Slumming It - X
31 Dec-3 Jan:
Carl brews ayahuasca for 12 straight hours, enough to fill 40 mason jars with brown goop. It is conjectured the fumes from this activity, coupled with months of intense DMT abuse, are what set him off. He is partying New Years Eve with Matt and the neighbors. Then he is sitting, pensive. They ask him to go get cigarettes for them. Minutes later, they hear roaring outside. When they go down to investigate, he is harassing passers-by. They coax him inside, and he is manic. Everyone says he is acting crazy, and are instantly labeled "intolerants" and "close-mindeds" who are against him. Carl is awake the next 4 days without food, becoming increasingly manic.
4 Jan:
I return home. There is barf in my sink, barf in my toilet, barf all over my trash can, my liquor and soda is all drank, my food is gone; all owing to Matt the leech. My furniture is upset, my laundry detergent has been poured on walls and random scattered clothing, my printer has been used to make color copies of craziness; all owing to Carl. I assume nobody is home, and I go to my room. Minutes later, I hear somebody creeping about, and it turns out to be Carl sneaking around like a ninja. I quickly realize he's crazy and use manipulation to earn his trust and friendship. I retire to my room to try to get away from his incessant blather. SWAT team comes. We are both released. Carl insists he wants to get away from the hostile neighbors, who he is sure called this in, as soon as possible. The police tell him he can't move out until he's slept the night. I go to bed and sleep, despite being able to hear Carl outside shouting at strangers and wrangling them into philosophical debates.
5 Jan:
Carl's door is closed and his "important stuff" is gone. His car is gone. I assume he moved out in the night. I get a call at work from Alex, the apartment manager. I tell him everything I know (nothing new), which he later relates to the police. I come home, and things are as they were, except: a closet door is opened, the one that holds Carl's hunting rifle. The rifle is still inside. Also, Matt's XBox 360 is missing now. Matt is still missing, and at the time I think it's because he knows I'm pissed that he trashed the place. It later turns out that he's hiding out at his mother's because he's afraid Carl will come back with the assault rifle he took.
That night, I wake up in the middle of the night and I can hear a door repeatedly slamming inside the apartment. I hear a second door being rattled in its hinges. The apartment is ice cold for no apparent reason. I reach for my pistol and leave to investigate. The balcony door has been sucked open by the wind and is slamming against the railing, so I close it and lock it. Carl's door is still rattling. I creep up to it; there is freezing-cold air pouring under the door, and I realize his window is open and the wind is shaking his door. It's locked, and I can do nothing about this.
6 Jan:
A leasing agent from the apartment office confides in me that the police have told them Carl is in the hospital. He tells me the apartment manager let a detective in (without a search warrant or my permission) and he established that Carl was "making drugs".
Shortly after coming home from work, there is a loud banging at the door, and my heart stops. I mentally flash back to the SWAT team. It's the apartment manager (Alex), and I let him into Carl's room because I need him to close the window and turn off the fan. He asks me if I know where Carl is, even though he already knows (I say No). He asks me if I knew he was making drugs (I say No). He tells me to let him know if Carl comes back, and I emptily promise to.
10 Jan:
Carl comes back with his M4 carbine and his psycho ex-Marine buddy to get some stuff he needs, including his hunting rifle and shotgun. He asks me to help him bring stuff out to the car, and I tell him it's not a good idea to be seen with him. He asks why, and I tell him the police know he was making DMT and they suspect me as an accomplice. He tells me to watch the door while he destroys evidence. For two hours. His room door locks have been changed, so he fireman kicks the door open and grabs some jars. He and his friend dump out the 40 jars in the toilet and kitchen sink, then pour vinegar and salt and hydrogen peroxide in them, then run several loads of them in the dishwasher, then stomp them on a blanket out on the balcony. I think stomping 40 glass jars will make somebody to call the cops, but it doesn't.
