The Bughouse

A representative of DOPE visited the Founder in the bughouse recently.  The Founder was wrapped in a straitjacket, sitting in his padded room, looking through the bars of the window at the Hudson.

‘It’s a lovely view’, he told DOPE.  ‘I can’t see this this from my home.  Do you remember the joke about Jesus on the cross?  I should be committed more often.’

‘You want me to ask them to unlace you’, DOPE asked.

‘Who are you and who do you represent’, the Founder asked.

‘I’m with DOPE’, DOPE said.

‘You look like you are nineteen’, the Founder said.  DOPE did, in fact, look like he was nineteen.  He was pale and scrawny.  His voice had vocal fry and the sleeves of his hoodie had thumb-holes.  When he spoke, he flicked bangs away from his eyes.

‘I’ll be twenty-two in September’, DOPE said.

‘What the hell is DOPE’, the Founder asked.

‘It is a new department that the Dirtlease board instituted shortly after you came in here.  ‘‘DOPE’ stands for the Department of Park Efficiency.  It is also a play on the name of a common crypto currency.’

‘Guard’, the Founder said, ‘Take this clown out of here!’

‘They can’t hear you’, DOPE said.

‘Can you unlace my straitjacket’, the Founder asked.

‘I don’t think that that is a good idea anymore’, DOPE said.

‘Fuck’, the Founder mused.

DOPE walked over to the window and looked out, with his back to the Founder.  ‘You can see Greenland from here’, he said.  ‘It is beautiful.’

‘That’s New Jersey, you moron’, the Founder said.  ‘What have you done to the parks since I left?’

‘We have cut the fat by reducing unnecessary services provided to residents.  As you know, the park in central New York provides trash removal services to residents but the park in northern New York does not.’

‘That’s right.’

‘So, we stopped providing trash removal services in central New York.’

‘What else?’

‘We re-thought our water strategy.  We decided that, when residents have access to water, they abuse that privilege.  So, we cut the water lines.’

‘Don’t we meter for water?’

‘Used to.’

‘And doesn’t that minimize waste?’

‘Oh, sure.  But we still have to, you know provide the pipes and fix leaks.’

‘So – people don’t have access to water?’

DOPE looked at the Founder in a hurt way and said, ‘What do you think we are – a bunch of monsters?  Of course people can use water!  We would never deny access to water!  Water is the most beautiful, most American hydrating fluid in the world!  And all the water in the world is manufactured here, in the United States!  We just ask people to truck drinking water in themselves.’

‘What about gray water and black water?

‘I will discuss black water later.’

The Founder stood up and put his face in the corner.  The padding was covered with rough canvas and smelled like crazy people.  He tried to stick his nose as tightly into the corner as he could.

‘Do you know why I am in here’, he asked.

‘Actually, no’, DOPE said.  ‘You came here before I started and the board has the attention span of a gnat.  Was it Siobhan?’

‘Kind of’, the Founder said.

‘How, kind of’, DOPE said.

‘Sibhan spread some more lies about me, but that is just Tuesday’, the Founder said.  ‘It is what the Department of State did with those lies that precipitated the behavior that caused me to come here.’

‘They have replaced the rug and the rest of the furniture in your office’, DOPE said.  ‘I intervened personally to allow for the expense.’

 ‘How else have you trashed my legacy’, the Founder asked.

‘We decided that it didn’t make sense for residents to just, you know, exist on the space they lease, so we made them accountable.  They need to earn the right to occupy the space they lease.  Every Sunday, residents are now required to send a list of at least five bullet points describing their park-related achievements for the week.’

‘How has that gone?’

‘It has surpassed expectations.  Did you know that home surgery, duct tape plumbing and flushable cat litter are achievements?  We have also asked people to dispose of their own black water.’

‘Say again?’

‘Septic isn’t free!  Until we came in, customers were just disposing of their black water into our system, which we built with our money!  Our new rule is, ‘If you excrete it, you delete it.’  All septic produced in the park has to be carted out of the park by the person who produced it.  No exceptions’.

‘Where do they dump it?’

