Michael Wilson looked around his near empty house and smiled. He was finally getting out. He had worked with his realtor for months trying to get this place sold but now, he had accepted an offer and he and his sons were getting the house packed and ready.
3 years ago, Michael had bought the house after the accident. The cops had told him his wife had died instantly, but that didn't help him forget the image of the eighteen wheeler that had turned her car into little less than scraps and pieces. After that, everything had changed. The house that he and his wife had made into a home had felt both too empty and too full at the same time. It was filled with memories of happy times but yet empty of her presence. He tried to stick it out. He tried to stay there but it wasn't possible. That house was hollow now and he had felt nauseous every time he had taken that same road to work every day. He'd had to get out and he finally did. Moving himself and his boys to a new subdivision across town had been hard but staying there had been harder.
On paper, the house was perfect: five bedrooms, four and a half baths, enough yard for a pool, and plenty of room for his kids to have their own space. He'd have never been able to afford mortgage but the life insurance and the money he'd made from selling that old shell of their family life had been more than enough.
But now looking back, the idea of starting over had been a mere pope dream. Jacob, his oldest, had given up his scholarships to the fancy out of state colleges and chosen to stay local. Mark, his middle son had become rudderless, throwing himself into his dead-end job without really striving for anything more. Tim, the youngest had become a near recluse, spending his time studying and hanging out online instead of making friends and living the life of a healthy teen.
He knew his boys had worried about him and part of the blame for their shared suffering had been his own grief and their response to it but the other part had been the neighbor.
You can pick the perfect house in the perfect place but you can't pick your neighbors. Of course, the Jenkins next door had been great. The elderly couple were friendly and kind. They kept a clean yard and kept an eye on what was going on. No, the problem was the other neighbor Chuck.
When he'd bought the house in winter, it was hard to see the way Chuck kept his home. It looked like any of the other snow laden homes in the neighborhood. It was only after seeing it in the spring that Michael had realized just how lazy his neighbor was.
The yard had grown up to knee height. Michael had hated it but said nothing. One day when Mark, 16 at the time, had been finishing up the front yard, Michael had told him to go and do Chuck's front yard thinking nothing of the neighborly gesture. But had been shocked when Mark had described the way he had leered at him and thanked him for being such a hardworking young man.
After that, Michael had noticed the "security cameras" that Chuck had were all facing toward his house and especially the backyard where the pool was. How Chuck always seemed to be outside when he and his boys were doing something. How Chuck seemed to linger too long, look to openly, and how his comments always seemed to be just on the edge between appropriate and dirty. It was when he had commented over the fence about needing a poolboy like Jacob when he didn't even have a pool. That Michael had lost it and told him to stay the fuck away from his house and his boys.
That should have ended it but that's when the phone calls started. The landline would ring at all hours and upon answering, Michael would hear silence or a man's breathing.
Michael had called the cops after a month of the bullshit. When they hadn't been able to help, he had gotten rid of the landline. The harassment had continued for two more years before Michael had given up and now he stood in his house with the majority of the personal effects removed as his sons lifted the coffee table into the truck.
Life can be tough but neighbors can be hell. Michael was trying to start over again. This time in a much worse real estate market but he was starting over again. Away from the memories, away from the creep. To the old three bedroom that had come available in a town away.