Man, that's a gay title. I meant it to be a nice Hitchcockian reference. Whatever.
This is what we woke up to this morning at about 6:30 :
Woman's Voice: "Oh God, NO!!!!!! He's not breathing he's not BREATHING!!!! Breathe, baby! (SLAP) OH NO OH NO OH NO!!!!! Oh, God, DO something, NOOOOOO!!!!!!! Give him CPR, SOMETHING! (SLAP)"
Honestly.
Turns out it was coming from our building. When the fire truck, ambulance, paramedics and two police cruisers arrived, they all ran through our awninged entrance. We know this because we were wide awake and sitting on the couch like frightened lap dogs looking out the picture window hoping they'd help whomever wasn't breathing. Then, after they'd been up there for a few minutes, we sat wondering why the screaming had stopped - had they sedated her? - and why it was taking so long for someone to come back out. Another sherriff pulled up, spying us in the window as he approached the building. He waved at us jauntily, like he was in a parade. We ducked down a little bit behind the couch, ashamed.
This isn't the first time we've been awakened by the neighbors in good ole' WeHo. On the second floor there was a gay couple (renters) who fought like animals from the day they moved in. Here's a snippet of dialogue from day one (for real): "I fucking HATE you!!!! (sob, sob) OW!!! My arm, my arm, you're hurting my arm!!!"
They were extraoridnarily nice in the elevator and in passing until the building forced an eviction and they refused to leave. The city allows 60 days from a notice of eviction to actual removal from the property (the city loves their renters, obviously), so for two months, these screaming monkeys continued to fight, propped locked doors open for their friends and made everyone in the building uneasy. For a few weeks, they seemed to have no key into the building (perhaps it was revoked, I don't know). I kept unpropping doors whenever I found them, knowing it would shut these guys out. They'd call up to random apartments at 3 or 4 in the morning through the call box and ask to be buzzed in because they forgot their key. Whenever they called us, I'd hang up. One night we were heading out through the lobby to the garage when we saw one of them pushing buttons on the callbox. A nicely dressed collegiate guy in his twenties, he smiled and waved at us and said through the glass, "Hey, guys. I'm so stupid - I forgot my key, could you let me in?" We both frowned and kept walking. "Sorry," I said. "We're not supposed to let anyone in without a key." From the garage we heard him screaming, "You guys are fucking ASSHOLES!!!" It was like he removed a latex mask to reveal the dripping beast beneath. The one who screamed and threw things upstairs.
When the police finally came to escort them out of the building forever, I was out walking the dogs. I saw one of them sneaking out of the side of the building, carrying a stuffed paper shopping bag under his arm, presumably their 'things.' I was standing across the street from our building when from behind me I heard, "You and your wife are fucking ASSHOLES."
I wheeled around to see the keyless guy sitting in the shadows of the building across from ours with sunglasses on, smoking a cigarette. Chauncy, my cranky Australian Shephard mix was getting agitated. Normally, I'd pull in her leash a little, so she wouldn't scare anyone when she lunged at them. "What are you talking about?" I asked, letting the leash go slack. "You heard me," he snapped back. "You and your bitch wife." Then his partner with the paper bag joined him and they hurried up the street. All I could think to say was, "I heard you fine, I just wanted to know what you were talking about." They were halfway up the block by then and Chauncy was sniffing a loaf of cat shit under a tree. I'd like to think I really showed those two and had a hand in the justice of their eviction. But I was just a witness when it came down to it. A fucking ASSHOLE witness.
Next door to us is a smallish house that was rented to a European student and his topless girlfriend. The house isn't cheap to rent and he has the largest TV I've ever seen set up in his living room, so I've made the assumption he's some kind of royalty or landed gentry. Some archduke's punk son sent to America for a solid education. I call him 'The Prince.' He drives a Mustang convertible and plays loud pop-rock and leaves his doors open and his lights on and comes home very late at night because he's young. We're a level above this house and from our second bedroom, I can see down into their front yard and into one of their bathrooms if they leave the curtains open. I've noticed without too much craning that the girlfriend sunbathes in the tree-enclosed yard topless. Without cupping my ear, I often hear them having sex (she's particularly loud, about which, it should be noted, I'm not complaining) or watching soccer matches. For a while she was out of town and he had some loud parties and a lot of friends with accents stay with him for long stretches of time. One night while we were closing the shutters in our bedroom, I saw him having fully-lit doggie-style sex with some other woman in his living room. My wife witnessed it, too, so it wasn't like I was being inappropriately voyeuristic. Although I did linger a moment longer at the window than my wife. As she was lying down declaring 'That's so gross,' I watched The Prince indifferently finish up with this other woman.
Then, a few weeks later, I heard The Prince and his girlfriend arguing violently one night, chasing each other around the house. She ran into the bathroom below our second bedroom and he followed her in, slamming the door so she couldn't get out. "Where's the ring?" he asked her sharply. She quietly muttered something then he grabbed her throat with one hand and said, "Where's the fucking ring?" She muttered again, and he raced out of the bathroom. I called the police.
The rest of that night was like a bad 80's television show. He feigned complete innocence in the driveway with one cop while she insisted it was nothing and she loved him to another cop inside the house. (Isn't it cool how I had a complete view of the whole thing from my place?)
A few months later, I was walking the dogs at night (I walk them three times a day - it's my only actual contact with my neighbors) when the two of them were thundering through their house, out the front door and right in front of the dogs. She was clawing at his t-shirt, which tore in half, as he was running down the street out of sight. It was then that I noticed she was - once again - topless. In fact, she was totally nude except for a very small thong that covered her business. As she grabbed at him, she fell on the pavement, hard.
"Are you ok?" I asked her.
"Of course I'm not ok," she snapped at me, as though it was all my fault. She covered her breasts with her hands and limped back into the house.
My wife called the police this time. They showed up in two seperate cruisers and stayed with her for at least an hour as she cried and told them there wasn't any problem. "Why did he take my blackberry, though, why?!!! It has everything in it, all my numbers and appointments! Why?"
The boyfriend didn't come back while the cops were there. I watched as they left, telling her he had to check in with them at the Sherrif's station by 9 o'clock the next morning or they were going to issue a warrant for his arrest.
Shortly thereafter, summer began and The Prince and his girlfriend disappeared for several months. They just recently returned, whooping and hollering like young cowboys arriving at a whorehouse. Can't wait to see what happens next. Or maybe I can.
The EMT's wheeled out a youngish looking guy who appeared to be alive about 20 minutes after they arrived. At least I think when they're covering your face with a manual respirator instead of a sheet it means you're still alive. Nevertheless, for all the screaming that started our morning, no one followed the gurney into the ambulance or the ambulance to the hospital. It felt like we dreamt it.
Am I the neighborhood's nosey old lady sitting in her window spying on these people and their madness? Maybe. But what if something else happens? We're surrounded here by all kinds of drama. Someone's got to witness it, right?
I just wish it happened in the middle of the day. So I could get some sleep.
