CHAPTER FIFTY: The Dismal Dorm

My weekend course and fellow students were great, but my dorm experience left a lot to be desired.  There was definitely material here worthy of a journal entry. I began writing notes as events unfolded and read them out to the group as we gathered for a summing-up session on the last day:

Arrived at the dorm Friday evening in trepidation at the prospect of meeting roommates: Dezzie (a little older than me) and Sherry (some years younger).  In order to check in, security guard requests we sign forms. On perusing said forms, we discover that the college is not responsible for injuries sustained through negligence of college staff.  Show this clause to security guard. He's never read the form but agrees we shouldn’t sign.

First of all, none of the doors are labeled. We try keys in each door we come to.  Finally find one that fits. Dorm encompasses a ‘sitting area’ surrounded by five bedrooms inhabited by plastic-clad bunks, several species of bugs and creepy crawlies, and a central bathroom-cum-shower.

Toilet is blocked.

Roommates leave to find coffee.  I remain to tackle Security about the toilet.  The office is empty, except for young girl in orange tee-shirt who gives me a form to fill out for maintenance.  

No good. Need toilet fixed tonight!

Like getting blood out of a stone:-

“Where’s the security guard?” 

“Making his rounds.”

“Can you call him?”

“He doesn’t have a phone.”

“Does he have a radio?”

“Yup.”

“Where is it?”

“There.” (Indicates radio on desk)

“Can I call him on the radio?”

“No.”

“Can you call him on the radio?”

“Yup.”

Girl calls Security on said radio. Reports blocked toilet.  Security heard to say, “We don’t unblock toilets. Tell them to buy a plunger.”

Visions of making trip to unfamiliar nearby town to purchase plunger at late-night hardware store or supermarket, the whereabouts of which are unknown, float through my head. We paid eighteen dollars for this!

“Just get him down here,” I order imperiously.

“Can’t,” says the girl. “If he doesn’t want to come down, I can’t make him.”

I persist. 

Finally Security says he’ll open up the third floor so we can use a bathroom there.

Return to the dorm.  Suddenly spy plunger in shower room beneath sink.  Ah hah!  Try plunger. Toilet works. Hooray!

Sit down in 'sitting room' to await return of coffee-searching roommates. Have ample time to survey the scene.

It’s not pretty: couch and chairs covered in suspicious stains. The carpet is gross. Afraid to remove my shoes, lest something should crawl across my feet. Oh, for a bright, clean motel room! 

Where are those dratted roommates?  It’s lonely by myself.

Suddenly, all hell breaks loose. Seeming hordes of elephants are thundering up the stairs. Floorboards protest overhead. For a women’s dorm, those sound very much like male voices.

Security guard arrives, no doubt bracing himself for female histrionics. Moustache twitching, he listens to my explanation that the toilet is now unblocked, thanks to the plunger.  Asks me if I’m from England. 

Sit down to wait some more and write it all down. 

Sherry and Dezzie arrive with welcome coffee.

One o’clock a.m., getting ready for bed.  Dezzie’s looking through a photo album in her room. Suddenly there’s a security guard in the 'sitting room,' striding through our palatial suite.

Dezzie, being scantily clad in preparation for shower and bed, asks him what the hell he thinks he’s doing.

“Security,” he announces.  “I come through every night.”

Recovering from being momentarily stunned, Dezzie mentions the bugs.

“Yup, there’s critters,” comes the cheerful refrain.

I exit the bathroom to find a tall, gangly security guard, complete with hick accent and too-long trousers drooping over his shoes, lounging in the hallway. Hands on on hips, he's informing Dezzie of his custom to walk through the dorm every couple of hours.

Aghast at this, we gaze back, mouths agape.  Is this guy for real?

Jokingly, I remark, “Well, don’t jingle your keys too loudly when you walk through in the middle of the night, will you?”

To which he replies, “No, but they can’t help making some noise." Holds up a large bunch of keys for our inspection.

" 'Cause, if we hadn’t known you’d be coming through, we’d be pretty scared,” I continue. “I’d have to come out here with my karate chop.”

