Whenever anyone asks me how adulthood is going, I tell them that it's not. This isn't because it's going badly. It's because, despite me living alone and quite literally providing for myself, I really can't believe that I'm actually an adult. This can be referenced through a lot of assets in my life, but perhaps one of the best examples is the fact that I slept on my couch for over a week because I took the sheets off my bed in order to force myself to do laundry, but instead, went out for margaritas with Chelsea and Zach for multiple nights. Also, to really bring the point home, those margaritas were my first "meal" that week that was neither a saltine or a glass of ginger ale in over three days due to my inability to refrigerate yogurt correctly.
But, in all honesty -- despite that small bout of food poisoning -- adult life in NYC is going surprisingly smooth. In the five short months I've lived here, I have started my dream job, bought a fish named Kanye (he died ten days later of what I firmly believe was an eating disorder), did not get stabbed during a Tinder date and have drank an embarrassingly high amount of margaritas, only two of which have ended up on my lap.
Despite the similarities between these two photos, they were taken ten minutes apart -- with two separate margaritas. I'm basically the reason waiters at The Heights hate us.
Also, shout out to Zach Groth for constantly documenting my embarrassing moments instead of, you know, handing me napkins.
Really, my only complaint about my new life is my downstairs neighbor.
On any given day of living in New York City, I am afraid of exactly two things -- ketchup on other people's plates and being murdered by the resident of 5C.
I recognize that the ketchup thing may possibly be irrational. It's something very weird, but very real that I've dealt with since the second grade when one of my classmates who, no joke, was named Jedi, slammed a monster-sized ketchup bottle down in the cafeteria and it exploded all over, making our entire class look as if they were covered in blood, thereby ruining condiments for me for the rest of my existence and making my three-month stint as a Sandwich Artist at Subway the worst job of my life.
But, the fear of being killed by my neighbor is an actual thing that I think could happen because he really, really hates me -- and, also believes I am Somalian drug lord.
The following is my story about my neighbor. I'll call him Arthur… because that is his name.
On the very last day of 2014, my parents and I drove from Boston to New York City for two highly important reasons. The first was to drop me off at my cousin's apartment so later that night, I could ring in the New Year at a loft party in Chelsea while wearing a sequined romper accompanied by a knee brace due to an "I-Had-Too-Much-Fun-At-A-Wedding" incident from late October.
You can't see my knee brace that well in this photo, but rest assured, it was there and a conversation starter with almost every person I interacted with that night. But, let's be real, I'm actually only including this photo because I want everyone to see how cute my romper was and how polished I looked pre-loft party/pre-pretending-NYC-was-Dill-Street/pre-Zach-ordering-two-pizzas-from-two-separate-places-at-2 a.m.-and-demolishing-them-both-while-I-slept-on-the-couch-wearing-heels-and-his-sweatpants. (RIP Dill Street).
The second reason was to sign a lease.
As I've written about before, finding an apartment in New York City was without a doubt the hardest thing I have ever done in my small, tiny life. In the past few months, I've had multiple friends ask me for advice about finding a place while moving here and my answer is always the same: "LOL." Between losing a horrifying amount of money to a broker and basically giving up hope that I'd ever qualify for a place to live that wasn't East Harlem, it's an actual miracle I didn't start out my residency in NYC living inside a box. It's even more incredulous I found a place that I truly love and, on that last day of 2014 when I signed a lot of papers that legally bound me to the Upper East Side for at least a year, I started to feel like a real-life adult, so much so that I transferred my Uber account from my dad's credit card to my own (I regretted this decision almost immediately).
My parents, God bless them, had never even been inside of the apartment they'd just witnessed me put literally all of the money I owned down on and so, I believe they were pleasantly surprised when we trekked up those six flights of stairs and I opened the door to my future home. And, I was, too. One thing I learned when looking for a place to live here is that after awhile, all of these apartments start to look exactly the same. The thing I loved (and, still do) about my apartment was that what it lacks in size, it makes up for in natural light, gorgeous views of the East River and the sound of small children playing in the park across the street that is frequently featured on SVU.
I did not have to leave my bed to take this photo.
So, even though I'd just given over an amount of money so large my brain had yet to comprehend the severity of the situation, I was happy. My parents and I walked down the six flights of stairs, chatting mostly about how much IKEA furniture we could fit in such a small space and barely registering the fact that the door to 5C was ominously cracked open, listening to our conversation.
