They took me from my own kitchen and they criticised it on the way out

I want it known that for sixteen years I lived at number 14 Dulacca Street, next to Cheryl, and in that time I was woken by blue light coming through her laundry window on more occasions than I could count, and I never once complained to the council, and on the night they put Cheryl back at the wrong house I made her a cup of tea and drove her the forty metres home, because that is what you do.

So I think I had earned, if I’m honest, a bit of consideration. What I got instead was a review.

The night

Tuesday, of course. The 6th of September. I’d been up late because the dog had been sick on the good rug, and I was at the sink at about a quarter to three rinsing it out, when the kitchen went blue.

I knew straight away what it was. You don’t live next to Cheryl for sixteen years without knowing. I turned round, and there were three of them in the doorway to the hall. Small ones. Grey. The big black eyes. One of them had its head tilted the way the dog does when you say “walk” in a sentence that isn’t about a walk.

I said, “Oh, for God’s sake,” and I put the rug down.

The inspection

Now, Cheryl has always said that they float you straight out. They did not float me straight out. They came in.

The lead one came over to the stove, and it reached up, and it ran one long grey finger along the underside of the rangehood, and then it looked at the finger. And then it looked at me.

I have never in my life been so mortified. That rangehood was original to the house. It was a 1978 Westinghouse and you could not get the filters and I had done my best with it for thirty years and I will go to my grave saying it was clean enough.

The second one opened the pantry. I don’t know how it knew which door was the pantry. It stood and looked at my tins, and it moved the tomatoes to be with the other tomatoes, because I had them in two places, which I know, I know. It then closed the pantry door, which did not close properly, because it never has, and it tried it again, and it looked at the third one.

The third one just stood in the doorway and touched the lino with its foot. The lino had a lift near the fridge. It touched the lift. It touched it again. I said, “I know.”

The procedure

Then they took me, and I’ll say this for them, after all that the procedure itself was brief, professional, and conducted in what I’d call a tidy environment, which I now realise was the point. They had standards. The bench was wiped. The floor was spotless. There was a place for everything. I lay there looking at the ceiling, which was seamless, and I thought, well, no wonder.

I was put back at the sink at about ten past four. The rug was where I’d left it. The three of them went out the way they came, and the last one, the lino one, stopped in the doorway, and turned, and looked at the rangehood one more time. Then they were gone.

Afterwards

I went next door at seven and told Cheryl, and she said “Oh, Maureen, welcome,” and hugged me, and then she said “Did they say anything about Gary?” and I said no, Cheryl, they said something about my rangehood, and she said that was very unusual and I should write it up.

I did not write it up. I rang a kitchen place in Roma.

I have since had the whole kitchen done. New rangehood, ducted, self-cleaning filters. Soft-close pantry. Floating floor over the lino. Tomatoes together. It cost me a sum I will not put on the internet, and I did not do it for them, I want to be clear about that. I did it for me. But I’ll also say that I did it quickly, and that I kept the brochure for the rangehood next to the bed for a fortnight afterwards, in case.

They have not been back. Cheryl says that means they’re satisfied. I think it means they’ve moved on to someone else’s kitchen, and I think about that person sometimes, at a quarter to three, and I hope they’ve got their tins sorted.

Maureen has asked us to add that she does not want to join the Tuesday group, that she has been to one, that there was a plate, and that she has “views on the plate”.

Document U8MC-11-0306. Status: CONFIRMED. This file is retained indefinitely, or until the Men in Beige ask for it, whichever is never.

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