I ... hang on.
Found it. A couple of years ago, I wrote this about a character I and some chums ended up moving in with sort-of against our will, Weird Joe.
Weird Joe was one of the people whose house I looked around as a possible place to live while I was sleeping on a friend's floor in Canterbury. He was noticeably weird, and the account that follows, happening a year later, shows I made the right decision by moving in with some blokes I met in a pub the next day instead. The Pub Blokes eventually split and some of us needed a new place. The only place we could really get was the same that Weird Joe had been in, only, we were told he'd be gone when we moved in, and only Claire and her boyfriend would be there.
Names have been changed.
Quote:
After spending weeks stressing about new houses, and then days packing and cleaning and arrgh at the House of Kings, you'd think it would be nice to drag suitcases etc. into your new room, dig out some sheets and food, make something quick to eat and pass out on your new bed, to leave the unpacking and pedantic tidying for next week, right?
I had to spend an hour emptying all the shit out of my bedroom before I could even carry my suitcases up there. This is, I remind you, after a full day in my work clothes, and there's not even room to unpack the soap.
Then I went through the pile of crap by the front door, which took an hour. There were things there that had been unopened since October [This was in July].
Then hunger built up and I wandered out to eat in town, and to buy a full range of cleaning equipment because the kitchen looked like a biological test site. There was mouldy food in an unlined bin in my room. The floors were caked with fluff and debris. The bathroom was decorated with hair. The sink had remnants of what was once food in it - almost to the brim. The fridge was half-full of scraps, uncovered tins and packets of dessicated meat (Claire had clearly held her own corner of the fridge with basics like fresh milk and butter). The two kitchen bins were unlined and overflowing, and there was a carrier bag full of rubbish hanging open on a cupboard door. The oven had an inch-thick crust. The floor had patches of thick brown slime, there were spiders in every corner, dead insects in the fridge and maggots in an open bin.
I spent the entire night waging war on this abomination, and the kitchen, save for a floor that needs a good mopping, is pristine, if empty. I treated every surface and cupboard; scraped, scrubbed and bleached the sink; shined the windows; cleaned the oven doors; isolated and destroyed the bins; purged the fridge; washed the salvageable utensils and discarded the rest; took down the countless posters, some of which masked obvious damages to the house; sorted the stack of paper for recycling, and left everything to dry.
Oh, and I found a replica gun under my mattress.
Today, we gathered together and decided to cancel all the cheques we've sent the new landlord. We have presented him with an ultimatum - get rid of Joe and accept five reliable tenants (including Claire and T in a month); or let him stay and make a drastic loss on the house.
We have a legitimate legal basis for this - health grounds, privacy (Claire and her boyfriend awoke last month at 5am to find Joe standing on a chair outside their door, watching them through the glass, and apparently he once wandered round the house fully clothed, but with his flies undone and his cock out), and breach of contract - he hasn't paid any bills, and he owes huge sums in rent. Yet he has several thousand pounds worth of computer and musical equipment. And has been a student since time began. John also firmly believes that he needs psychiatric help, and he speaks from experience of working with such people.
We don't think he's dangerous - but he is a liability. It's a good thing he hasn't come back yet, because if he had I think John and I would have killed him.
None of this is really the landlord's fault - he even sent checklists of things to do before the new tenants arrive, and came to see the house yesterday. Landy Bloke (for that is his moniker) is working on helping us out right now. But we're still not paying a penny until Joe is out and we're given adequate compensation (the freezer has been broken and I've lost over thirty pounds' worth of food. The (new) washing machine is broken, the shower is fucked and the oven is too dirty to use. This essentially means that we're unable to wash ourselves or our clothes, or even to eat at home). If he (and it seems unlikely) doesn't agree to sort this mess out, our old landlord is looking for somewhere we can stay instead. I'll probably have to cancel my visit to London either way. And this was only last night.
Several weeks later, I wrote:
Last night, I danced around the house. There are reasons for this.