While this is going on, he relates to me what happened after he disappeared. There was a patrol car surveilling the place to make sure Carl didn't escape, but he snuck out without being detected. Then he was driving away, and someone was tailgating, so he slammed on his brakes and caused the guy to rear-end him. He got out, roared like a lion, and punched out the guy's window. He didn't hurt the guy, but stomped around roaring until the police came. The police tazed him and commited him to the psych ward of a VA hospital. He was released after 5 days, because they couldn't (or were too lazy to) hold him longer. He has been unable to locate his car.
Carl rants about how the neighbors called the cops, which has been privately admitted to me to be true. I plant the idea in his head that it was Matt, because I hate Matt, and he runs with it. He tears down Matt's poster and throws it out.
Then he grabs my book on ninjas and leaves with all the broken glass in a bindle, which he dumps in one of the dumpsters on the premises.
11 Jan:
Carl's father comes to the apartment office to do damage control. He has flown here from upstate NY to help him out. He moves out all Carl's stuff, cleans up the place, and pays for the damage. Carl arrives escorted to look for stuff he's missing, sees Matt, and says "I better go." Matt sees this behavior, and having already seen the torn-up poster, realizes he's on Carl's bad side.
Alex calls me up to tell me all this, and to assure me that Carl has never been here unescorted. He tells Matt that Carl kicking down the door is a vicious rumor he doesn't appreciate. More outright lies. He says Carl will never come back. Right...
Carl's father apologizes to the neighbor, who is understandably concerned about Carl being back, saying "Sorry, he gets like this sometimes." Which opens up the possibility that this is some schizophrenic relapse. Later, one of the neighbors will tell me that he admitted to having been a pathological liar before he entered the military. I can tell it's coming back, because he told me his father was a lawyer (really a community college teacher) and some other tall tales, and his friends are all coming out of the woodwork to trade stories and realizing he's woven a fairly intricate web of deception. He asks for money, claiming he's got all these sources of income and pension money, but he's got a mountain of unpaid medical bills and speeding tickets and owes $10,000 for the crew that salvaged his ship wreck.
He had told me the boat burned down accidentally (here's the newspaper article). Later, drunk, he confessed that he burned it down for the insurance money (unsuccessfully).
13 Jan:
The apartment manager tells Matt to move to Building 9, but he refuses. It's not clear whether he wants Matt to move in with other "problem tenants" or he doesn't want to be liable when Carl goes ballistic on him. The neighbors and I conspire to get Matt out, because he leeches off us and trashes our shit and brings bad people here and never shuts up.
I stage a schizophrenic breakdown. I make a sacrificial altar using Matt's XBox 360, throw apples everywhere, balance strange things on other strange things, leave Carl's insane scribblings everywhere, and dump baking soda everywhere and wet it. Matt bangs on my door and demands to know what happened. I use a "screaming chicken" dog toy inventively to imitate the sound of a baby being tortured. He screams "Why do I hear a fucking baby in there?" I turn my Greek Rempetiko music up deafeningly loud, and I can hear him out there cursing and pacing. Later I come out dressed to go the gym, but with a trenchcoat over it and my hair messed up. He starts up with me and I shout him down, repeating some of the same things that Carl said. "YOU GAVE ME MY VOICE! YOU TAUGHT ME HOW TO SPEAK!" I leave, and Matt is stricken with terror.
He thinks I may just be addicted to crack, so I continue the act when I get back, reaching ever more manic heights.
16 Jan:
Perfect timing. At 2:43 a.m., Carl comes back, again with his baby nestled under his trenchcoat: a gas-operated, air-cooled, magazine-fed, selective fire, shoulder-fired weapon with a telescoping stock. He knocks on the neighbor's door, but puzzingly not on ours. He is probably looking for things in their apartment he couldn't find in ours. They refuse to let him in, and call Matt frantically to warn him to get out. Matt is sleeping and ignores their calls.
The next day I proudly break the news to him. He doesn't see its immediate relevance, being that Carl knocked on the neighbors' door, so I drop an unsubtle hint that the move to Building 9 was suggested for his own safety, and that Carl told me he wasn't done "taking out the trash". His eyes bulge wide, and 5 minutes later I hear him leaving. I assume he is hiding out somewhere, waiting to leech a car ride off someone so he can get his stuff relocated.