"Look," my dad said, as we walked out of my new building. "Your neighbor is getting a look at who will be living above him."
And, indeed -- the profile of an older man peering down from behind his dark curtains on the 5th floor appeared to be watching us as we stepped out onto the street. As we made eye contact, he scowled, then forcefully shut his shade.
That was the first time I saw Arthur.
Four days later, the entire Prandato family packed ourselves into our car and, along with a U-Haul containing pretty much everything I own, made our way back to the Upper East Side while listening solely to Kanye West and old-school hip-hop. The free-heartedness and epic coolness of this road trip came to a halt when we arrived at my building, remembered it did not include an elevator and realized we were going to be spending the rest of the morning lugging boxes and the ridiculous amount of books I'd taken from the free pile during my time at The Globe up six flights of stairs.
And, that is how we spent the morning. And, the afternoon. And, to be honest, some of our evening as well (the amount of books I took from The Globe was obscene). All throughout this, the door to 5C was cracked open slightly, and, if you looked hard enough, you could see an eyeball staring out through the slit. Because this was my first interaction with anyone that lived in the building I'd just committed to spending a year of my life in, this was slightly concerning.
But, fear not, friends -- luckily, not everyone in my apartment was terrifying. The tenants in my building are an equal mix of kids my age and people who have lived there for 45+ years. (This often leads the stairwell to smell like a strange combination of weed, my grandparents living room and, inexplicably, hot dogs). Besides my awful neighbor who rerouted my Internet to their apartment, most people are great, including my 86-year-old neighbor Sally, who lives directly next to me on the sixth floor walk-up and has since she's been my age. Every time she walks up those six flights of stairs, she says "GODDAMN RENT CONTROL" with every step. She's my favorite and I firmly believe she is the future version of me because I truly cannot fathom how I will ever get my belongings down those stairs ever again and will probably live in apartment 6C for the rest of my existence.
Anyway, the first time the Prandato family was exposed to Arthur from more than a peek behind a cracked door or curtain was actually the day my brothers spent the entire day with Mao, the literal worst cable man in New York City. If you follow my blog, you'll remember that while I was starting my first job in the Financial District, my brothers were back at my apartment, letting in the Verizon guy who was so bad at his job, he was there for the entire day. While Mao was sitting on my couch waiting for his co-worker to bring over the part he'd mistakenly forgotten (his co-worker brought over the wrong part as well, delaying the process further), Jonny and Dana looked at each other in disbelief, then began to build the rest of my IKEA furniture.
Within a half hour of them starting the process of putting together my irrationally heavy dresser, there was an uncomfortably violent knock at my front door. Jonny opened it and before him appeared a very small, very angry and very weathered-looking Dustin Hoffman lookalike.
And, Dustin Hoffman was NOT happy.
Dustin Hoffman, who introduced himself as Arthur, surveyed the small disaster scene that was my apartment being set up, took a confusing note of Mao lounging on my couch, then demanded to know why he had been hearing a constant banging coming through his ceiling. Jonny tried explaining the concept of how to put together IKEA furniture, but Arthur was not having it. He became increasingly agitated, insisted the boys were hiding something from him and, with one hand attempting to push open the door further, asked to be let in to inspect the apartment.
This was not expected and, in reaction, Dana became visibly enraged, Jonny actively refused and Mao looked on incredulously from the couch. Arthur insisted he was going to call 911 to report the illegal activity, to which the boys replied he was more than welcome to send the police up to what was quite clearly a very legal, albeit slightly confusing, situation of two kids building furniture while the awful cable man observed them. Arthur stomped angrily down to his place below and, as he left, the apartment was silent.
"Wow," said Mao, as he settled back down to his comfortable seat in front of the non-working-because-of-him television, "Good luck with that one."
After the boys recounted this interaction, I just assumed Arthur was a grumpy old man and, honestly, I was actually kind of pleased about it. I finally felt like my life was starting to align with that of FRIENDS. I had not yet found a Central Perk or a Chandler or, dammit, even a Joey, but I had a Mr. Heckles and, for the time-being, that was enough.
