3: 3
The last couple of days, we'd been busy handing out welfare packages to residents who'd prepaid their property fees for the whole year.
Pantry staples. One set per household.
Katherine Finch saw the announcement in the group chat and came down to the property office again.
"Property Manager Harrington, that pantry set of yours—send one up to 503."
I really couldn't believe her.
She was nearly a year behind on her fees. Over three thousand dollars.
We'd posted three payment notices, and she'd torn down every one and thrown it in the elevator.
I kept handing packages to the residents in line.
"Only prepaid residents get them. Your fees haven't been paid."
She was not happy.
"Why are you treating me differently?"
"They can get one but I can't?"
"Is this because I filed a complaint after you people wronged me? So now you're settling a personal score, is that it?"
Out came her phone again.
"I'm going live right now, let everybody see"
"exactly how you garbage property people retaliate against a resident just for standing up for her rights!"
I put a hand in front of her phone.
"Sorry, company policy. Fees first, then the gift."
"Do me a favor,"
"because if I hand you a pantry set and you decide it's poisoned and file another complaint, I really will lose my job."
Her face went white in an instant.
The other residents in line all laughed.
Heads down, shoulders shaking.
"You—you're making malicious assumptions!"
Katherine's voice climbed higher.
"My last complaint was to keep the industry in order!"
"Yes, you were keeping order."
I nodded.
"And so you don't strain yourself, you can buy whatever you need, or have your husband buy it."
"It's for your own safety."
A few residents passing the door looked over with plain contempt.
Katherine's face went red, then white.
"Fine, Sandra Harrington. You remember this."
She threw the line at me and left.
That evening, Katherine posted another secretly filmed video in the resident group chat.
It was me dropping off holiday treats for Vera Chavez in Building 3.
The caption read:
"Property manager suspected of bribing residents with gifts to buy their loyalty,"
"cozying up to people to line up false testimony. Requesting a full investigation by the relevant authorities."
Vera was in her eighties. Her son lived in another city.
Every time the property had a welfare handout, I brought her a set too. Had been for years now.
The chat went quiet for five minutes, then Vera's granddaughter jumped in.
"503, don't you have anything better to do?"
"We younger ones aren't around, so Property Manager Harrington's the one bringing her things and fixing her faucet."
"If your complaint scares the property team off from coming to her door, you and I are going to have a problem!"
A whole line of replies followed.
"Team Property Manager Harrington!"
"Katherine Finch, give it a rest!"
Ivy was finally happy.
"See? People can tell what's what."
I was glad, but I didn't let it go to my head.
The next day the company held a training session, and Clive, Ivy, and I went.
The instructor was a property veteran with twenty years in, teaching how to handle disruptive residents and how to preserve evidence.
Clive listened and took notes the whole time, his notebook packed with writing.
"We were too soft before,"
Clive said.
"All we thought about was good service. Never thought about protecting ourselves."
After the training, a Building B resident sent me a video.
"Property Manager Harrington, guess what my peephole camera caught?"
It was Katherine letting a man into her place at two in the morning.
She opened the door in a nightgown, and a man slipped inside.
The two of them walked in with their arms around each other.
That man was almost certainly the one I'd spotted before.
He had a real instinct for not being seen, a cap pulled low, everything covered up tight.
But his build was nothing like Katherine's husband's.
I'd met her husband. Short, stout, balding. This man was tall and thin.
Ivy leaned in to look.
"Sandra, that's the same man from last time!"
"Don't say anything yet."
I answered.
"The clearer the evidence, the better."
That afternoon Katherine Lawrence from the repellent company came by to see us, bringing a box of new samples and an ingredient test report.
When she'd heard someone had reported the repellent, it had made her furious.
"Our ingredients are fully transparent. Musk? Come on."
"Do you know how much that stuff costs per gram? You think we don't factor in cost?"
"One look and you can tell someone's been watching too much TV."
While she was talking, out of the corner of my eye I caught something past the glass doors of the lobby.
Katherine had her phone up, lens aimed at us, and hit the shutter.
Her eyes flashed sharp behind the phone, and she turned and slunk away.
Clive saw it too.
"What's she up to now?"
I stared at the direction where she'd disappeared.
What else would she be up to.
Just biting whoever she could get her teeth into.
I thought about the man in that footage. Come to think of it, he looked awfully familiar.