“That wouldn’t scare me,” the hick guard laughs, preparing to leave. “I’ll be back around three o’clock … two more times tonight.”  He departs, leaving us still wondering whether he’s serious about the nightly walk-throughs.

Dezzie checks with the noisy upstairs neighbors, who confirm this fact. 

“He’s one weird security guard,” a student pipes up. “Lock your bedroom doors.”

Great.  We have to lock ourselves in to protect ourselves from roaming security guards.  What next?

Six, a.m..  A blaring siren awakes us from our fitful slumber.

BAAP!  BAAP!  BAAP!

What’s going on? 

Dopey-eyed we emerge from our respective bedrooms into the 'sitting room' to have eyeballs assailed by searing flashes from a fire alarm. 

Hastily get dressed. 

Go downstairs to gather with other students in the frigid outdoor air.

False alarm.

Return to bed. 

BAAP!  BAAP!  BAAP!

Not again!

It stops.

Silence.

Then, BAAP!  BAAP! BAAP!

Someone comes to inform us there’s an issue in “B Block." They’re trying to fix the problem. 

We sit, hands over ears, waiting it out and popping headache pills.  Dezzie’s pain is over her left eye.  Mine’s over the right.

Three minutes later, blessed silence descends once more.

No point going back to bed. It’s almost time to get up. 

Oh, God!  Wish we’d stayed in a motel!

                                                             * * * * * * * *

I drove home in the middle of a torrential wind and rain storm. It was raining so hard that all the traffic on the two-lane country road was forced to pull off to the side to wait it out. Sheets of water cascaded down the windshield as powerful gusts of wind buffeted my little Geo Metro from side to side. 

When the storm moved on, I continued home, trying to decide whether I felt refreshed or exhausted after my dorm experience. As I pulled into the driveway, Mummy came running out, practically sobbing and wringing her apron. She engulfed me in a big hug and didn’t seem to want to let go. 

“I thought you were dead,” she gulped.

“What?”

“We were watching TV, and a message flashed across the bottom of the screen saying a tornado had just passed through Bellingham, just about the time you left. Oh, I’m so glad you’re safe!”  She engulfed me in another mammoth hug and rained kisses on my cheeks.

“So that’s why it was raining and blowing so hard,” I said. “We had to pull off to the side of the road. An actual tornado, though?  Cool!”

“Not cool at all,” Mummy retorted, indignantly.  “I was very worried.  Come in and have dinner.”

Over dinner, I asked Wim about the status of the ceiling situation in Schemmerhorn.        

“ ’S’okay,” he drawled.  My friend Tim came and helped me.  He’s an expert in ceiling installation, so, between the two of us, it only took an hour or so. Ya, Giselle was hovering around, taking photos and grumbling, going on about how we’re gonna be in trouble for not getting a #permit, blah, blah, blah. We just ignored her. There was a basketball lying on the floor. I reckon Giselle’s son was bouncing it against the ceiling over and over and that's what made it fall down.

The next day, as Wim and Tim were finishing up the job, Giselle was still pondering painting the walls, which she hadn’t yet gotten around to doing.

"Trouble is, they get dirty so quick from the kids puttin' their hands on 'em all the time," she moaned.

Wim suggested she paint them white and let the kids fingerpaint them. Giselle thought that was a great idea and actually cracked a smile.

On Monday, I received the promised notice from the #building #inspector advising me I needed a permit in order to install the ceiling.

With his usual "Agh!" Wim picked up the phone and called his building inspector buddy, Ron. When he told him that he and a ceiling installation expert had already put up the ceiling, Ron said that was fine and confirmed that a permit was not required for renovating walls. "Whoever inspected the fallen-down ceiling shouldn’t have talked like he did with your tenant.” he added. Then he waived the need for the ceiling permit and agreed it was doubtful that the fallen ceiling had had anything to do with the walls because they'd been "solid as a rock" last time he checked. 

