She Knocks At My Door

So, it’s 6:30 in the morning. The weak, gray light is just starting to come into the living room where Steve the Dog and I are asleep.

Oooh, delicious sleep. I had been half-sitting, half-laying on the sofa next to the big front room windows late last night, reading some PG Wodehouse, and floating on the effects a a nice glass of red wine. Well, not exactly a nice glass, considering the bottle cost $3.99. Glen Ellen, or something like that. Oh, and a really big glass, I have to admit.

Not This Big (Not Quite)

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Next thing I knew, my book had fallen out of my hand and tumbled off my knees and onto the floor. I summoned up every iota of heroic effort to pick the book up off the floor and lay it safely on the coffee table.

The exertion left me with no reserve steam with which to trundle the few extra feet to bed and so I remained on the sofa, snoring, until the weak, gray light began filtering in.

And then, a knock at the door. Steve the Dog jumps up and starts barking, natch. He’d be a great watchdog if it weren’t for the fact that after barking at any and all putative intruders or burglars, he’d succumb to their petting and welcome them to all my wordly possessions, even handing them (pawing them?) the key to my safe.

Especially if the intruders or burglars had the foresight to bring along Milk-Bones.

Tip For Burglars: Pack These

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A knock on the door at this time in the morning sounds roughly equivalent to a Tomahawk missile strike in Tripoli. If I still had hair, it would be standing on end.

Then I figure it’s my next door neighbor, Tom. At this very moment I detest Tom with all the malice my heart can muster.

I wonder: What in the holy hell is this chucklehead banging on my door at this ungodly hour for?

At step three toward the front door (two steps prior to me stubbing my little toe on the end table) it occurs to me that maybe Tom is going to invite The Loved One and me out on his boat on Lake Monroe this morning.

Okay. My feelings for Tom might become a tad more tender. Although my next thought is, The ‘sto cazzo, why’d he wait so long into the season to invite me on his boat?

I am, in short, not emotionally prepared to receive an audience. Add to that the fact that I’m half naked. Honest. T-shirt but no drawers. Don’t laugh. That’s how I sleep.

Alright, laugh.

I unlock the front door, crack it open, and peek out.

A young woman is walking away from the door, although she’s still on my property. She looks a wreck. Messy, dirty blonde hair. A thin, coral, short-sleeved top. Mid-calf length pants, filthy. And no shoes.

“I’m sorry,” she says, the pain of a thousand insults she’s suffered throughout her life on her face. “I got the wrong house.”

“Okay,” I say. I close the door.

Now let’s think about that for a moment. Of all the things I could have said, I chose, “Okay.”

A strange,  stressed-out, clearly homeless, maybe delirious barefoot woman wakes me up at an hour when the cardinals are still dreaming, tells me she really didn’t mean to knock on my front door, and I say, “Okay.”

Still Dreaming

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I could have said, “Are you crazy?” Or, “Do you need any help?” Or even, “Duh, what?”

But no. I say, “Okay.”

Because at this second all I want in this crazy, mixed up world is to be able to fall back on the sofa and resume sawing wood.

Which is precisely what I do.

Until the voice of The Loved One wafts in from master boudoir. “Mike! Who was that?”

Alright, her voice doesn’t exactly waft. It claps like thunder.

“Mike!”

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I describe my early morning visitor.

Another thunderclap: “Mike! Call the sheriff!”

“Okay,” I mumble, fully intending to do so within the next two or three days, after I wake up. If I feel ambitious, I may even call today.

A few seconds pass. A third thunderclap: “Mike! Are you calling the sheriff?”

I mumble something about how unfair this cruel life is.

The Loved One’s delicate voice shatters the calm a fourth time. “Mike! She’s barefoot!”

And, you know, that finally got through the cheap red wine haze surrounding my aching head. Lauren Spierer was barefoot!

The Loved One: “Did she look like that girl?”

Me: “No.” Pause. “Maybe.” Pause. “I dunno.”

“Mike! Call the sheriff!”

So I do.

Dispatcher: “Monroe County Sheriff.”

Me: “There’s a young barefoot girl wandering around out here at _______________. But I don’t think she’s Lauren Spierer.”

I word it this way because if I just say there’s a young, barefoot girl wandering around my neighborhood, the sheriff, the Bloomington Police, the Indiana National Guard, remote trucks from every Indy TV station, the crew of “America’s Most Wanted,” and maybe even the Marines will show up.

This town is a rubber band pulled way tight right now.

The dispatcher seems to be taking her sweet time about things. There’s a silence at her end after I speak. Right before I say, “Are you still there?” she finally responds.

“Can you describe her?” she says.

I do.

Silence.

“What’s your name?”

I tell her.

Silence.

“You say she’s barefoot?”

“Uh, yeah, but I don’t think….”

“Give me that address again.”

I do so.

Silence.

“What’s your telephone number?”

I rattle it off.

Silence.

Then this. “Uh huh.”

When a cop or a sheriff or a detective says, “Uh huh,” it’s time to worry.

Great. Now I’m a person of interest. Maybe even a suspect. I’m gonna be tailed. Questions are gonna be asked of my neighbors and co-workers. Reporters’ll start nosing around.

And I know the dispatcher’s been stalling me because they’re tracing the call. Maybe even thinking of running a tap. Oh, hell! Why’d that stupid woman have to knock on my door?

At last, the dispatcher speaks again. “We’ll check it out.” Click.

Alright. Gotta straighten up a bit. Rinse my mouth out and splash some water on my face. Jump into a pair of cargo shorts. Strap on my sandals. Go out to the garage and sit at my desk and wait for the deputies to show up.

Uh oh. The garage is a little messy. I should put that ladder away. And those bags of deer feed and topsoil, better move those to the side.

And then I think, Wait a minute, if the deputies pull up and see me fiddling with things here they’ll think I’m trying to hide evidence.

So I sit back down. But, dammit, I have to put that ladder away. So I do. And I sit down and look out toward State Road 446, expectantly, innocently.

Wait. I can’t look too innocent. The deputies’ll figure I must be trying to hide something. So I try to look less innocent.

What do I do? Sneer? Play around with a switchblade?

An hour passes. No deputies. Hmm.

My phone rings. It’s the sheriff’s office. “Is that woman still wandering around your neighborhood?” the dispatcher asks.

“Naw, I don’t think so. I don’t know. Should I go out and look? Maybe I should call the neighbors.”

“No, no, that’s alright. I just wanna let you know we haven’t been able to send anyone out there yet because our deputies are tied up serving a warrant right now.”

“Okay! Yeah! Sure!” Now I’m the most cooperative citizen in the long history of Monroe County. And I know I sound as guilty as sin.

“We did send out some DNR officers to check out a similar report.”

Oh. DNR. Department of Natural Resources. They patrol the forests and lakes and other lonely places where bodies are found. I shiver.

“Well, thank you for following up!” I say, way too cheerfully. Damn. I’ve gotta be at the top of the suspect list by this point.

I hang up and sit back in my desk chair, watching State Road 446 though my open garage door. Lauren Spierer still has not been found. And the Bloomington area is still a rubber band pulled far too tight.

This post originally appeared in The Third City, Sunday, June 12, 2011.