‘We have also cut costs by firing our maintenance staff.  Site visits were a politically-motivated practice engaged in by the prior administration.  So, we don’t know where they dump the black water and we don’t care.’  When he said that, DOPE giggled like a nineteen-year-old boy.  The Founder pressed his nose deeper into the passed wall-corner and thought about a bad trip that he had had when he was eighteen.  He had spent four hours curled in a fetal position, terrified at the abyss within and without.  Soft hands and kind words from his friends had not helped, because they were, he thought, outside of his perception-box.  This was much worse than that.

‘I didn’t finish telling you how I got here’, he said.

DOPE scrolled though his phone and said, absently, ‘Do tell’.

‘Well, Sibhan dropped a dime to the Department of State to say that we had sold her a home without a C of O.’

‘Was that true?’

‘Kind of.  All the work had been finished.  We just needed the building inspector to, you know, inspect it.  Then her little green men started destroying manufacturer warranty stickers and installer stickers.’ 

‘Have you seen this’, DOPE asked.  He turned the screen of his phone toward the Founder.  When the Founder took his nose out of the wall-corner, he saw a young woman with an abnormally thin waist, a large butt and long, thick eyelashes applying makeup. 

‘Could you focus, please’, the Founder said.

‘Sorry’, DOPE said.

‘The problem, as I said earlier, was not Siobhan being a pest.  That’s what she does.  It was the numb-nut at the Department of State who got her complaint.  When I told him that the C of O was obtained shortly after we sold the home to Sibohan, he asked me if the home had a warranty sticker, a data plate and an installer’s certificate.  I said, ‘Yes, duuuh.  Obtaining those three stickers is a necessary but not sufficient condition for getting a C of O’.

‘You spoke to him like that?’

‘Of course not.’

DOPE pulled up an Only Fans video on his phone and quickly muted the volume.

‘And then the numb-nut asked me where the stickers were.  I said, ‘Well – in older homes, these stickers were placed on the inside of the door of the cabinet under the kitchen sink.  Then, people started putting them in the master bedroom closet.  This particular model does not have a master bedroom closet.  So, we put it in the cabinet underneath the kitchen sink, as if it were an older model.’’

DOPE kept his eyes on his phone as the Founder was speaking.  ‘If you are the best the board could find’, the Founder said, ‘We are totally and utterly fucked.’  DOPE looked up from his phone and said, ‘What?’

‘This particular home’, the Founder said, ‘was a TRU by Clayton.  It had some nice design features, but the build was crap.  One of the design features is a pantry off the kitchen with washer-dryer hookups and a shutoff that can turn off the water for the whole home.  The space used by that pantry area is space that would otherwise be used to make a master bedroom closet.’

‘So – what happened?’

‘The numb-nut says, ‘The sticker needs to go in the master bedroom closet’.  I say, ‘There is no master bedroom closet.’  He says, ‘The sticker has to go there.’  I say, ‘There’s no there there.’  Do you like Tommy Orange?’

‘Who?’

‘So, I say, ‘This is a TRU issue.  They manufactured the home.  HUD approved it and TRU warrantied it.  I just took delivery’, and he says, ‘As the retailer, it is your responsibility to make sure that the home conforms with applicable requirements.’  I say, ‘The home conforms with the HUD code.  In no possible world is a master bedroom closet a structural issue.  I suggest that your time, and my tax dollars, would be better spent if you went after significant issues.’  He says, ‘A violation is a violation.’’

‘What happened after that?  What does he want from you?’

‘I am not sure.  I remember grabbing the underside of my desk and flipping it over, and I faintly remember gnawing on the rug.  Then, I was here and a week had gone by.  Now, it has been a month.  Could you get me some hookers? It gets lonely in here.  If you can’t get hookers, could I get some cigarettes?’

DOPE looked bored the way a nineteen-year-old with security clearance can look.  ‘I’m actually not here to talk about that’, he said.  ‘I’m here to tell you that changes have been made to the company health insurance policy.  The board has decided that it is not OK for you to just sit around in the bughouse and be crazy.  You have to earn the right to do that.’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘We want you to produce content for executive orders.’

‘I don’t think I will be much help.  I’m a gibbering idiot in a straitjacket.’

‘We will pour some black water into the room before you begin.’