During my lunch hour a few weeks later, I delivered a brand new, huge recycling bin to 51 Manson Street. As Marvin handed me that month's rent, he told me they’d be using the recycling bin for papers and would need two more bins for plastic and glass. I sighed and promised to deliver them soon.

Meanwhile, #Social #Services had suddenly decided to increase Giselle's #rental assistance by $200.00. Giselle told me to keep the extra money to help pay off her debt to me, which was a nice surprise; I’d expected that debt to drag on forever.

When I delivered two new, plastic garbage cans the next week, the ever-present Marvin again mentioned the fence. 

"As I told you before, get me an estimate," I told him as I got into my car.

                                                              * * * * * * *

Every couple of months, Wally the realtor had been sending me printouts of market activity in the surrounding #neighborhood. #Selling #prices ranged wildly and didn’t seem to correspond with the condition of the #properties: A #house listed as being in “very good condition” sold for a measly $50.00, while a house in “poor condition” went for $4,500.00.  The “fair” to “very-goods” ranged from a measly $5,250.00 up to $45,000.00. Only two were listed as being in “excellent condition” and sold for $39,000.00 and $45,000.00  My house was listed as “very-good.” 

The printouts were always accompanied by a form letter, the final paragraph stating in big, bold letters: REMEMBER: Price is the most critical factor in getting your #home sold.  Buyers always buy what they perceive as the “best buy.”

I was gloomily perusing the report for August when Wally phoned.  “Someone’s interested in your house,” he announced.  “They’d like to view it in a few days.”

“Really?” I said, excitedly.

“Yup.  Can you arrange it with your tenants?”

“Oh, er, yeah. I guess they’ll know the house is for #sale now, won’t they?”

“Can’t be helped,” Wally said. “If your #tenants are going to be absent, you’ll need to get the keys to me and advise them there’ll be strangers walking around their #apartments … supervised, of course.”

"Okay." 

Yes!” I yelled as I put down the phone.  “Oh . . . just someone interested in buying my house,” I explained as some nearby secretaries were startled out of their word-processing reveries by my outburst.

I put off telling Giselle and Diane the news that night and was glad I did, because Wally informed me the next day that the prospective buyer had decided on another #property. 

Bummer.

“It’s coming up four months now,” the realtor said. “You wanna renew your listing?”

“Yes.”

“You know, it might not be a bad idea to think about reducing the price.”

I sighed.  “What would you suggest?”

We dropped the #listing price $5,000.00 to $54,900.00.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR: Nose-Wear and Fashion Flair

Since receiving Mr. Catcher’s rejection note regarding Mamie’s damages, I had been going to Manson Street just about every evening after work to paint the #apartment.  Now that I was somewhat more experienced at painting, it didn’t take me as long as the last time.  The fact that I was less painstakingly pernickity about painting the trim probably had something to do with it too.

My sister Frederica sometimes accompanied me when she wasn't too tired after a day of entertaining my mom's summer camp kids, so at least we were able to spend some time together catching up on news.  

It was now Sunday: a week to go until August.  Despite adding the words “Money Back” to my advertisement in the Schemmerhorn Gazette, I was beginning to resign myself to the prospect of another month without #rent, when a girl named Kristina called to inquire if the apartment was still available.  I told her it was, and she asked if she could come along, right now that morning, to see it.

"Sure," I said.  "I can be there in half an hour."

Leaving Mummy and Frederica busily sewing a long mouse tail, stiffened with handfuls of glue, onto a leotard that Bronwyn was to wear in one of the camp’s end-of-summer performances, I drew up outside number 51, just as two very dark-skinned girls rode up on bicycles. 

One of them mumblingly introduced herself as Kristina.  She was short, stocky, and wore her hair in lots of tight braids.  The other girl, younger, slimmer, but equally be-braided, was her sister, Priscilla.  Both sported shiny nose rings.

