Thread by @JAEbberts

Y'all want to hear about the time that I found my dead next door neighbor?

We were renting a house in an older neighborhood full of 1920s bungalows. The yards were well kept and everyone around us were older folks and well established.

Next door to us on the corner, however, was the junkiest house in the hood (also a rental)...

Our neighbors were a little younger than us, were prone to partying and were definitely an embarrassment to the established folks who waited patiently for them to move out...

When they finally did move out, the landlord (who had been largely MIA) decided to move in and fix the place up before putting it back on the market...

He was a nice guy, early 60s, friendly and quiet. We would exchange cordial "good morning!" And "good evening!" pleasantries coming and going throughout the days...

This went on for several months while he fixed up the house that had been sorely neglected and terrible abused by a rash of bad tenants.

We would sometimes talk about the weather, or discuss our favorite football teams, but not much interaction beyond that...

Tuesdays was garbage day, and each morning about the time I was leaving for work, he would be wheeling his garbage cans to the street in his blue house robe and slippers. I'd wave, so would he, and I'd be off...

By the end of the day his garbage cans would be tucked back under the carport, and mine would usually be knocked over in the street or something. I'd have to go get it and endure the glares of the other neighbors with obvious opinions about how we were keeping up our yard...

Then one Tuesday I came home from work and noticed his cans were still on the street when I got home from work. I didnt think much of it, but did notice....

Wednesday morning, they were still at the street. Wednesday afternoon, the same.

At this point I took conscious notice of the situation and thought it was odd, but figured he maybe left town for a few days. It was summertime afterall and people do travel...

By that Friday I had been working on my car in the driveway between our homes. I started catching a whiff of something I thought must have been a dead animal. It was really strong and I figured something had died in the crawl space under my house...

The smell was TERRIBLE but I figured it had been baking in the summer heat and must have been pretty fresh. I grabbed a flashlight and looked in the crawlspace, but could not see anything...

A couple hours later I came back out to work on the car and again the smell was just so overwhelming that I couldnt focus on what I was doing. I was determined to locate the source...

It was at that moment that I glanced back out to the street and realized the trash cans were still there. I looked up the driveway and saw that his car was still there... immediately it struck me, but I didnt want to believe it...

His dining room windows faced my driveway. They were the kind of small windows that ran along the top of the wall on these older craftsman homes. Really pretty, though they had been neglected over the years...

Glancing up at the windows my stomach dropped.

They were COVERED in flies. When I realized that the flies where on the INSIDE of the glass I braced myself for what I was going to find if I proved any further...

I told my wife what I thought was happening and went to knock on his front door.

I dont know if I expected him to answer or what, but of course, he didnt.

His side gate was locked so I jumped the fence into the back yard to check the back door...

I knocked there, then tried the handle. I started to open the door and was knocked back by the most foul smell I have ever encountered in my life. There was something primal about it. It showed up and announced itself as DEATH...

I quickly pulled the door shut again and peered through the window instead, and there he was...

Sitting topless in an armchair, head rocked back, mouth open and body a strange marbeling of white and blue. He appeared bloated to me, but it may have just appeared that way because he was topless. The TV was still on quietly, the AC, however, was not...

I returned home, told my wife what I had seen and called the police. They showed up, gained entry and then IMMEDIATELY exited. The smell was SO BAD!

The fire department and coroner showed up shortly thereafter with a big fan to air out the house...

They blew this stank all up and down my idyllic street, which no doubt served as an ominous warning to some of my less than youthful and sometimes mean spirited neighbors.

It was too much for my wife to abide, however, and we got a hotel room for the night...

Coroner said he died in his sleep right there in his chair. There are worse ways to go, I suppose, I just hope that when I do I'm not left to cook in the middle of the summer in a house with no AC