This is about a friend of mine. Sure, it might be about me. Because this is one of those stories in which even I would rather not be a participant. This is an unpleasant story and at the same time it’s fucking hilarious. I piss my pants every time my friend tells it. Or maybe when I tell it. Believe what you want; I’m sticking to my story.
My friend “Jorge” lived with his girlfriend in an apartment building. I use the seemingly redundant “building” because it was one of those old-style places that had a main entrance and a secure hallway for all of the apartments.
It was only two stories high, so there were no elevators. It was actually rare that you would ever run into a neighbor. For some reason, everybody in the place seemed to keep non-traditional hours. No bullshit, there was one apartment occupied by about six to eight Korean hookers who worked at the massage parlor across the street. I’m not making some crude reference to their vaginas, but honestly, their apartment smelled lousy with fish. Just fucking lousy with stinky-ass, fermenting, festering, fish flesh. It was unbelievable. They must have only eaten rotten fish for every single meal. It’s the only thing I can think of.
There were also two apartments that were taken up by crazy shut-ins that the state took care of. No bullshit. Sounds like a fantasy right? No fantasy baby; that’s the city.
I never ran into the shut-ins (go figure), but I ran into their caretakers a couple of times and that’s how I found out that my apartment building was harboring people who were good enough to get out of the mental hospital, but not quite well enough to go grocery shopping. Fucking excellent.
The fourth apartment was taken up by an old man. Probably a widow. I saw him once carrying groceries. But the great thing about this guy was that he was home 24/7 and he used to blast porno movies on his television all fucking day. Like he was hard of hearing… But the neighbors on the other side of his wall were the Korean hookers, so they probably heard the porn and thought, “Oh vey!”– as Koreans are apt to say– “Who are we to complain?”
So, after being buzzed in the front door of this wonderful apartment building, you would immediately hear loud pornographic sounds and smell the strongest fish you’ve ever smelled in your miserable life.
That was the bottom floor. Two crazies, a bunch of hookers, and a lecherous old man occupied those bottom four apartments.
Thankfully. Thank God (for my friend). There was one dude on floor two that was a weed dealer. He always had the good shit and he was always inviting me and Jorge to get high. However, he was also one of those self-righteous wanna-be hippies who always seemed to be talking down to people. I always felt like he was smirking at me, like he thought he was so fucking smart because he read an article in Mother Jones the night before. I’m a liberal too asshole, but I will eat a taco. I guess that makes me a dick in the patchouli-wearing world. Big fucking deal. Oh and p.s. to any other wanna-be hippy assholes: The Grateful Dead aren’t that fucking great. Jerry was the only real talent. So fuck you too.
There was my friends Jorge and Alicia, they lived together and ended up married.
And in the two apartments towards the back of the second floor, one was vacant and one had a new tenant that nobody had ever seen. He or she or it had occupied Jorge’s building for about six weeks and neither he nor hippy-dippy had ever seen “her” walk by. It was rumored that she was a very hot woman, but that is the way rumors tend to run among guys who are fantasizing about the new girl.
This is actually kind of amazing. Because even though I said it was very rare to run into neighbors in the hallway, I meant for the residents of the other six apartments. Not for Jorge.
You see, Jorge likes to get high kids. And when people get real high all the time they do weird shit. Like, for example, Jorge would sit around stoned out of his mind watching the television and as soon as he would hear the front door slam, he would hit the mute button on his remote control and listen to see if the visitor was coming up the steps.
Once he knew the visitor was coming up the steps, he’d prance over to the peephole like some kind of sissy, thinking he could run fast and “go lightly” at the same time. He’d smash his face against the door to prevent any movement. Anyone who is experienced with peepholes knows that the unwanted visitor can sometimes see a flash in the lens, indicating movement on the other side.
So my friend had a face-smashing technique in which he could stare out his peephole without causing a tell-tale lens flash.
Weird dude, right?
That’s not the half of it. Sometimes, if he were in the mood, he would act like he was leaving just as he heard somebody coming up the steps. He would act all casual and turn around and act like he was locking his apartment door and then he would turn to the person coming up the steps and be all, “Oh hi. You startled me. I was just leaving.”
This is how he met the pot dealer across the hall. Except when he did that, he forgot– as he often did– to put on shoes and his thin facade was immediately exposed.
So I wanted to set up just how weird Jorge is. Getting stoned and peeking at people through the peephole… Oh and he had a catch-phrase. It was “not in my building you don’t.”
I don’t know what it meant and Jorge was probably fantasizing he was Spider Man or something, but it worked. If there were people at the apartment and Jorge was compelled to peep through the door, the catch-phrase would keep his guests wondering. (But not enough to ask the crazy man what that mean exactly.)
So, eventually, Jorge saw his new neighbor. And she was hot. Very, very hot. And she dressed like a slut. This girl liked to fuck, according to Jorge. He claimed to have great skill at picking out girls “who liked to fuck”, even though he said this about everybody.
My laptop is about to die. Must continue this story later.
To be continued…
