Like A Good Neighbor

Do you ever play that game where you pick a random couple in a restaurant and then, at your table, imagine their lives? Like this:

Sometimes B and I like to play that game, spinning elaborate tales over dinner. We especially like to play the game with people and neighbors we encounter in our building, the repeated sightings make our hypothesis that much funnier or crazy, depending on the story we have woven. Of course there was the time that I continued to darkly insist that our neighbor was a drug dealer and, SURPRISE, HE WAS, YAY POLICE. I think we quit playing for awhile after that, something about being right and B was worried that if I jokingly said the new neighbor above us was very Dexter-esque that might come true too.

Then a new couple moved in and we couldn’t help but speculate. They were an odd couple, she is tall and willowy and pretty and he….resembles Paul Bunyan. No, seriously, he has the beard and wears a lot of flannel and if their dog was any bigger I’d suspect it was an ox in disguise and I’d start calling it Blue or Babe or whatever that Bunyan character named his ox. Anyway, he drives a rather non-descript car and we started noticing on the weekends it was gone….but the most insane cars ever were taking its place. 

Bentley’s with custom interiors…a Lamborghini. Two different Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren’s. A Rolls Royce. At this point we couldn’t help but play “What’s their story” and we decided that while Mr. Bunyan was off in the woods cutting down trees on the weekend for extra hazard pay, Ms. Thing was clearly in some sort of adult business because OH MY GOD LOOK, AN ENZO FERRARI. We suspected she was related to someone in Hollywood, or perhaps she had every Alderman and politician in the state in her back pocket. As the cars continued the stories grew more elaborate. A Prince in Dubai. Secret wealth. Oprah’s long lost sister. Then we’d see her in the elevator and blush as the dogs played, thinking we know you are up to something….. and we’d laugh at the latest concoction of tales we’d created. Then we’d see another Rolls Royce and it would start all over again.

I don’t remember exactly how the mystery unraveled, but after a good 8 months of fun and stories we realized, no, sadly, Mr. Bunyan was not a logger. He works for some crazy body shop/car dealer that does custom work on very, very, very high end cars…and as a perk he gets to bring some of them home for the weekends.

No prince in Dubai.

No escort service to the rich and powerful.

Not even a sugar-Daddy (or ten) on the side.

Just a couple with a really cool job perk. Even cooler than telecommuting.

Now I need to invite them over for dinner to tell them all about the drug dealer who used to live in their unit. We also need to solve the mystery of the lady down the hall that has a new dent or ding in her car every week and wears entirely too much Victoria Secret Love Spell, despite the fact that it is only marketed to high school cheerleaders. I mean, what is the story behind that?