I showed them around the apartment.  It looked spic and span, with its white walls and newly- painted floors.  There was, however, just one problem.  I’d painted the wooden floors a rich chocolaty-brown color and mistakenly used wall paint instead of floor paint.  As a result, our shoes stuck to the painted floorboards, coming away at each step with a squelchy, ripping sound, like pulling Velcro apart.  Luckily, Kristina and her sister seemed not to notice the sound effect, though their heavy tread made the ripping sound louder.  They quickly walked around the apartment, impressed by the size of it.  Meanwhile, I was trying to size them up.  They seemed pretty innocuous.

When we got to the kitchen, Kristina announced, "Okay, I wan' it."

"Really? Well, I'll need to get some information from you first." I said. "First of all, why are you moving?"

"I got me two keeds, and where we live, they don' 'ave no place to play that's safe.  Our street's pretty bad, you know?"

"I see.  Well, you know your children would only have the street to play in here too?  At least we're on a dead end, and it's pretty safe, judging by the number of kids who're always playing outside."

"I see that," Kristina agreed.

"How many would be living here?" I asked.  "And how would you be paying the rent?"

"Me and muh keeds and sometimes muh sister'll be livin' heah.  See, our parents died, so my sister, she live mostly with muh uncle.  Social Services will pay the rent."

"All right," I said.  "It's almost August.  Will you be able to move in by the first of the month?  Don't you have to give your landlord notice?  And what about D.S.S.?"

"Yeah, it might be too late, but I still wanna move in heah.  Your ad said there’d be some money back?"

"Yes.  I'll take two hundred dollars off the first month's rent, so you'd only need to pay me two-fifty for August."

"Okay, I can handle that.  Muh brother can gimme the money."

I pushed away the thought that I had gotten into trouble before from accepting tenants on the spot.  I was getting desperate again, though, and Kristina and her sister couldn’t be as bad as Ray and Co, could they?  

"Would you be prepared to sign a lease?" I asked.

"Sure, okay."

I quickly went over the lease I had brought with me, just in case.  Kristina nodded at all the clauses I read aloud to her, such as the tenant being responsible for keeping the place clean, refraining from illegal activity,  etc.  When we had read through the whole thing, she signed on the dotted line, and I congratulated her on becoming the new tenant of Apartment #2, 51 Manson Street. 

Priscilla looked dully on during the whole process, only piping up at the end. 

 "How long is the #lease for?"

"A year."  

She grunted and resumed her bored expression.  Neither of the sisters seemed to possess an overabundance of personality, but that was okay: dull, boring #tenants were good.

"Would you mind coming downstairs to meet my other tenants, if they're home?" I asked.  

Giselle and her boyfriend, Marvin, knew just about everyone in the #neighborhood.  I thought it might be a good idea to run Kristina by them, just in case.

Giselle proved not to be at home, and Marvin was just getting into his car outside.  With a quick wave of his hand, he roared off down the street.  Oh, well.

I drove home, rejoicing in the fact that I had a new tenant.  My money worries should be over for a while.  I pushed aside the little kernel of doubt that was niggling inside my head, telling me I shouldn’t have signed Kristina up so fast without at least checking her #references first.  However, I had come to the conclusion that a #landlord would say anything to get rid of a problem tenant, so references weren’t very reliable, anyway.

A few hours after I arrived home, the phone rang.  It was a girl called Charmayne Brown and she wanted to know if the apartment was still available.  I told her I had just rented it.

"Aw," she moaned.  "My aunt lives right next door.  I really wanted to move in there."

"Oh," I said.  "Well, uh, I suppose I could still show you around.  You never know.  It might fall through with this other girl."

"Yes, please," Charmayne said, eagerly.

"You want to come along?" I asked Frederica.

We drove over to Schemmerhorn after lunch.  The floor was still sticky, and the first few steps we took into the apartment still sounded like ripping Velcro.

I looked at Frederica, she looked at me, and we burst into helpless giggles.

"Come into my parlor," Frederica croaked in a horrid imitation of Cruella Deville from The 101 Dalmatians.

Shortly thereafter, Charmayne arrived.  She was a short, heavyset girl with shoulder-length, mousy brown hair and a stud in her nose.  She was accompanied by a taller, heavier girl.

