Hey, Friends.
So, I have a story to tell you. It's kind of long, and it might ramble a bit. I'll try my best to keep it in order and coherent. I'm warning you up front that it's not a happy story, and it doesn't have a good ending. Basically, don't read it if you don't want to be bummed out. You've been warned.
It all started back on Thursday morning. I was at home, and I noticed a guy walking up and down my neighbor Walt's driveway. I didn't think anything of it at first. I thought maybe it was Central Hudson coming to read his electricity meter, or someone that was coming to do work on his house.
A few minutes later there is a knock on my front door, and it's the guy I had seen walking around Walt's yard. He tells me he's friends with Walt, but since he got sober a couple years ago he hadn't really hung out with him since Walt still drinks. Understandable. He had stopped by to visit, but had become concerned when he saw Walt's mail hadn't been taken in for a few days.
We went outside to look at Walt's house. I told him I hadn't seen him in a week or so. That's not unusual. I really only ever saw him if he was getting home from work when I was leaving in the morning, or if we both happened to be out in the yard working at the same time. I knew he had been parking on the street in front of his house because he seemed to be having a lot of trouble walking the last time I had seen him, and that would be the easiest way to get into the house.
His friend proceeded to tell me that Walt had cancer, and he had undergone a few surgeries on his leg to have things removed. I had no idea. He had never mentioned it to me at all. He told me he had tried calling, but that Walt wasn't answering the phone. Apparently that didn't surprise him in the slightest. He said Walt was kind of a hermit. He wouldn't answer the phone if he didn't feel like talking to anyone, and he could be sitting in the house and wouldn't answer the door if he didn't feel like having a visitor. The mail not having been brought in was concerning him. We went to check his garbage can and see if he had brought anything out. I honestly couldn't remember if he had brought the cans down for pick up this past Monday or not. I told him I hadn't seen him coming or going to work recently, and thought he might have retired. He told me he left his job a while back because of his health issues.
He was worried enough that he was going to call Walt's sister. He was considering calling the police to do a goodwill/healthcare check on him, but he didn't feel like it was his place. I promised I would keep an eye out for him, see if I saw any lights on in the house at night to at least indicate he was home.
Walt's a very nice man. I never would have considered him a "hermit". He just liked to keep to himself. He was always very friendly when we saw each other, and we would chat. He started, without ever being asked, using his snow blower to clear out the end of my driveway for me in the winter. He'd be getting home from work and have to clear his way into his driveway, so he just started doing mine so I could leave for work. I'd buy him Heineken (his drink of choice) as a thank you gift. He also gave me my
potentially pilfered presidential flowers because they were running rampant in his yard, and we always chatted about our gardens. He also fed the feral cats in the neighborhood (I do as well), and he had a litter of kittens that were born nearby that he let live in his garage this summer and he took care of them. He's a nice man, is my point.
This brings us to yesterday, Friends.
It was an absolutely gorgeous day outside, and since I was still on vacation I decided to go across the river for a hike. That's originally what this post was going to be about, but I'm going to save that for another time.
I finished my hike and ran a few errands before heading home. I got in the house, fed the outdoor cat who was on the back steps looking for food. I was wandering through the house, opening all of the doors and windows to let in the fresh air. I opened the front door, and saw this:
Ignore my Halloween decor
What the hell is going on? There were now 2 police cars parked in front of my house, and they literally were not there 5 minutes ago. Did someone get robbed? Accident on the highway and they parked up here to be out of the way?
So I go outside, and I see a woman with 2 officers standing in front of my neighbor's house. Oh no. Walt!
As I head over to talk to them, the officers head down the driveway toward Walt's back door.
I asked the woman if everything was okay, and she said she hoped so. We introduced ourselves, and it turns out she is Walt's sister. She told me he wasn't answering the phone or the door, and I told her about the friend looking for him the day before. She confirmed that he had called her. I told her what I had told him -- hadn't seen Walt recently, etc. She said she had called the police to check on him, and then said, "He's kind of a hermit. Doesn't like a lot of people. He's going to be so pissed at me if he's in there just fine and I called the cops on him." She said the cops were trying to find a way in to the house.