And, Arthur was oddly similar to Mr. Heckles. I never saw him out of his bathrobe, he often banged on his ceiling with a broom when he thought I was being too loud and, one morning when Jonny was visiting me on his spring break and we were walking down the stairs together, in reply to our "Good morning!," he told us we should rot in Hell.
But, the day I realized Arthur had transferred from grumpy, old Mr. Heckles to "He-May-Stab-Me-As-I'm-Walking-Up-My-Stairs" was the day in early March when the police knocked on my door at 10 a.m. on a Wednesday. Generally, I usually am out of my apartment by that time, but on this particular day, I was running slightly late due to getting red lipstick all over my white fur coat I wear when I want to fit in with my Upper East Side neighbors.
I was shocked to see anyone, let alone two policemen, come all the way up to the 6th floor because, honestly, the only people who ever come up that high are those of us that live there and the homeless man who casually sleeps in our stairwell during the winter. However, as surprised as I looked, I'm fairly certain the policemen were even more confused.
"Have you, uh, noticed any… smells coming from around here?," the younger policeman asked me, still looking as if he wasn't sure they had come to the correct door.
I didn't know how to answer, mostly because I was embarrassed. The only smell I could honestly smell at that moment was the Febreze I had just sprayed myself with because I was too poor to afford perfume and would frequently use this as a substitute. Weirdly, I got a lot of compliments during this time in my life, but this was still not something I wanted to admit to a police officer.
I said I hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary, then wished them a good day and headed down the stairs on my way to work. Halfway there, I realized I hadn't seen Sally in awhile. I morbidly hoped she hadn't died and that was the cause of the smell the cops had been searching for, then continued on my trek to the subway.
A few days later, I ran into my neighbor Pat, one of my favorite people in my building. Pat literally knows every person who spans the two block residence of our management complex, mostly because she is very friendly, but also because she has been living in the same apartment for the past 47 years.
Pat has one dog and, because she's a nice person, frequently walks other residents animals as she makes her way down our street. On this particular day we ran into each other, it was absolutely beautiful outside and, after complimenting my Febreze-like scent, we sat down on the stoop and began to talk about life. This is when Pat gave me some good news and, also, some bad news.
The good news was that Sally was not dead and the smell the policemen had been searching for was not a dead body. In fact, there was no smell.
This led to the bad news and the bad news was Arthur.
Apparently, after I had left to go to work on that Wednesday, the cops went down to talk to Pat because, like I said, she literally knows everyone, including policemen. After explaining that they were in our building responding to a complaint from 5C regarding 6C, they told her this was not the first time Arthur had called the cops on me.
He called them every day.
Pat could see my confusion and began to launch into the troublesome history between Arthur and the residents of whoever lives in 6C. It would appear that for quite some time, Arthur has believed that the apartment I currently rent has been passed down through Somalian drug lords as a location to hide a large amount of narcotics before sending them out into the market. Pat said she wasn't sure where this idea initially stemmed from, but it definitely had caused some problems between the previous occupants of my apartment and Arthur, including, but not limited to, them taking a restraining order out against him.
Now, before I moved in, the apartment had been vacant for quite some time and he had lain low for awhile with his drug theories, but as soon as Arthur saw my parents and I on the day I signed my lease, his suspicions were once again raised. Every day since the first week of January, Arthur had been calling the police on me while I was at work, insisting to them I was hiding a ridiculous amount of drugs in my apartment and the smell of it was seeping into his residence.
When questioned as to why he suspected me of being a drug lord, Pat told me Arthur only had one answer: "The dogs." According to him, I had somehow wrangled all of the dogs in our building to be my drug mules and, when they barked at me from behind their owner's closed apartment doors as I walked up the stairwell, they were signaling to me they were ready for me to give them more drugs to carry.
I know.
I had been scratching Pat's dog behind the ears when she dropped this nugget of information on me and, immediately, I recoiled my hand in fear, imagining Arthur looking out from his curtains, scowling at the fact that my interaction with the dogs was drug-related. And, while I was at the same time very, very confused at this enlightening new theory of Arthur's, some events that had happened in the past started to make slightly more sense. This is why he wanted to come into the apartment the day the boys were setting up furniture, insisting they were hiding something. This is why he told Jonny and I to rot in Hell.