Carl brews ayahuasca for 12 straight hours, enough to fill 40 mason jars with brown goop. It is conjectured the fumes from this activity, coupled with months of intense DMT abuse, are what set him off. He is partying New Years Eve with Matt and the neighbors. Then he is sitting, pensive. They ask him to go get cigarettes for them. Minutes later, they hear roaring outside. When they go down to investigate, he is harassing passers-by. They coax him inside, and he is manic. Everyone says he is acting crazy, and are instantly labeled "intolerants" and "close-mindeds" who are against him. Carl is awake the next 4 days without food, becoming increasingly manic.
4 Jan:
I return home. There is barf in my sink, barf in my toilet, barf all over my trash can, my liquor and soda is all drank, my food is gone; all owing to Matt the leech. My furniture is upset, my laundry detergent has been poured on walls and random scattered clothing, my printer has been used to make color copies of craziness; all owing to Carl. I assume nobody is home, and I go to my room. Minutes later, I hear somebody creeping about, and it turns out to be Carl sneaking around like a ninja. I quickly realize he's crazy and use manipulation to earn his trust and friendship. I retire to my room to try to get away from his incessant blather. SWAT team comes. We are both released. Carl insists he wants to get away from the hostile neighbors, who he is sure called this in, as soon as possible. The police tell him he can't move out until he's slept the night. I go to bed and sleep, despite being able to hear Carl outside shouting at strangers and wrangling them into philosophical debates.
5 Jan:
Carl's door is closed and his "important stuff" is gone. His car is gone. I assume he moved out in the night. I get a call at work from Alex, the apartment manager. I tell him everything I know (nothing new), which he later relates to the police. I come home, and things are as they were, except: a closet door is opened, the one that holds Carl's hunting rifle. The rifle is still inside. Also, Matt's XBox 360 is missing now. Matt is still missing, and at the time I think it's because he knows I'm pissed that he trashed the place. It later turns out that he's hiding out at his mother's because he's afraid Carl will come back with the assault rifle he took.
That night, I wake up in the middle of the night and I can hear a door repeatedly slamming inside the apartment. I hear a second door being rattled in its hinges. The apartment is ice cold for no apparent reason. I reach for my pistol and leave to investigate. The balcony door has been sucked open by the wind and is slamming against the railing, so I close it and lock it. Carl's door is still rattling. I creep up to it; there is freezing-cold air pouring under the door, and I realize his window is open and the wind is shaking his door. It's locked, and I can do nothing about this.
6 Jan:
A leasing agent from the apartment office confides in me that the police have told them Carl is in the hospital. He tells me the apartment manager let a detective in (without a search warrant or my permission) and he established that Carl was "making drugs".
Shortly after coming home from work, there is a loud banging at the door, and my heart stops. I mentally flash back to the SWAT team. It's the apartment manager (Alex), and I let him into Carl's room because I need him to close the window and turn off the fan. He asks me if I know where Carl is, even though he already knows (I say No). He asks me if I knew he was making drugs (I say No). He tells me to let him know if Carl comes back, and I emptily promise to.
10 Jan:
Carl comes back with his M4 carbine and his psycho ex-Marine buddy to get some stuff he needs, including his hunting rifle and shotgun. He asks me to help him bring stuff out to the car, and I tell him it's not a good idea to be seen with him. He asks why, and I tell him the police know he was making DMT and they suspect me as an accomplice. He tells me to watch the door while he destroys evidence. For two hours. His room door locks have been changed, so he fireman kicks the door open and grabs some jars. He and his friend dump out the 40 jars in the toilet and kitchen sink, then pour vinegar and salt and hydrogen peroxide in them, then run several loads of them in the dishwasher, then stomp them on a blanket out on the balcony. I think stomping 40 glass jars will make somebody to call the cops, but it doesn't.