The officers came back and asked if everything was okay. I explained that I was Walt's neighbor, just asking what was going on. They asked if I need them to move one of the patrol cars since it was blocking my driveway. I told them it was fine, and went back into my house. I didn't want to be one of those people who stands outside gawking at the scene. Plus, his poor sister didn't need an audience if it turned out to be bad news.
That doesn't mean I wasn't trying to watch from the windows in my house.
It gets dark out pretty early at this point, and a lot of the lights on our street aren't working at the moment. (I just reported them all today. Let's get that shit fixed.) Jazz-kitty is spazzing out in the house, I've got the feral cat curled up and hiding on a rug on my back steps, and I'm just trying to cook dinner and figure out what the hell is going on.
At some point a fire truck and an ambulance arrived.
I see a guy with an ax or a hammer -- some kind of big tool -- walking down Walt's driveway. And then I can hear them breaking down his back door. Oh, God. This can't be good.
A short while later I noticed that the ambulance had left. Oh, no. What if Walt was really sick and needed help and was stuck in the house? I felt terrible for not having thought to check on him. And then I saw a guy with a camera walking up Walt's driveway. Maybe they had to take a picture of the damage done to his door?
All the lights in Walt's house were on now. I turned on my front porch light, since they were operating by the headlights of one of the police cars and it was really dark out. They had been there for almost 2 hours at that point, so around 7:30 at night.
I started messaging my friend (and neighbor) down the street, as I had seen that she had been outside earlier. I said that I thought something bad had happened to Walt. She said she thought he had passed away. She saw the officers tell the woman outside something, and she said "Oh no!" really loudly.
And then she told me all of this stuff about our neighborhood that I had no clue had happened. Like before I moved in, I guess there used to be people who hung out and slept in the little wooded area just beyond Walt's house. They would yell and throw things at people. She saw them when she was walking her dog, and they would get scared and run away.
She also said all kinds of people come wandering through our neighborhood now. She always sees a purse, or a piece of clothing just thrown by the side of the road. How have I not noticed any of this? I walk around the neighborhood on occasion when it's nice out and I have never noticed any of this. Not giving me a case of the warm fuzzies, Friends.
So I text my friend because, what the fuck. I'm kind of bugging out in my house while all of this is going down, and he knows how interesting my neighborhood can be.
I'm still kind of hoping that Walt just had to be taken to the hospital at this point. Not looking good, as why would the police still be there three hours later, but I was hoping.
I was still messaging my neighbor, texted my Mom to tell her what was going on. She stops by my house frequently while I'm at work. Maybe she had seen Walt more recently than I had. Nope.
Eventually I get a knock on my door with the announcement that it's the town police. I was kind of expecting that.
The officer said he had an unusual question for me. Had I heard any gunshots recently?
Gunshots?!
I know I must have looked shocked, because that was not what I thought he was going to ask. I assumed it was going to be more like: did I know Walt? Had I seen him recently? When did I last remember seeing him, etc.
I told him no, but I would be a bad judge of that anyway. Gunshot, car backfiring on the highway - I honestly don't know that I wouldn't have heard a gunshot and assumed it was something else.
And then I said, "Walt's not okay, is he."
And the officer confirmed that he had passed away.
I said I felt horrible, that I should have checked on him. The officer said not to feel bad, wasn't my fault, and from what he had gathered Walt didn't like many people.
I told him Walt liked me, and the short version of how he would remove the snow from my driveway and I would give him Heineken in return. The officer said, "Well, there was certainly plenty of that in the house."
Whoa. Alrighty, not going any further down that route.
Apparently the gunshots were not the unusual question. He wanted to know if I had a power drill and screws they could use to secure the back door. I told him I didn't think so, but I could check out in the garage -- I have my brother's tool box in there. (I got it when it didn't make the move to Texas with him.) He told me not to worry about it, he'd ask around.
