The look on Patricia Thompson’s face when she pulled into her driveway and saw me stepping out of the house directly across the street was worth documenting for posterity. Her grocery bag slipped from her hands, sending cans rolling across her perfectly manicured lawn as she stood there, mouth agape, looking like she had seen a ghost. “No, no, no, no, no,” she shrieked, the sound carrying clearly across the quiet suburban street. “This can’t be happening.” I offered a friendly wave as I walked to my mailbox, acting as though our encounter at the store had not happened. “Beautiful evening, isn’t it, neighbor?” I called out pleasantly. Her face turned an alarming shade of purple as she scrambled to collect her scattered groceries, shooting daggers at me with every movement.
That night, the war began in earnest. At exactly two in the morning, music started blasting from the Thompson house at a volume that probably violated several city ordinances. I could see Patricia through her living-room window, phone in hand, live-streaming to what I assumed was some private neighborhood group. “Teaching the intruder a lesson,” I heard her shout over the music. “This is what happens when the wrong element tries to move into our neighborhood.” I calmly reached for my phone and started documenting everything, texting my deputy chief a simple message. Phase one initiated. They’re taking the bait. At three in the morning the music finally stopped, only to be replaced by the sound of eggs hitting my front door. Tyler’s aim was terrible. Most of them hit the siding, leaving trails of yolk that would be a pain to clean. By four in the morning, their three dogs mysteriously got loose and ran straight into my yard, where they proceeded to dig up my newly planted flower beds and leave a mess on my front steps. I watched it all from my window, my security cameras capturing every moment in crystal-clear high definition. Patricia stood on her porch in a silk robe, pretending to call for the dogs while making no actual effort to retrieve them. “Oh no,” she called out in the fakest voice I had ever heard. “How did they get out? Bad dogs, come back.” She was still filming herself, probably thinking she was creating plausible deniability. What she was actually creating was evidence.
The next morning I was out front watering my surviving plants as if nothing had happened. The egg residue on my door had already been documented and cleaned, the dog mess removed, and my flower beds temporarily repaired. Patricia marched across the street like she was leading an army, though her confidence faltered slightly when she saw how calm I appeared. “You don’t belong here,” she spat, stopping just at the edge of my property line. “This is a nice neighborhood. A family neighborhood. We have standards.” I continued watering my plants, not even looking at her as I responded. “It certainly is a lovely neighborhood. I can see why you’d want to protect it from people who throw eggs at houses and let their dogs destroy property.” Her face flushed, but she pressed on. “I don’t know what you’re implying, but I’ll make your life here an absolute hell until you leave.” “Ma’am,” I said, finally turning to face her with a pleasant smile, “you already started. Please feel free to continue. I’m documenting everything for posterity.” The warning was subtle but clear. Patricia’s eyes narrowed as she noticed the security camera mounted prominently by my front door. She laughed, pointing at it. “You think that scares me? You think one little camera is going to protect you?” She spun on her heel and marched back to her house, already pulling out her phone to text someone.
That night I watched from my study as Tyler crept across the street with a baseball bat. He smashed the visible camera with three swings, then pulled out a can of spray paint. What he wrote on my garage door was so vile, so racist, that even describing it makes my stomach turn. But the best part was that he filmed himself doing it, posting to what he thought was a private social-media account. “Got his camera,” he captioned the video. “Now the loser can’t prove anything. Mom’s going to be so proud.” Of course, what neither Tyler nor Patricia knew was that the visible camera was a decoy, a thirty-dollar fake from an online retailer. The real cameras, four of them in total, were hidden in my porch lights, mailbox, doorbell, and a decorative rock in my garden. Every angle was covered. Every crime recorded in perfect detail.