The house next door, the one on the other side of the fence that defines the property line. The house with the light gray trim and the darker gray aluminum siding has been home to at least three divorces, a drug mart, and more recently what seemed like an ordinary family. But, those who live next door never stay ordinary for long and so you’ll not be surprised at what happened on a recent Thursday night, at the house next door.
“Cops!” he said.
“What?” I said.
Cops, I can see them outside my window.
My son is playing Grand Theft Auto on his computer.
“What have you done now, stolen another car?” I said.
“Me? No, well yes a car but only in the game, the cops outside are real.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
I set down the book I was reading, The Mystic Arts Of Erasing All Signs Of Death: A Novel by Charlie Huston. As I approached the back door there was the loud crashing sound—I couldn’t make out exactly what it was. I opened the door slowly and there, not five feet away, I saw the word POLICE; it was emblazoned on the back of a man standing near my back door. I could hear someone else rummaging about in my backyard. Probably another cop, but I wasn’t sure.
The marijuana plant that had been there in the backyard most of the summer, an I-wonder-if-these-seeds-will-grow lark that succeeded beyond all expectation was gone. It was beginning to peek over the back fence earlier in the year when I decided that though unlikely someone might one day see it from the road, or be searching for a fugitive in my backyard and so I’d removed it. I almost left it, what are the odds of what happened happening, but I didn’t.
He didn’t have his gun drawn so I stepped out the back door. He turned. “I wondered what all the noise was,” I said. “I was about ready to call the police.”
“Were here,” he said, righting the garbage can he had inadvertently knocked over.
“What is it, what’s going on,” I said.
“We’re arresting a man next door,” he said.
My neighbor I thought, or maybe a friend of his, but why were they looking in my backyard. I thought about asking, but I didn’t.
I went back in the house but then went to the front door opened it stepped out on my porch. My neighbor Tony’s hands were behind his back. I heard the cuffs snap shut.
Two officers, one on each side led him down the stairs of his house and to the sidewalk. One officer on each side, a hand curled around one of Tony’s elbows led him down the street; a third officer trailed behind. I turned away and when I looked back there were another eight or nine officers walking down the sidewalk behind Tony and his escort. It was like a march of the penguins, but instead of penguins it was men in black with the word POLICE printed in bold white letters on their backs.
I walked a few steps to the center of my yard to get a better view. They continued down the sidewalk to the west where there were several police vehicles, unmarked, and to my surprise another half dozen officers.
What had my neighbor done to bring so many policemen to the neighborhood? It had to be serious, didn’t it?
I expected to see Tony the next day—bailed out of jail or released on his own recognizance—free until a court date was set, but the following day and the day that followed that came, and the only evidence of Tony was his red short bed pickup parked in exactly the same place it had been parked the day before.
Probably drugs I thought, dealing not using.
A week passed, and still the truck was in exactly the same spot in his driveway. It looked as though he wouldn’t be coming back soon. What would happen to his truck, his house, his children who unlike the truck were gone?
Maybe he’s a fence; he does have a jewelry store. A fence across the fence, ha ha.
Three more weeks passed, and the pickup didn’t move.
Could he have killed someone? His ex-wife perhaps which would make her the ex ex-wife.
It finally ended last night. Shortly after I took the trash out to the road for the weekly pickup, my wife returned from her painting class just as an SUV pulled up in front of Tony’s house and Tony got out and went in.
This morning the truck was gone.
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Everyone loves a good mystery. Nice stuff. Thanks for sharing, Norm.
A friend of mine had a variation on a “Tony” Only there were three of them. One day the cops swooped into his neighbour’s house and dragged them out. It was a total shock to everyone. There nothing on the local news about it. No one knew what it was all about. A few days later the three Tonys were back. Like nothing had ever happened…