And, now the look of shock on the policemen's faces when a 5'2" girl with hipster glasses, high-waisted jeans and an armful of golden bangles answered the door registered -- they weren't expecting someone like me, a 23-year-old who can barely cook and once set off the fire alarm by vacuuming.
Instead, they were expecting me to be an armed, dangerous and, from Arthur's description of me, Somalian, drug lord.
And, quite clearly, I am none of those things.
I've recounted this story many, many times since I've learned I may be on New York City's suspected drug lord list, though the most recently was about a month ago when I met a guy in a tea shop. When I arrived at the tea shop, I was having a pretty bad day. I was extremely hungover due to my love for karaoke, bottles of wine and the fact that the night before, I'd discovered a place in Chinatown that combined both of them. Despite my hangover, I'd just finished a CrossFit class where they made us run up a hill. A lot. And, finally, when I'd been trying to get back to the Upper East Side so I could finish my freelance work at Starbucks with my 86-year-old friend Steve and his dog, the subway was shut down, leaving me stranded in Flatiron at this particular tea shop until my hangover and memories of CrossFit disappeared.
I walked into the tea shop and all the seats were full, save for one at a tiny table that had a skateboard resting against it. I scanned the people in the vicinity, made a quick judgement call on who the skateboard belonged to, settled on the attractive guy wearing all black and a beanie, then kindly asked if I could sit there.
He said yes, which I'm very thankful for, because at this point in the day, I probably would have started immediately crying if he'd refused. I grabbed my tea, set up my laptop to start working on my freelance project, then proceeded to ignore both those things completely as I spent the next two hours talking to the attractive skateboarder wearing all black and a beanie about design, travel and, yes, how I am quite possibly a suspected Somalian drug lord.
Also, I just have to sidebar myself for a second to say, yeah -- the way I met the attractive skateboarder wearing all black and a beanie was a total "Meet-Cute." Which, thank God, because the last "Meet Cute" I had was when I worked at The Globe and desperately bought a cup of hot chocolate in the T station at the same time a guy purchased a hot dog and we both looked at each other in such a combination of shame, attraction and mild bravery that it would have been wrong not to get each other's numbers.
Anyway, because I have a tendency to cover a wide variety of topic the first time meeting people (See: the day my friend Emily and I met my now-friends Sophie and Ethan at a party in Jamaica Plain last summer and, within four hours, discussed our stances on religion, politics, Tinder dating and Ethan's extreme hatred for being wished "Happy Birthday!' via Facebook.), I did tell the skateboarder, whose name is Jamie, all about Arthur and his belief in my occupation as a Somalian drug lord. While we were already getting along pretty beautifully for people who had just randomly met at a tea shop, I think he was kind of intrigued at the fact I was a hungover-23-year-old-karaoke-loving-drug-lord and, at the end of our conversation, he asked for my phone number.
So, the other night, Jamie and I were chatting about the hardest part of writing. We hadn't been able to hang out because he'd spent the whole weekend at a writing retreat trying to complete his book and, though it had to be done that night, he was saying that finishing it was the hardest part, which I totally agreed with. Though I'd spent most of the weekend attempting to be a hipster by exploring the open art studios of Bushwick and bar-hopping in East Village with Zach, I was also in the process of trying to finish this blog post.
Though Jamie was unable to come with me to Welcome to the Johnsons, Zach went with me instead, where the $20 minimum and $2 PBR's destroyed us before I ended up spending the rest of the night talking to a dude with a man-bun all about The Alchemist and my Personal Legend, then eating a Happy Meal plus a McFlurry in the cab ride home instead of giving him my number.
I know, everyone -- I'm killin' the dating scene.
I think the reason ending my blog posts is so difficult for me is because I'm always worried I left out a significant part of the story. Did I include every detail I wanted to? Did I tie up all my tangents and sub-stories and side bars? Is this story actually done?
And, I think that's why this specific post was so hard for me to finish -- because for as long as I live in 6C (which, remember, will probably be forever), my story about Arthur and my life as a perpetual Somalian drug lord will never be finished. I'm sure there will be many, many more posts on this blog about another drug-related dog theory or altercation Arthur and I will have and, honestly, I feel as if this story will never be completed.
Well, you know -- unless Arthur kills me… in which case, someone please call those poor, confused cops and tell them I was never a drug dealer. I just really, really liked the smell of Febreze.