The Life and Times of Alann

Before we went to bed the night I discovered the BB gun range I also noticed that things in my bedroom closet had been rearranged. Nothing special, a blanket I threw in there was folded and some stuff was moved on the floor to one side. I then in the morning I noticed that the 2 guitars for guitar hero we keep in the closet were missing. I then went into (and this is important to notice the locations) the front entry closet where we kept the drums and peddle and noticed they were also gone. Finally I went over to the front room, which is right off the entry, and looked at the PS2 in the entertainment center and found that the microphone, guitar decals and 3 guitar hero games (1 never opened) were also gone. Odd. How come they borrowed the game and forgot to tell us? We don't mind if they play it or take it home to borrow, but it is only polite to ask first.

So now we are kind of upset because of the damage to our stuff and lack of courtesy when borrowing things. But Janet has always been really great so we send her a text and say "can you bring back guitar hero and anything else you borrowed?" We soon get a reply that says "Yes". Well good everything seems to be working out. We will talk to her about the BB gun damage when she comes over to drop things off and get her pay and we'll deduct the damage from her pay and move on with life. WRONG.

Around 4 or 5 we are dealing with the kids, Alex is eating and Claire is whining about something, so we are a little distracted. Then suddenly there is a knock on the door and there is this guy there that i have never seen before and he starts to make moves to come in.

(Most of this will be paraphrasing) I'm like hi, who are you? He says "oh, I'm Ben I'm Janet's husband. (O.K. where is she?) I came over to drop off these keys and this bottle of car paint touch up we accidentally took off your dresser (Which BTW I swear was still in its packaging when we left). Janet is at work."

Me: Oh o.k. so where is Guitar hero?
Ben: We don't know, we don't have it. We only have ours.
Ben: We thought that it was strange you asked for it back. Are you going to rent the house to us for the (hugely) discounted rate?

Of course at this point I am completely dumbfounded by what her not coming over in person and the denial of having our gaming gear and all I can think to say is, "Uuu, we just got back from vacation so you'll have to let us talk about it first."
Ben: Oh o.k well I'll see you later.

So i then rush into the backroom where Becca is feeding Alex and say "They stole Guitar Hero from us! You need to get Janet over here now so we can talk to her alone about this!"

So Becca texts her and Janet says she can't make it over here till 10am the next day because she works nights. So now I am really upset and paranoid. What else is gone? So the search starts. I said "what else could they have stolen that would be worth taking?"

This little side note is important for the rest of the story. We try to work with cash and not credit so that we don't build up any extra credit debt by being lazy with our spending. So Becca will tell me how much she needs for the month and then cash out parts of it for spending through out the month. She does this by putting the money in different envelopes labeled for their use and using them when she does purchases.

Suddenly Becca realizes that she has left some of our bill money envelopes in a black binder on the counter, which has been mysteriously cleaned and rearranged. Over $500 in CASH is missing from all the different envelopes and from around the house!!!! We start dialing Janet's phone number right then and there telling here she needs to be over here ASAP! We don't mention what is going on, just that she needs to get here now.

By now we have been talking about who could have done this and talked to the neighbors about what they have seen and only Janet and Ben have been seen coming and going from the house and because of Becca's past relationship with Janet we think that Ben has been taking things without her knowing. So by not telling her what we want to talk about we don't give him the chance to make up any lies if she talks to him before coming over. Finally she is scared enough and agrees to come over at 8 am instead of 10.

Well we have all night till Janet get to our house. So what do you think we do? Agonize and talk about what we have to do next and what are our legal choices. While talking about it I go back to the front closet and open it to look in it again to see if they actually got the drum peddle because it was separate from the drum set. Then i notice my leather jacket Becca gave me for my birthday 2 yrs ago is missing. The special hanger is there and so is the scarf I wear with it but the jacket is missing. He stole my jacket too! By now I am livid and ready to go over to his parents house (where they have been living for the first 2 weeks of their marriage) and settle things right now.

But, the hope is that Janet can help us get our stuff back. So I stay home and start looking again for what else could be missing. 2 other things end up missing (so far) a small Bayonet knife I keep in my nightstand and a *yellow RC car with track for wheels* from my closet. (notice its all my stuff going missing). So after doing some research, because I can't sleep, I find out that over $1,000 has been taken from us and that if found guilty the responsible person could be charged with a 3rd degree felony and have to pay $5000 and/or up to 5yrs in jail.

Thus started a very sleepless night and the beginning of the "confronting story" in which the, as my wife says, "Scary, how dare you do this in my house, protective, I will consume your soul" Alann comes out.