last thing I want to do after a long, exhausting day at work is lurk in a shadowy corridor waiting for some stealthy figure to come along, squat and deposit a steaming pile of fresh crap before my very eyes.
Anyway, who’s to say the Mad Crapper isn’t living right here among us?
Sharing much T.M.I. about the latest strike, Gecko follows me to the mailroom, where I retrieve a stack of bills and catalogs from our box, along with an envelope addressed to Resident.
Uh-oh. Is this from the Citizens Vigilante Group?
No, thank God.
Even better.
“Building’s being fumigated again on Monday,” Gecko informs me as I open the envelope and skim the super’s note telling me just that.
“Again? Why?”
“Roaches,” says the perennial bearer of bad news. “Seventh floor’s infested.”
Infested. Now there’s a word that can’t possibly have a positive connotation under any circumstances.
“Uh-oh,” I say, making a face.
“Uh-oh is right. They’re probably crawling around in your place, too. Keep an eye out when you turn on the light.”
“Believe me, I will.”
It’s not like I’ve never seen a roach. Just about every apartment in New York has them at some point or another. But I freak out every time one scuttles past.
Going back to the Crapper’s latest M.O.—the culprit apparently signed his most recent offering with a fecal flourish—Gecko follows me toward the elevator.
“Have a good night,” he calls after me as I step in.
“You, too.”
“I doubt that,” he replies dourly as the doors slide closed.
For once, I’m right there with him.
On our floor, I make my way to apartment 9K, the tiny Ikea-furnished one-bedroom where we’ve been living for—is it almost five years now?
Five years. No wonder.
After unlocking three dead bolts, I step inside and promptly crash into a chair.
Not because somebody left it practically in front of the door, but because that’s where it belongs. There’s just no other place to put it.
I drop my barbell—I mean, bag—on it.
Ah, relief.
Rubbing my aching shoulder with one hand I turn on a lamp with the other, and check to see if roaches are scurrying into the corners.
No. But they’re probably there, tucked away into the cracks, watching me.
Just to be sure none has invaded our space, I give the apartment a good once-over. That takes all of four or five seconds, because there’s not much to it. Two boxy rooms—living room and bedroom—plus a galley kitchenette and bathroom.
Maybe the place would seem more spacious if we got rid of some of this clutter, I think, trying to be optimistic.
Like what, though? Our toothbrushes? The television set?
A booming sound overhead makes me jump, until I remember that a family of circus freaks moved in upstairs last month.
Seeing them in the elevator, you’d think they were a perfectly respectable Upper East Side family of four: Dad in suit with briefcase, Mom in yoga pants pushing designer stroller, one older kid who’s invariably plugged into something handheld with earphones, one younger kid placidly rolling along in said designer stroller.
The second they get home sweet home, though? Sideshow, full swing. Our ceiling shakes so violently you’d swear there are elephants, giants and fat ladies stomping around up there. Jo-Jo-the-dog-faced-boy scampers to and fro in an endless game of fetch, and there must be at least a couple of klutzy Wallendas who regularly fall off their trapeze onto the uncarpeted floor.
I’m betting a full-time live-in decorator is there as well, because furniture is rearranged as regularly as most of us pee. And I think there’s a resident carpenter, too—that, or a serial killer, because I hear what sounds like a hammer and a buzz saw at all hours. (Jack claims it’s just high heels and a blow-dryer, but he has a high noise tolerance. I could be standing right over him, talking to him, and he doesn’t hear me. I swear, it happens all the time.)
Oh, and I don’t know what happens to Older Kids’ ubiquitous earphones when he crosses the threshold of his bedroom—which has to be right above ours—but he’s not using them there. Our room vibrates day and night with the audio from his television and iPod speakers and arcadelike video-game system.
Valentine’s Day was a nightmare. To celebrate the third anniversary of Jack’s popping the question—yes, I’m big on commemorating relationship milestones—I staged this whole cozy scene for when he got home from work. There I was, waiting in our bed with lingerie, candles, champagne, chocolate fondue and Norah Jones (her new CD, I mean, not Norah herself—we’re not into threesomes).
About five minutes into our romantic evening, our room filled with deafening screams—not mine, and not pleasure. Then came the squealing car-chase tires, cursing and gunfire. Talk about a mood wrecker. Obviously, the kid was tuning in to some cable movie or a PlayStation game that wasn’t rated E for Everyone.
If you ask me, our upstairs neighbors should be censoring their kid’s audio-video habits.
That, or we should get the hell out of Dodge.
You know what? I really think it’s time.
Because, suddenly, I can’t take it anymore.
The circus freaks, the cramped quarters, roaches and pesticides, Mitch, the prices, the subway, Gecko, the Mad Crapper, my job, Crosby, the elevators, the lugging and hauling, the bodily contact with strangers.
When Jack and I first got engaged, I remember, I wanted to move.
But he said—and I quote: “one major life change per year is my quota.”
Ever since, there’s been at least one major life change per year. First we were newlyweds, then he got promoted at work, then I got promoted at work…
Worst of all, in the midst of the job shuffling, my father-in-law died suddenly.
Jack’s had a somewhat contentious relationship with his father for most of his life, and his parents’ divorce after more than thirty years of marriage didn’t help matters. As the only son, with two older sisters and two younger, Jack has always been his mother’s favorite—and his father’s least favorite.
Jack Candell Senior was a high-powered ad exec on Madison Avenue for years, and he pretty much pushed his son into the industry when what Jack really wanted to do was go to culinary school.
I think—no, I know—Jack Senior was hoping his son would become a wealthy, high-profile account-management guy, like he was. Instead, Jack
