at the Manson Street house slightly early on Friday the 28th, but the rattletrap was already waiting for me, loaded to the gunnels with boxes, bags, and children.  It seemed to groan beneath the weight of several mattresses tied onto its roof, and the leftward list was more pronounced than ever.

Ray and children erupted from the car and eagerly watched me unlock the door.  We went upstairs, and after a quick look round I handed the keys to Ray and left them to it.

By February 22nd, I still hadn’t received a rental voucher from the Department of Social Services.  I heaved a gusty sigh when I heard that Ray’s case worker was none other than Mrs. Planet.  She must have moved up to the “M” section of the alphabet.

"Did you send in a rental certificate?" Mrs. Planet asked, when I finally reached her.

"Nooooo."

"Gotta have a #rental certificate from the City," she announced in a rather triumphant-sounding tone, "before we can send out vouchers for rent."

"What is a rental certificate, how do I get one, and from which department?" I asked.  "And how come D.S.S. didn't tell me they needed one before this?"

"Dunno.  Probably because you never had a new D.S.S. tenant before?  But call the building inspector. Send us a rental certificate, and we'll send you a voucher for the #rent."

I called the Schemmerhorn building inspector’s office.  It was much easier getting through to their ofices than to the caseworkers at D.S.S.

"Sure," they said.  "Come in, pay a ten-dollar fee for each #apartment you want inspected, fill out a form, and we'll call you to set up an appointment."

I asked if they could mail me the form to fill out and I would mail it back to them with a check. 

On hearing this request, the friendliness slipped slightly.  This was most irregular.  They didn’t normally do that.

I explained that I worked in St. Albans and couldn’t make it to Schemmerhorn during office hours.

Well . . . in that case . . . they supposed they could.

The form arrived two days later.  I filled it out and mailed it back with a check for $10.00.

The #building #inspector – not Mr. Bray this time, but an equally young-sounding, go-ahead man by the name of Ron – called a couple of days later.  I made an appointment for him to meet Wim at the #house the following week.  Unfortunately, this appointment had to be scheduled for the day after Mr. Catcher was inspecting the apartment for the #security #agreement.  Wim would be making two trips to Schemmerhorn, but it couldn’t be helped.

The #inspection by Mr. Catcher went off without a hitch.  The apartment was clean and safe.  As for Ron, the building inspector, Wim and he got on like a house on fire.  Recognizing kindred spirits in each other, they no doubt had fun discussing building techniques and #codes.  I sent the resulting rental certificate to Mrs. Planet at the Department of Social Services, poste haste.

It took about one month for Miz James to start complaining about Ray.

"That #tenant of yours!" she puffed into the telephone.  "I was hoping it was going to stop after a while, but it hasn't."

"What hasn’t?" I asked.

"His kids make fun of my kids all the time, callin' them racial names an' stuff.  Every time they go out, they have to hear it from them kids.  They're always outside, cussin' and messin' up the yard.  I wan' a fence put up so my keeds can be in the yard by theirselves."

Coincidentally, just that past weekend, I had taken a class on ethics-in-the-workplace and watched a dated but very interesting video documentary about an experiment in discrimination.  At an all-white school in an all-white town in the South- or Mid-West – I don’t remember which – the pupils had literally never encountered a black person, and one of the teachers decided that her class of ten-year-olds could benefit from experiencing first-hand what it was like to be discriminated against. 

At first, the children thought it sounded like a fun exercise, but they soon realized it was anything but.

The teacher sorted her students into two groups: the blue-eyed group and the brown-eyed group.  The first day, the blue-eyed children were informed that they were superior to the brown-eyed ones and that brown-eyed people were stupid and lazy.  Unlike the blue-eyed children, the brown-eyed children weren’t allowed to have seconds at lunch or to play for an extra five minutes at recess.  Any mistakes the brown-eyed children made in their lessons were pointed out to the blue-eyed children and ridiculed.  They were also made to wear collars so as to be easily identified as brown-eyed children from a distance, so that the blue-eyed children could easily avoid them.

It was amazing how quickly the blue-eyed children turned into utterly hateful, spiteful creatures.  They were soon taunting the brown-eyed children and making their lives a misery.  Several fights broke out in the playground.

On the next day, the roles were reversed.  The brown-eyed group was now superior to the blue-eyed group.  While taking some joy in now being the favored ones, the brown-eyed children were not as horrid to the now be-collared blue-eyed children as the blue-eyed children had been to them.  This was obviously because the brown-eyed children remembered what it had felt like to be discriminated against themselves. 

Another interesting point was that performance scores in reading and logic were better when the children were deemed superior than when they were considered inferior, thus proving that self-image can affect performance.

Anyway . . . "I'm sorry to hear you're having some trouble with Ray's kids," I told Miz James.  "I'll certainly write a letter to him today about the racial remarks.  Also, I'll talk to Wim about putting a fence up in the back yard.  I guess that would be a good idea, anyway."

"Okay," Miz James said in a grudging manner.  "But tha’s not all."

"Oh?"

"Those kids of Ray's . . . they take up the whole front porch.  I come home an' have to climb over them to get to my front door.  It's not right when a person can’t even make it to their own front door without fallin’ over people.  Maybe you should think about putting up a fence dividing the front porch, too."

This was a bit much.  "I don’t know about that,” I said, “but, as I said, I'll speak to Wim."

"And," Miz James continued, "the older daughter . . . Jennie?  She's real trouble.  Comes home on the weekends and raises all kinds a hell.  She's like fourteen goin' on twenty, that one, if you know what ah mean?"

I tried to sound soothing and understanding, but was finding this increasingly more difficult to do.  

“I'm sorry to hear that, Ms. James.  She's a problem child, you know?  She’s run away from home a few times.  That's why she has to live in a children's home."

"Tha’s all very well."  Miz James sighed heavily into the phone.  "But she's trouble an' I don't see why we should have to put up with it."

I broke in as she paused for breath.  "I will write to Ray and try to set him straight.  If the #racial remarks don't stop, maybe you could sue.”

"Humph."  Miz James didn’t sound at all mollified.  “An’ another thing before you go.  The water heater downstairs is leaking.”

Fantastic.  What did those run?  A few hundred dollars?  I added it to Wim’s to-do list.

Miz James finally let me go. 

With a sigh, I hung up the phone and started working on a letter to Ray.

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.