so many waterbugs

From the time I was in 8th grade until I last year, I lived in a tiny apartment with my mom and little sister Laura. This apartment was located behind the Dunkin Donuts on 420 in delightful Norwood...selected specifically so that Laura and I could attend Interboro High School. Now, the argument could be made that my parents obviously valued my older sister Kate's education and resulting success in life over their other daughters due to the fact that she was sent to Prendie, where as Laura and myself received our education in a school that trucked in mothers from Chester who regularly would physically remove each other from the middle of class to rectify some baby mama drama...but i digress. Anyway, Norwood itself is a rather nice town.. sans the attitude and personality of my beloved hometown of Folcroft but sufficient enough. So, in the spring of my 8th grade school year my mother moved us into an deceivingly normal looking 2 bedroom second floor apartment. Now due to lifetime-movie worthy family drama I was able to ignore or just not notice the fact that my mom had moved us directly into the only existing cult/ government biochemical testing ground in Delaware County. Slowly but surely this fact began to present itself to us.



This apartment building houses about 3 families in the front and 8 families in the back...luckily we ended up right in the middle of the "families" living in the back. One of the first realizations was that every family dwelling around us were actually related to each other. Fine..families are great. Except that this family would constantly park themselves outside on the only existing common area from sunrise to sunset. Although not initially annoying, hours and hours of exchanging fake pleasantries began to destroy my soul. Between myself, my sister and my mother we would spend approximately 63 minutes in our apartment a day. Work, school, friends, sports, etc caused us to constantly go in and out of the apartment, usually in a rush. Our neighbors, it appeared, never left the apartment complex. Im relatively certain that, much like how vampires are unable to cast a reflection in a mirror, these people would cease to be visible to the naked eye away from Huron Avenue. More annoyingly, these vampires seemed to all share the same hobby...catching us in mind-numbing conversations that never ended. I think it was a game and the object was to prevent us from living our life...and they got a triple word score for catching us if it looked like we were REALLY in a rush. More times than I'd care to count I was late for school or work because, although I left on time, I was caught the second I emerged from my front door and cornered into a discussion about whether or not I enjoyed magazines. Or I would return from working a night shift wearing my scrubs, covered in 3 different bodily fluids with a stethoscope still draped around my neck to my one neighbor creepily joking about where I've been all night..as though I were returning from an epic gang bang or my shift at Lou Turks.


The two most common and feared conversation starters were the brother in law duo of VV and freakshow. VV lived in the apartment with his wife and teenage son and daughter (leading me to conclude that they shared a room as the layout of the apartments were the same. There will always be something unsettling about the thought of a teenage boy and his teenage sister sharing bunk beds). VV got his name after we watched a Victim Channel movie called Video Voyeur...were the creepy peeking neighbor set up a camera to spy on his neighbor's wife. VV had an unnerving way of commenting on my physical appearance in such a way that I often felt as though he must be spying on us.. He also loved to compliment my perfume which, maybe I'm being alittle conservative, but I always found to be super creepy and totally inappropriate due to the fact that I was 15 at the time. As our "relationship" grew, VV felt more comfortable and entitled to pry into my personal life. It actually got to the point where each time I left my apartment, he emerged from his (hence the belief that he was watching us) and would question me about my plans for the evening. "Where are you going?", "Who are you going with?", "What time are you gonna be home?", "Does your father know where you are going?" Unfortunately I was raised with respect and therefore felt obligated to answer him despite the fact that all I wanted to do was kick him in the shin and throw lighter fluid on him.

Conversely, freakshow showed no signs of believing that we were actively involved in a romatic relationship...but he did show signs of dementia. At any given moment, he could be found camped out in front of his prized PT Cruiser, admiring it. He would get his lawn chair, cup of coffee and automobile wax and alternate sitting and sipping with waxing his car. Unlike VV, freakshow was much easier to avoid due to his routine and habitual parking spot. However, after a few years, our slum lord began enforcing his parking policy and requiring us to park in the lot in the front of the apartment...ensuring that I would be forced to talk to freakshow EVERYTIME I got out of my car. Sane people exchange shallow pleasantries with their neighbors or perhaps talk about the weather for a few minutes. My mentally ill neighbor would never allow me to slip past him without beginning a conversation about his great grandfather's affinity for wearing a polka dotted tie while mowing his lawn. Or his long lost brother who smugly ignores their family and lives down south...(He, by the way, was my favorite member of the family).
Our parking arrangements made it impossible to not walk directly past freakshow's campground...so I began experimenting with alternate routes to my apartment. I attempted to walk all the way around the opposite side of the building. This was surely an act of desperation due to the fact that the land housing our apartment also grew plentiful crops of waterbugs. Numerous nights I would be forced to put Laura on my back and carry her up the steps as her fear of these bugs left her paralysed. I would regularly sprint up the steps and through the walkway, hearing crunching underfoot the entire time. Each morning, this walkway resembled the hallowed grounds of a waterbug graveyard, serving as the final resting place for all the bugs who lost their lives in the previous nights battle. Therefore, it is obvious that my neighbors left me exasperated...forcing me to chose between hours of soul killing conversation or mapping out a new route with the threat of being eaten alive by the most disgusting and visually offensive bugs on earth. On the night that I decided to trial my new and unexplored route, I returned home from class at about 9pm. I purposely parked in the far right corner...the closest to my escape route. I caught a glimpse of Freakshow to my left and noticed him taking out a pen and paper to jot down notes for his immenent discussion with me. Thankfully it was not his habit to get out of the chair to greet me, therefore I knew that he would not begin talking until I got within earshot of his lawn chair. Smiling to myself, I gathered my textbooks and bag and boldly headed right....keeping my head down. The cement parking lot ended and spills into an oddly placed stretch of grass and weeds that the landlord prefers to grow until it reachs waist-high. Hidden under the grass lay uneven cuts of cement and steps as dangerous as landmines. Navigating my way through was difficult and uncomfortable. I stubbed my toe twice but refused to stop for fear of having a waterbug crawl up my leg. Finally, I reached the otherside of the mid-driveway jungle and happily stepped again onto cement. I broke into my usual spint and joyfully turned the corner to climb the steps which would bring me to freedom. Thinking to myself that my terrain was not quite as bad as I imagined it would be, I couldn't surpress a huge smile at my success. I would gladly stub everyone of my toes if it meant that I would be saved from even 2 hours a week of agitation. Deep in my thoughts of victory, I didn't even notice that VV sat waiting at the top of the steps to greet me.