"This is my friend, Maureen." Charmayne waved at the other girl.  "We're going to be roommates."  

Maureen had a short bob of thick, black hair cut into the shape of a bowl sitting on her head.  It did nothing for her.  She also sported a nose stud.  Nose wear seemed to be the "in" thing nowadays.  I’d seen two nose rings and two nose studs in one day.

The girls noticed the stickiness of the floor but didn’t remark on it.  I tried to tread very lightly, so as to minimize the Velcro effect as much as possible, but the heavy-footed Charmayne and Maureen more than made up for my light tread.  We sounded quite spectacular as we ripped our way from room to room.  An equally heavy-footed Frederica very kindly remained in the living room, while I showed the two girls around.  

They liked the place and were very keen to take it.  We ended up in the living room by the mantelpiece, where I’d left some blank application forms.

Charmayne had been telling me how she lived with her parents and was mother to a little boy.  She had just found a job and wanted to live on her own.  Social Services would cover part of her rent because of her single mother status.  Maureen also had a job at a nearby supermarket and would help with the balance of rent.

"Why don't you fill out one of these, just in case?'  I handed an application to Charmayne.  "You know, I did sign a lease with the girl I showed around this morning, but now that I've met you, I think I'd rather have you as tenants, instead."

Charmayne was busy filling out the application form, when a skinny youth sauntered in through the front door and nonchalantly joined our little group.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"Stan . . . Charmayne's brother," he answered casually around a wad of gum.  "I live next door."

"Oh.  With the aunt?"

"Yeah, that's right," he drawled.

All Stan had on was a pair of black cotton shorts and sneakers.  The top of his jockey underpants showed above the waistband of his shorts. Stan obviously thought he looked "real cool,” judging by the number of times he glanced down at his shorts to check that an inch of white underpant was still evident.  If either had ridden up or down, he'd hastily make adjustments. Neither Charmayne nor Maureen seem to find the garb of Charmayne's brother unusual.  

I glanced at Frederica.  She was standing rooted to the floor, a pained expression on her face.  I looked away quickly, lest we make eye contact and both break out into giggles.

Charmayne finished filling out the application and handed the form back to me.  I told her I would give her a call in a day or so.

When the girls and Stan had gone, Frederica thankfully shifted position, to the sound of much ripping and tearing.

"Oh, that's better!" she gasped.  "I couldn't wait for them to go. I was stuck to the floor, and I didn't like to move because it'd make too much noise."  

She bent double and laughed heartily, shaking as she let out suppressed mirth.

Giggling, myself, I waited for Frederica to recover.  When she was able to breathe again, we locked up and left.

Giselle met us on the porch and motioned us back inside.

"Just thought I'd let you know," she said.  "They make a lot of noise, those people next door, and those girls is two of 'em."  

Giselle looked so forbidding that I began to be turned off at the idea of Charmayne and Maureen as tenants.  Any hint of trouble was enough for me, and coming from the mouth of my downstairs tenant, who'd have to live beneath the people she had warned me about . . . 

"An' you showed the apartment to some other woman too?" Giselle went on.  "My boyfrien', he says you don't want them people living' here, neither.  They're big drug dealers."

"Which woman," I asked.

"The one wit a whole mess a braids."

The image of Linda Fletcher popped into my head.  Could she be the one Giselle meant?

"Are you sure she had braids?" I asked.  "Was it someone who came a while back?"

"Dunno.  My boyfrien' just said you don' want that girl wit braids what came here."

For some reason, I didn’t even think of Kristina, who definitely did have braids.  

I talked things over with Frederica on the way home.  

"What did you think of Charmayne and Co?" I asked her.

"Seemed okay."

"But what about what Giselle said, about them making a lot of noise?  It sounded like they'd be a rowdy bunch."

"Well, if Charmayne and Maureen have to party, they can do it next door, can't they?  Which would you rather have?  These two, or the black girl you saw this morning?"

I considered the question in an agony of indecision.  Finally, when we were almost home, I decided.

"I'll keep Kristina," I announced.  "What would Giselle think if I  decided to rent the place to Charmayne, after what she had just told us?"

