Am I boring you? I have to ask that often when I'm speaking. If you don't know me well, it's one of my defining characteristics that I talk a lot. A lot. Sometimes too much. That's why this blog is great. Total self indulgence. No one has to read this if not interested, and I get to say whatever I want.
Back to my tale.
Let's see, Friday. Last official day of work at school (of course, I still have to go back today and finish cleaning my classroom). A friend of mine, a teacher's aide at school, just got into Northridge. We planned a surprise congratulations party for him; he thought it was just a little get together to celebrate being done.
So, we're eating, drinking, laughing, and the phone rings. It's Walter. I'm sure he can see the cars, and hear us, but he wants to know if I got the new rental agreement from the new property management company. Yes, I did. Did I get a rent increase?
Oh. Here's the sticky part. No. I didn't. I know I didn't because the landlady had told me the day before that although a couple of us were getting increases, I wasn't.
But, I said that I hadn't seen it with the papers, but that I hadn't looked at the papers too closely, and I had friends over right now. Could I go look for the papers? No, Walter, I have guests right now.
So he said he's "call me later." Later comes, my friends have left, and I'm cleaning up. I see his truck drive past my window, so I quickly turn off all the lights and my stereo. I sit in the dark for 20 minutes, waiting for him to walk by (he has to walk by my window to get to his place from where we park). Chicken shit, I know, but I just didn't want to deal with him.
After 20 minutes, I get tired of it (I'd make a terrible thief, or spy) and turn the lights back on. 3 minutes after, he walks by. Creepy.
But he doesn't call. Saturday morning, I'm up early, doing laundry. No one's around yet at 7 in the morning. At 8 I go out to put my stuff in the dryer, and don't get four steps past my door. Walter is out, working on his truck. Waxing it, actually, one of the things that Mrs. P. doesn't want him to do. I digress.
I see him and turn right around and go back into the house (chicken shit, remember?). He can't be out there all morning, right? I would have to pass by him to get to the laundry room, and I just don't want to talk to him. I stay inside for another hour, watching The Aviator (great film, by the way) and then go to my bedroom window to check if he's still out there. I don't open the window, I don't touch the blinds, just peek out; damned if he doesn't slowly turn his head around like a lizard and look straight at me. ARGH! He's too far away for me to really know if he saw me or not.
I figure this is ridiculous, and go out to the dryer. I waited so long, he was able to do a load of his own, and get his stuff in the dryer. Damn it. I'm walking back, head down so I don't have to make eye contact, and he appears right in front of me as I turn the corner.
"Hi Rebekah. Did you have a chance to see your new rental agreement?"
"Uh, hi. Um, actually no. I know where it is, but I haven't looked at it again this morning."
So far, I haven't lied. One thing about me is that I don't lie. I try to avoid things sometimes, but I don't lie.
"Well, could you look at it for me?"
"You know, uh Walter, I feel uncomfortable talking about this with you. I mean, I don't know what your rent is, or Leslie's, and I don't want to know either."
"I'm not asking about amounts, just whether or not you got an increase in your rent. We moved in about the same time, and I want to know if it's just me or not."
He has a point. But. I already know where this is going.
"Well, see, it's like this, I don't want to get involved in a problem you might be having. I have a good relationship with Mrs. P. If I look at that paper, and I have an increase, everything is fine, but if I look at that paper, and I don't have an increase, well then, I'm involved in something that is really between you and Mrs. P. Do you see how I feel?"
"Yeah, but it wouldn't be fair if you didn't get an increase and I did."
Oi. So I told him I had to go hang up my undies (can't be dried in the dryer, you know) and walked away.
It doesn't end there. (I'm thinking, maybe it should, as I read this, I'm even boring myself). But that's for the next blog.
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4 comments:
what a story...what a weirdo...and so the party's on, summer has begun. keep blogging, rhoda
I have to talk to him... he lives next door. I suppose I could pretend that I've gone deaf and blind...
Hey... that's an idea.
Talk to him like one of your annoying students. When he says "Rebekah?" you can say, "What now Walter?" with furrowed brow and long sigh.
And tell him that you don't know why, but your rent actually went down.
Oh wait, sorry that'd be lying. : - )
Hi!
Wow, looks like you've been given the "gift" of a living, breathing, writing exercise. Yeah, right, whoopee!
Do you think authors like Stephen King just make up characters like this? Uh, what I mean is... I don't think he's going to pull out a hatchet or... never mind.
I don't know if you're doing it on purpose, but you're really getting some good writing out of this guy. Rather than giving us an "off-stage" description of what he's like, the dialogue you've selected speaks volumes about him. He IS what he says, and how he chooses to behave. You're not just telling us he's creepy, you're revealing his creepiness.
Sorry, I had to move away from my writers group a year ago. I must be having delayed withdrawal symptoms...
So. Reality. What do you do about this guy? Does he still have the dog? Maybe she raised his rent for that reason. Maybe she's just putting pressure on him to choose another place to live.
But he's not a very self-reflective person. He’s passive-aggressive, asks leading questions to fish information without revealing his motive; and is literally sneaky. At the same time, his attitude indicates that he isn’t interested in how his behavior affects other people. In fact, he seems to enjoy making people feel annoyed and off-balance.
What motivates behavior like this? Maybe he’s just mentally unbalanced: anti-social, or slightly sociopathic. Perhaps he has a history of people doing terrible things to him, and it’s made him a little nuts.
You can choose to be direct if you think it will help. If he continues to fish for your opinion about how he is viewed by others, go ahead and tell him. “I can only say how I feel around you. I won’t guess what others are thinking. I don’t like that you come up so quietly and don’t announce your presence when you’re near me. It makes me feel like I can’t trust you.”
But why bother? You DON’T trust him, and it’s not likely that anything you say will cause him to change his behavior. He has an ingrained pattern of how he approaches the world, and even if he says he wants to know, he will probably deflect any information that doesn’t match his world view.
Probably the best thing you can do is set limits, and keep all conversation at a minimum. If he consistently presses you, just tell him he makes you feel uncomfortable, and he’s going to have to figure out why himself, but to stop talking to you. And keep a big butcher knife nearby at all times.
I’m kidding!
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