While this is going on, he relates to me what happened after he disappeared. There was a patrol car surveilling the place to make sure Carl didn't escape, but he snuck out without being detected. Then he was driving away, and someone was tailgating, so he slammed on his brakes and caused the guy to rear-end him. He got out, roared like a lion, and punched out the guy's window. He didn't hurt the guy, but stomped around roaring until the police came. The police tazed him and commited him to the psych ward of a VA hospital. He was released after 5 days, because they couldn't (or were too lazy to) hold him longer. He has been unable to locate his car.
Carl rants about how the neighbors called the cops, which has been privately admitted to me to be true. I plant the idea in his head that it was Matt, because I hate Matt, and he runs with it. He tears down Matt's poster and throws it out.
Then he grabs my book on ninjas and leaves with all the broken glass in a bindle, which he dumps in one of the dumpsters on the premises.
11 Jan:
Carl's father comes to the apartment office to do damage control. He has flown here from upstate NY to help him out. He moves out all Carl's stuff, cleans up the place, and pays for the damage. Carl arrives escorted to look for stuff he's missing, sees Matt, and says "I better go." Matt sees this behavior, and having already seen the torn-up poster, realizes he's on Carl's bad side.
Alex calls me up to tell me all this, and to assure me that Carl has never been here unescorted. He tells Matt that Carl kicking down the door is a vicious rumor he doesn't appreciate. More outright lies. He says Carl will never come back. Right...
Carl's father apologizes to the neighbor, who is understandably concerned about Carl being back, saying "Sorry, he gets like this sometimes." Which opens up the possibility that this is some schizophrenic relapse. Later, one of the neighbors will tell me that he admitted to having been a pathological liar before he entered the military. I can tell it's coming back, because he told me his father was a lawyer (really a community college teacher) and some other tall tales, and his friends are all coming out of the woodwork to trade stories and realizing he's woven a fairly intricate web of deception. He asks for money, claiming he's got all these sources of income and pension money, but he's got a mountain of unpaid medical bills and speeding tickets and owes $10,000 for the crew that salvaged his ship wreck.
He had told me the boat burned down accidentally (here's the newspaper article). Later, drunk, he confessed that he burned it down for the insurance money (unsuccessfully).
13 Jan:
The apartment manager tells Matt to move to Building 9, but he refuses. It's not clear whether he wants Matt to move in with other "problem tenants" or he doesn't want to be liable when Carl goes ballistic on him. The neighbors and I conspire to get Matt out, because he leeches off us and trashes our shit and brings bad people here and never shuts up.
I stage a schizophrenic breakdown. I make a sacrificial altar using Matt's XBox 360, throw apples everywhere, balance strange things on other strange things, leave Carl's insane scribblings everywhere, and dump baking soda everywhere and wet it. Matt bangs on my door and demands to know what happened. I use a "screaming chicken" dog toy inventively to imitate the sound of a baby being tortured. He screams "Why do I hear a fucking baby in there?" I turn my Greek Rempetiko music up deafeningly loud, and I can hear him out there cursing and pacing. Later I come out dressed to go the gym, but with a trenchcoat over it and my hair messed up. He starts up with me and I shout him down, repeating some of the same things that Carl said. "YOU GAVE ME MY VOICE! YOU TAUGHT ME HOW TO SPEAK!" I leave, and Matt is stricken with terror.
He thinks I may just be addicted to crack, so I continue the act when I get back, reaching ever more manic heights.
16 Jan:
Perfect timing. At 2:43 a.m., Carl comes back, again with his baby nestled under his trenchcoat: a gas-operated, air-cooled, magazine-fed, selective fire, shoulder-fired weapon with a telescoping stock. He knocks on the neighbor's door, but puzzingly not on ours. He is probably looking for things in their apartment he couldn't find in ours. They refuse to let him in, and call Matt frantically to warn him to get out. Matt is sleeping and ignores their calls.
The next day I proudly break the news to him. He doesn't see its immediate relevance, being that Carl knocked on the neighbors' door, so I drop an unsubtle hint that the move to Building 9 was suggested for his own safety, and that Carl told me he wasn't done "taking out the trash". His eyes bulge wide, and 5 minutes later I hear him leaving. I assume he is hiding out somewhere, waiting to leech a car ride off someone so he can get his stuff relocated.