"I can't say," said Frederica.  "I didn't see Kristina, but I think those girls would've been all right."

"My instinct is telling me to go with Kristina," I said.  "I've gone against my instincts before and gotten into trouble, so this time I'm going with my gut.

We drove for a few minutes, looking at the view.  The road followed the river for quite a way before turned away from it at an old, unused, brick railway station.  The train tracks had been replaced by a bike path.

“What did you think of the girls' nose studs and Stan's pants always falling down?” I asked after a while.

“Pretty funny,” Frederica said.  “It's starting to become the ‘in’ thing in South Africa too."

“Really?  Well, speaking of fashion statements, I guess I shouldn’t be too critical.  I never told you my geriatric ballerina story, did I.”

“No, you didn't.  Do tell?”

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE: The Sales Spiel

The next day, Mummy received a flood of calls about the #apartment; but no one wanted to see it when they heard it was in Manson Street.

Almost without exception, the calls went like this:

Brrring! Brrring!

"Hello?"

"Hi.  I'm calling about the apartment in the paper?"

"Oh, yes?"

"Can you tell me a bit about it?"

"Well, it has a large living room and dining room, three bedrooms, a large kitchen, a bathroom, and a small room leading off of the living room which can be used as a study or something.  It also has a balcony and an attic."

"Sounds nice.  Where is it?"

"Manson Street."

"Oh. Er, thank you."  Clunk!

or

Silence . . .clunk.

The calls kept coming in, but still no one was interested when they heard where it was.  Mummy eventually resorted to tactics aimed at enticing people.

To the question of “where is it?” – or even beforehand – she would launch into a spiel that went like this:

"Oh, it's a very nice street."  Which I'll admit was overdoing it a wee bit.  "It's on a dead end, so there's no through-traffic.  Except for the prostitutes and their johns, that is  “The street's full of kids riding bikes."  Not adding that they were mostly young hooligans.  "It's a friendly neighborhood."

A couple of people sounded slightly interested at this, although I think my mother’s gushing tended to make the callers a little suspicious.  And of course their suspicions were confirmed when they heard the words "Manson Street."

“I’ll really have to visit this house, of yours,” Frederica said, after overhearing some of Mummy’s more creative descriptions and the disinterest that followed. 

Later on, Mummy resorted to, ". . . Manson Street . . .," and before they could get a word in edgeways, " . . . it used to have a bad name but the #neighborhood's really coming up, you know."

Still no success. 

I couldn't understand it.  To my knowledge, nothing particularly bad or, should I say, worse than usual had happened on Manson Street since I bought the house. Why the bad name and the stay-away-at-all-costs reputation?

After a few more days, Mummy phoned me at work.

"A prospective #tenant just called who sounds really interested, even when I told him the #house was on Manson Street," she said.  "I've got the number.  I think you should call him."

"Right."  I took down the number and called right away.  A man answered the phone, and I told him who I was.

"Oh, yes," he said.  "Do you know if it's near Thomas Street, ‘cause my wife has some friends living there that she likes to visit."

"I'm not sure," I answered, "but we can look on a map."

We made an appointment for Saturday morning. 

Saturday dawned.  Allen went to Schemmerhorn with me to keep me company.  We arrived a half-hour early, complete with brooms, mops, and vacuum cleaner, to give the place a quick once-over before the people arrived.

We drove up to the house to find the street door to the second-floor apartment standing wide open; a couple of scruffy little girls and a boy were darting in and out of the doorway.

"What the . . .!" I exclaimed, leaping out of the car next to where Shirley was chatting to the neighbor from across the street.

"Who's in the upstairs apartment?" I demanded, rather unfairly, of the poor woman.

Poor Woman looked slightly taken aback.  "I thought you knew," she said.  "They moved in on Monday.  You mean, you didn't know?"

"No, I did not!"

"Well, Jerry and me, we thought, gee Anastasia rented that place real quick.  I mean, we only saw you last Saturday, and they was in on the Monday."

"We'll see about that!"

