It HAPPENED AGAIN to be continued post...

To make sense of this post please read THIS ONE and then THIS ONE first…

There are patios and then there are PATIOS. We managed to acquire one of massive proportions upon moving into our new place MUCH to my pleasure. For over a month it was completely covered in boxes and ‘furniture’ (childhood toys and memorabilia, chairs without seats, tables without their legs etc…) but eventually, all of these items miraculously disappeared into the closets and cubbyholes of our house. A Vancouver winter had left the deck covered in scum and caked on dirt but that day the sun was shining and the moment felt right – it was time for some good ‘ole power washing!

There’s nothing I love more than a high-powered hose with an attachment that has some sort of ‘power-jet-stream’ function on it. I often envy those that actually get paid to do this for a living; stripping off grime to reveal cleanliness has so many rewards! After planting my flower boxes and hanging baskets I gave it a good sweeping and slug the hose up onto the deck. I then proceeded to start the much needed patio cleanse. The deck had a slight lipped edge to it, making it difficult to get the water to wash off the sides and instead the water and soil slowly funneled and hence plugged its only outlet… a 1“ x 1” drainage hole. In the blind joy of the jet stream I failed to notice this until about 50 gallons of water had backed up around the hole. In vain I tried to scoop out the dirt with my fingers, but realized that the problem had fused itself in the drainage pipe, situated in the carport below.

Earlier that day I’d noticed the ‘white girl’ wondering around the yard and back alley. Her strawberry blonde hair hung in stringy chunks around her face – unbrushed, unwashed for god only knows how long. She wore a pair of soiled men’s denim pants and an oversized royal blue soccer jersey. Her eyes had the hollow look of ‘crackhead’ to them… no colour, just deep dark pupils of blackness. They were set deep into a squished up childlike face, thickly peppered with freckles. She’d peak around the corner of the alley and up the short length of the fence to the basement door below. A loud ‘come HERE’ whistle from Eddie and she quickly trotted up to carport, like a dog with its tail between its legs. As usual, at around 1pm there were horrible yells, bangs and slamming doors from the suite below. One-sided conversations floated up from the floorboards… “NO! NOooooo! FUCK YOU EDDIE! Please! PLEASE don’t make me sit in the alley!” and “What AM I to you! A F---ing DOG? You can’t treat me like this!” and “What cha gonna do HUH!? HUH Eddie?! You gonna hit me you big man??! Do it… DO IT! Why don’t you just kill ME!?” I chewed my peanut butter and banana sandwich slowly, shaking my head back and forth in disbelief. Afternoons like this happened every other day – the screaming, the fights, the mild beatings. There were scads of crying sessions as well… but the kind of crying an 8 year old uses for attention more than actual anguish or pain- the boo-hoo-hoo-hoo kind of bawling – fake and tearless. You know… the type that stops and starts when someone is looking or paying attention? It gets pretty old after 20 minutes.

I stared down at the 10 x 10 foot puddle that had formed around the hole. I could hear water drizzling onto the concrete below and decided to go take a look. Hopping down the back porch stairs I rounded the corner and pushed open the door that led to the carport below. Fully opened the door barely cleared a figure sitting cross-legged on the ground. It was the girl. She held a takeout container to her mouth, shoveling into it some sort of Asian noodle. There is a type of comedic timing that we often only see on cheesy TV sitcoms – the kind that rarely - if ever, happens in real life. Well in the mere seconds it took me to stop the door from slamming into the wall again, my mouth dropped open, eyes wide with horror at the sight before me. Looking upwards I watched as the drainage pipe twitched and then BURST open – spewing a MASSIVE explosion of black water into the air! Trying to jump up in time to avoid the 50 gallons of liquid was futile, and the girl – situated about a foot away from the pipe above was instantly soaked. Pushing past her and apologizing profusely, I tried in vain to reconnect the pipe. My attempt only made things worse, shooting the mud out even further. Hearing the commotion, Eddie appeared in his doorway to find the both of us covered in mud and water. The girl said, “It’s OK… I’m fine.” I told her again how sorry I was and that I was pretty much finished. I retreated to my unfinished deck upstairs feeling horrible… welllll, not really horrible but more so embarrassed as this was the first and only interaction I would have with the girl.

Later that day I saw her ride away with Eddie, perched precariously on the crossbar of his stolen bike. She had changed her shirt but her jeans and hair were caked with the dark potting soil from my planters. Sure that they were gone for the evening I grabbed the key to the storage room we had in the carport. I had noticed that the door was ajar while down there trying to fix the pipe… Turns out I didn’t need the key as the door was unlocked. I peered inside and was pissed off yet saddened by what I saw. A lone 100-watt light bulb burned away, flooding the dingy room with light. The soaked soccer jersey was tossed into a corner. A water bottle filled with yellow liquid. A plastic dustpan filled with cigarette butts. An empty drug baggy with white residue. A crack pipe. A pair of dirty tube socks. Our things had been moved around to make room for a makeshift bed – a grungy blanket and overstuffed toy bear as a pillow made that obvious. This was no longer our storage space but a drug addicts bachelor suite. She’d even tried to hook up our vintage TV to our old VCR… Now what? I thought… I wish there was a handbook on how one should handle such situations. I closed the door and locked it. Back upstairs I rearranged my pretty plants and organized our inviting patio, all the while the scene of the exploding pipe played over and over and over again in my head…


AGAIN this is to be continued…