Screw that. I grabbed a flashlight and went out in my garage to look. Pretty soon the officer joined me. We found a power drill, but no battery to go with it. I had a hammer and some nails, told him he could take whatever he needed. He said they'd find something else.
I went back in the house and then it hit me -- Walt had a bunch of tools in his garage. I remember our neighbor behind us telling me that Walt had lent him some of his power tools once. So I went outside, saw a different officer, and I told him that Walt should have some tools in his garage, that he had lent them out to people before. He told me they had looked but couldn't find anything. That seemed odd.
I went back in the house. I was freaking out a little bit at this point. I felt horrible that Walt had passed away, right next door, and it had never crossed my mind to check on him and see if he was okay. But what the fuck did gunshots have to do with anything? Was Walt murdered? My friend down the street had said she was worried someone had robbed him or something.
So I called my brother. He can totally be helpful from all the way down in Texas!
I tell him the whole saga of what's been going on. First, he said I would know if I heard a gunshot. It does not sound the same as a car backfiring. I would have been able to tell the difference.
And then he made an excellent point: murderers don't normally lock the house up after they kill someone. They just flee the scene. The police had to break down the door. If there were gunshots involved, it was probably because Walt had committed suicide. They were probably trying to establish a timeline.
Oh God.
I mean, I felt better hearing the logic that there probably wasn't a murderer running loose in the neighborhood. But, holy shit. Not making me feel any better about not having checked up on Walt.
We talked about Halloween and some other things. I felt a little better after I got off of the phone with him. Thanks for being there, Bro!
The police eventually left. I had still been messaging my friend down the street. She told me to keep an eye on Walt's house -- make sure nobody tried to steal his stuff. On it. That's the least I could do at this point.
A little after 9 pm I hear four loud bangs. Oh hell, no. That better be someone setting off fireworks. We can hear them from everywhere -- Marist has them at times, I can see when Vassar shoots them off from my house, and we can hear them from down by the Hudson River when they have them. I get a message from my friend down the street immediately asking if I had heard that.
Yup. I definitely did. So I take a quick peek at the back of Walt's house, just to make sure no one is trying to get in there. Thankfully the moon was pretty bright last night, so I could see that no one was near his house. It was First Friday in the city of Poughkeepsie last night. Maybe they were shooting off fireworks? That was my hope. Two more bangs, but I can't see any sign of fireworks anywhere.
So I text my friend again. He'll probably know. I'm pretty sure he was probably at First Friday.
And then I tried to distract myself enough for the rest of the evening to be able to attempt to get some sleep. I was super paranoid that every odd sound was someone trying to break into Walt's house, and I just felt bad that I hadn't done anything to help him and had no clue what had happened right next door.
This morning I went out and got the numbers off the streetlights and reported them as being out. After all the stories I heard last night about the crazy shit that has gone down in this neighborhood over the years, I want some damn working lights.
I saw my neighbor across the street, who was out working in her garden. We discussed what had happened last night, tried to remember the last time either of us had seen Walt. She liked him too. Said he was very nice man, and his mother had been a lovely woman. I barely knew her -- she was sick and passed away not too long after I moved in.
We went over to Walt's together to check the back door -- make sure it looked at least shut and like no one had tried to get inside. It looked okay. Didn't seem like anyone had tried to get in.
And then I was telling her all of the crazy stories I heard last night about what had gone on before I moved in. She said that's why she has an alarm system. She wasn't even going to tell me how many times her house had been broken into over the years.
What the hell.
How can I possibly not know any of this had gone down?! I mean, clearly I couldn't have known about the shit that happened before I bought my house and moved in, but still. I'm a little creeped out, not gonna lie.
Walt's sister is at his house now -- I heard voices in the driveway and went out to see what was happening. I told her I had tried to keep an eye on the house, and that I was so sorry for her loss. She thanked me and let me know that a crew from ServePro would be here today, and possibly Monday as well. I didn't ask any other questions.
I told you, Friends. It wasn't a happy story.
Goodbye, Walt. I hope you are at peace. I'll think of you every time the lilies in my garden bloom.