The first is that I'm extremely childish and jumpy-abouty when I'm happy. The second is that Weird Joe came back last night, and he'll be gone forever by the end of the month. I'm tempted to dance around the library right now.
John, T and I were perched in the living room watching telly. It was a repeat of the Jeremy Clarkson thing about great inventions, and last night's episode was about television. We're sitting there (I've pretty much got my own habitual seat sorted. The sofa and chairs in this house are more comfortable and a much better shape for me - I tend to sit in odd positions, and shift about a lot), quietly watching and making sarcastic comments, when the front door bashes about a bit. We all assume it's Claire coming home, and the ascending footsteps would be hers. There followed a rythmic pounding on the ceiling directly above us for a few moments, which confused us all - Claire's room is downstairs. In my mind is "What the hell are Claire and Boyfriend shagging up there for?". In John' mind is "What they hell are they doing in my room?".
Then came the sound of someone playing the electric guitar. At that point, we looked at each other, and both clearly thought "Wait a minute... that's Joe's room.". So, me and John stood and went straight upstairs to confront him. He'd locked himself in, but we got him to come out.
He was terrified of us! We basically asked what was going on, and it transpired that he had another room somewhere else and would be gone by the end of the month. We talked to him about all the big issues of the last month, ie: rent, bills, knackered appliances, his unexplained absence, biohazards in the kitchen, perving on Claire. He was contrite, and I felt like a bloody schoolteacher, because we were extremely nice, just basically tried to advise him on preventing his next house from being a disaster. He stood there, looking at his feet, mumbling "yes. Yes. Okay. I will. You're right. I'm sorry." and yet we were barely accusatory at all - I for one have no hard feelings, as long as he leaves. It's really hard to describe. He was sort-of nice and reasonable, a very shy, but nice guy - and yet he was just not all there at all. In time, if he can get his arse in gear, I think he'll be alright. But... nyeh. Enough of this.
He's going, and he's packed lots of his stuff already. The telly in my room, and the Funsquare SuperPlus GO! and VCR in the front room are ours for the keeping, and we ought to be able to set up an internet connection for Dave's PC later in the year. He's going, he's going, he's going, and once I've detonated a sackful of bleach bombs inside his room and left it to air out for a fortnight, I'll get his room. Once he'd left last night, oh GOD, how I felt good. I'd been feeling off colour all month, and I just couldn't settle down. Once I knew he was leaving, oooh, relief. He'll be gone by the weekend, he'll be gone by the weekeeeend... ah jaisus, see what I mean? I was prancing about and singing all night, even while washing up.
A couple of months later, Claire and her bloke moved out, and a bunch of my DVDs went missing. They were birthday presents, too. Cocks. I suspect the boyfriend, and only partly because Claire was a bit of a fox and didn't walk off with my 'phone when she had a perfect opportunity to.
Oh, and "T" was a lovely Indian girl whose mental parents sent people to kill her boyfriend, "John", and everyone he lived with, for being a white christian. That replica gun came in quite handy after that. Cheers, Weird Joe!
I kind of wish I hadn't left it behind now, but oh well.
Oh! And then there was the bloke who left his room uncleaned for so long that we stopped going to that end of the house, and when he finally came back from his girlfriend's house, the whole room was littered with dead and dying bees. Apparently he got his girlfriend to come round and hoover them up, which I missed, but spent the next few days worrying that they might band together in the bag to form some sort of gargantuan multibee.
And then there's my family. For an idea of what that entailed, I once came home to find the dog sitting in an inflated paddling pool in the middle of the 'middle room' while my sister pelted her with frozen peas, and my 50 year old mum bouncing around on a trampoline in the front room while shouting trivia answers at the TV, and I didn't so much as blink while walking past all this to get something to eat until a friend followed me inside and pointed out that it was a little bit weird.
It's probably not that surprising that I'm somewhat reluctant to move house next month. Living with a couple I met on the internet and a baby is about as normal as things seem likely to get.
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