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT: Beauty and the Boxer

I was about to bid Miz James farewell, when we heard a tremendous crash from upstairs and the raised, angry tones of Bryan berating Mamie about something.  The verbal barrage went on for quite a while, interspersed with more thuds, thumps and crashes.  It sounded as if all hell were breaking loose up there.

"Does this happen a lot," I asked Miz James who didn’t seem fazed by the noise..

She raised an eyebrow.  "Uh, huh.  He has a temper, that Bryan.  I dunno how Mamie takes it."

            The third week in August, several people called to inquire about the apartment.  I told three of them that I would be at the house that Sunday between ten o'clock and two o'clock.  I duly arrived at the house on Sunday morning and sat on the front porch in one of Miz James's garden chairs to await the prospective tenants.

No one came. 

The ever-present Miz James, however, kept me well regaled with all the doings of the neighborhood until I could have screamed.  Bryan periodically exercised his lungs upstairs, throwing around his weight and God knew what else besides.  During a break in the yelling up above, I tentatively rang the doorbell.  Mamie answered the door with what looked like the beginnings of a black eye.  She came out to sit with us for a while.

"You can't go on like this, girl" Miz James told her, and for once I agreed with her. 

"I know," Mamie said.  "I'm going to give him the shove one of these days."

Finally, close to two o'clock, just as I was getting ready to leave, two young women walked up the street to the house.  One of them introduced herself as Giselle.  With light, coffee-colored skin and delicate features, she was quite a beauty.

Giselle introduced the other woman as her sister Barbara and told me that just herself, her two children and her dog would be living in the apartment.  I remembered my mother had taken a call from a woman who had seemed very anxious to know if I rented to people with dogs.  I didn’t see why not.  If it was a choice between having a #tenant with a dog – in this case, a boxer – or no tenant, the tenant with dog won hands down.

I showed Giselle around the #apartment, and she liked it very much.  She seemed calm and collected and also told me she was quite handy around the house.  She wouldn’t need to call me for minor things, such as a leaky faucet or a blocked toilet. 

“Who will paying the rent and the security deposit?” I asked.

“The Department of Social Services will handle the security and pay part of the rent.  I’ll pay the balance,” Giselle said.  “I get disability payments for my son, too, so don’t worry, I can afford the #rent.  Can you fill out the landlord statement, in case I get the apartment?”

“Okay, and here’s an application form for you to fill out too.”

After Giselle had filled out the application and left, I turned to Miz James. "Well, she seems okay."

"Ah, ha!  You see?  There you go already," Miz James remarked.  "Taking the first person that comes along.  That's not the way to be a #landlord."

"I know," I admitted, "but she did seem nice, all the same."

That night, I called the phone number for Giselle’s landlord, which she had written down on the application.  Her current landlord gave her a good reference, which included positive words like "clean" and "respectable."  I phoned Giselle afterwards to tell her she could have the apartment, dog and all.  She promised to deliver the landlord statement to Social Services the next day.

The following morning at work, I arranged with the #building #inspector and Mr. Catcher to inspect the downstairs apartment for the #security #deposit and #rental #certificate.  They certainly were getting a lot of business from this particular landlord.  Wim resigned himself to another trip to Schemmerhorn, but at least I had managed to coordinate the appointments with the building inspector and Mr. Catcher for the same time, so that Wim would only have to make one trip.

            Miz James moved out the last weekend of August.  This was fine by me because it gave me a couple of days to get the apartment ready for Giselle.  The day she left, I handed her a $475 dollar check for the security deposit.  She had been a good tenant overall, and the apartment was in good condition. 

Once she’d departed, however, and I had a chance to really look around at a year’s worth of wear and tear, I was disappointed at how much painting had to be done.  I spent the next three nights painting the worst rooms and touching up others.  At least Miz James had done a thorough job of cleaning – the stove and refrigerator didn’t need any work, and the semi-gloss kitchen walls had been scrubbed clean of grease.

The same weekend that Miz James moved out, someone vandalized the graveyard behind 51 Manson Street.