Hank Stein, �The Prisoner: A Day in the Life�
This is part fifteen of a 25-part story about Hawaii. The story begins here. Part five is located here. Part ten is here. Other parts you'll have to find yourself. So there.
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Okay, now I�m bored. Reading a mediocre book based on a brilliant television show isn�t helping either. So I�m actually relieved when I first hear a knock at a door. We have visitors!
Then I remember that we�re not actually supposed to be here.
As it turns out, it�s my dad�s friend, the one who helped us move. She�s come to collect some of the few things my father left behind, like the coffee table, the end table, his television, and some plants around the bungalow. We help her load up her car, and promise to bring the stuff we can�t fit over to her house when we vacate tomorrow morning.
After she leaves, another guy knocks on our window. It�s a neighbor, who explains that he gave my father some money for some of his stuff, and one of the things he was supposed to get is his television � the television that my father�s friend just took away.
We watched this television on the night my father left, before the cable was cut off, catching the tail end of Adult Swim. This is a shitty television set, even by my father�s standards, hence why he�s decided to leave it behind. But I promise I�ll get it back for him.
Another five minutes pass and there�s another knock at the door. It�s a different neighbor asking for my father. Since we�re not supposed to be here, but he has paid his rent though the first, I tell him that he�s supposed to come back and pick up the rest of his stuff. We�re just waiting for him to call, so we can pick him up at the airport.
�Oh,� he says. �Well, he gave me one of his chairs, you know the electric one that goes back?�
When we first arrived here, my dad introduced us to the only guy in our complex who he actually got along with, a guy named Marty who tooled around in an electric wheelchair. Marty offered some unsolicited commentary on the situation of these houses that they reside in. It seems that they used to be set aside for the elderly, like my father, or the disabled, like Marty.
But I guess they had too many units, and Marty now says with some resentment that the government now lets anybody in here. It almost sounds like he�s going to say, �When I first got here, there wasn�t a black man in the entire neighborhood.� But he expands on his complaint.
�They�re letting all these people who are Section 8 or recovering drug addicts. There�s some real nuts here now.�
I think I�ve just met one of the nuts. I�m sitting around in boxer shorts, so I�m not about to open the door. The guy stands at the window, looking around wildly, though never actually looking in the house.
�Uh yeah. So. Uh. The chair? It don�t work. It used to work, but now it won�t go back anymore.�
�Really?� I say, still not getting up.
�Uh. Yeah. So. Uh. Will he be back?�
�Soon, but we�re not sure it will be today. I�ll tell him about it.�
�Uh. Yeah. Okay. So. Okay.�
He continues to stand at the window, not looking inside. Finally he walks away.
We hear his voice soon after, but he�s not at our window. He�s at the house behind us again, the house blasting Wheel of Fortune at top volume.
�Elaina,� he says. �Elaina. Open the door, Elaina. Elaina, open the door.�
Oh Christ, having a place to ourselves with a hot shower and bathtub and electricity is nice, but I�m ready to go camping.
