Thy Neighbor by Norah Vincent Read Free Book Online

really humiliate the guy with science. Tape him doing something beyond bestial in the privacy of his own garage and post it on the Internet viewable for a fee.
    My hatred boiled over. I was a man possessed, obsessed with the technological opportunities for my revenge, heady with the seeming godliness that secret eyes and ears would bestow on me and the divine justice it could afford. I got a huge thrill imagining it. How I would surveil people’s property, note their comings and goings, learn their schedules, then sneak into their houses while they were out doing the weekly shopping or playing the Wednesday game of bridge and install my micro cameras and audio equipment at will. Cleverly conceal them in lamps or VCRs or, better yet, make presents with these things preinstalled.
    â€œHey, Dave. As a thank-you for all you did for me, I got you this top-of-the-line DVD player. Now you can watch pornos in your bedroom undisturbed.”
    And I can tape all your whacked-out sexcapades for public consumption and make a tidy profit on the side.
    You fuck.
    There was life again in that expletive. A plan worth living for. I was in.

4
    Dave was my first time out, my trial run, so I went with the preinstall rather than the B and E plant. It was safer, easier, and, I convinced myself, not a crime—or not one they were likely to catch me for. Besides, in Dave’s case, it gave me much more pleasure to make a gift of my treachery, even if, or maybe especially if, there was a chance he’d find me out and prosecute. I was able to actually buy the hardware—complete with hypersensitive mini mics for good-quality audio—already rigged at a specialty spy store I found in the Yellow Pages.
    This was years before Dave got his home theater and just at the time when DVDs were newly available, so I gave him his first DVD player, which he duly oohed and aahed over and promptly rigged to the TV in his bedroom.
    I also gave him what I told him was a state-of-the-art ionizer for his bathroom, which, I explained, could neutralize even the most virulent odors in minutes.
    His family would thank me.
    â€œAccording to the literature,” I said, “veterinarians use them in their examination rooms when expressing the anal glands of large breed dogs.”
    I went on to add that even a few of the more well-endowed urban zoos had installed them in their enclosed walk-through exhibits so as to minimize public discomfort in the monkey ramble and the reptile pavilion.
    And that was that. I had my eyes and ears in place. My starter kit of remote violation was up and running.
    But it didn’t quite go the way I’d planned.
    The equipment was fine. Perfect, in fact. I could pan around most of the bedroom, except for a couple blind spots behind the DVD player or in the corners, but none of the action was happening there anyway. In the bathroom I had full views of the toilet and sinks, as well as the double-wide mirror over the sinks.
    I’d had to angle the bathroom shot myself, repositioning the ionizer on a social visit to the house. Dave had put it on the counter between the sinks, which meant that the mirror was out of bounds, and that was just too good to pass up. So I moved the Sanizephyr (as I believe it was called) to a shelf against the opposing wall and told Dave that it wouldn’t work properly if it wasn’t at least five feet off the floor.
    â€œMethane rises, right?” I explained. “Think of cow burps and the ozone. Same principle.”
    So far, so good.
    Clap goes the clapper board—aaaand action . . .
    But Dave’s contribution was less than what I’d hoped for. Well, less and more, actually.
    Dave surprised the hell out of me in this, I have to say, because what he did when he was alone—aside, of course, from the doleful daily wank under the bedclothes—wasn’t sexual. And, trust me, given past experience, I’m using “sexual” here in the