Dingos stole my Underpants!

Okay, not really. But somebody did.

A number of years ago, I lived in a decrepit apartment building located in the college ghetto of BG. It was one of those buildings that people say “have character” to make you feel better about living there. It was a hole. Everything inside it looked like it hadn’t been replaced in years. The ceiling over the shower had cracks which would leak whenever the people upstairs showered. I kept waiting for the day that the upstairs tub would just finally fall through my bathroom ceiling with a naked person in it. Luckily, that never happened. The carpet was so dirty, the soles of my feet turned black if I walked on it for too long without socks. Totally disgusting I know, but I guess that’s what happens when you sign a lease at the last minute without even taking a look at the place.

Every few nights or so, a fight usually occurred in the hallways or outside in the parking lot. It was usually girls fighting with their boyfriends or if we were lucky, girls fighting each other. (Aren’t those the best kind?) We heard all sorts of dirty laundry about everyone because the walls were so thin. It was like living in the middle of an ongoing soap opera.

The neighbors to my right we’re the classiest of the bunch. It was a guy and a girl in their 20’s and they had a baby. Many mornings found me being awakened by the sound of a woman screaming/pounding loudly at my neighbor’s door. Her rants usually consisted of the same two themes: “My son’s too good for you” and “You’re a terrible mother”. After several concurrent days of this, it began to grow tiring. And she was like clockwork. Every day, 9 o’clock sharp.

One morning, after several minutes of this, I poked my head out of my door to see what the hell was going on. A leviathan of a woman was pounding on my neighbors door with her meaty fists. She was dressed in all of her trailer park finery.

Woman (to me): Hey! You know the girl that lives in this apartment? She’s a bad mother. If you hear anything going on in there, you call the fucking cops!
*resumes pounding on door*

Me: Uh….Okay?

Woman: *Yelling into closed door* You hear that bitch? This girl next door is going to call the cops on you if you do anything funny in there!

Me: Um, excuse me? Excuse me! Maam? I never said that…. *trails off, tries inching back into door*

Woman: Hey! You call the cops if you hear anything at all! You hear me? I ain’t jokin around!

Me: I have to go now.

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One evening before leaving for work, I decided to put in a load of laundry. It was mostly bras, underwear, and socks, with a few sweatshirts and some towels. My boyfriend at the time was staying at the apartment while I worked, so I asked him if he could grab my clothes out of the dryer when they were done, since they would be finished in about an hour and a half. He agreed, and I left.

Upon returning from work, I found that he had in fact forgotten to grab my clothes because he had been busy putting together a new entertainment center for me. So I trudged up to the third floor to retrieve them. Much to my dismay, I found the dryer to be empty, with none of my clothes in sight. Not even so much as a wayward sock or even a dryer sheet. My clothes had totally disappeared.

I immediately began freaking out. Mostly because all of my bras and just about every pair of underwear I owned had been in the wash, leaving me with only the bra and underwear I wore to sustain me. Frantically, I knocked on everyone’s doors telling them my sob story hoping that one of them would tell me that they’d accidentally grabbed them. No one did. Most of the people were really nice about it, and genuinely sorry that they didn’t know where they were. Everyone, that is, except my next door neighbor.

As I spoke with her about my clothes, I glimpsed a suspect basket of laundry in the hallway of her apartment. When it became apparent that I was trying to look around her and at the clothes in the basket, she quickly told me that she hadn’t seen my clothes and promptly closed her door in my face. Stunned, I was left both pantiless (pantyless?) and without hope. My clothes were gone. Gone forever.

I couldn’t understand. Who would steal someone else’s lingerie? It’s like buying used underwear at the Goodwill. You don’t know where they’ve been or what that person had going on down there. I realize that mine were clean because I’d washed them, but I had worn them. They had touched my private parts. I of course began to envision the worst. A fat, sweaty, bald guy watching Baywatch, wearing my underwear on his head, sniffing the crotches and rubbing them on his face. It was enough to give me the chills.

Grudgingly, I went to the store and purchased more underwear, socks, and bras. I was very angry because buying all that stuff at once is really expensive. So angry, in fact, I considered putting a sign up by the mailboxes.

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Dear underwear thief:

I hope you are enjoying your ill gotten undergarments. I just wanted to let you know that I have a raging case of the herpes.

Enjoy.

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Of course everyone at work thought the whole incident was hilarious. They would pantomime wearing my underwear on their heads and do their best silence of the lambs impressions. My misery was their utmost joy.

Months went by, and eventually the incident faded from memory. Until one day, it all caming screaming back to me.

While vaccuming my living room one afternoon, I happened to see my next door neighbor walking through the parking lot. She was pushing a baby stroller. It wouldn't have been a big deal except she was wearing a pair of my sweatpants. Can you believe it? That bold white trash tart had the nerve to wear my clothes around the apartment building where I could see her in plain sight.

And it didn't end there. The following week while doing my laundry, I discovered a pair of my underwear in a load of laundry that she'd left in the dryer. I began rooting through the clothes. Sure enough, I found one of my towels, a pair of my sweatpants, four more pairs of my underwear, and a bra. (I left the bras and underwear, but took the other stuff back). I briefly entertained the idea of putting all of her clothes into a trashbag and throwing them in the dumpster, but changed my mind when I saw the baby clothes. (too nice, I know. Fuck that baby! j/k of course).

She got the message. She never left her clothes in the dryer ever again, and made sure to avoid me at all costs around the apartment. In retrospect, I wish I would've thrown her damn clothes away, the bitch.