The Other Occupier

TheLastStraw:  Readers will doubtless be aware of the origin of the word poltergeist, from the German poltern, "create a disturbance" and geist "ghost". And those with a passing knowledge of the tonier sort of horror movie (the ones that don't involve over-sexed American teenagers having their intestines smeared all over the place), will be familiar with the traditional ways in which such spirits make their presence felt. Doors slamming. Jiggling furniture. Moans in the attic. That sort of thing.

But our particular geist prefers to poltern in a different way. I've yet to see the movie in which an unseen presence from the Other Side fraudulently appropriates a domestic waste management contract. However, come in closer, children, and I'll tell you a story . . .

We call him The Occupier. At least, that's the name on the letters which arrive from Dublin City Council. As is often the case with supernatural apparitions, The Occupier appears to have been living in our house far longer than we have. In fact, he probably doesn't consider it to be "our" house at all. When we first moved in, he was getting lots of correspondence: TV licence demands, offers of cheap credit; announcements that he had won free Caribbean holidays.

The years passed, and the letters to The Occupier dried up, with one exception: the council. Although we had told them of our existence at this address, they continued to keep in touch with The Occupier as well. As his waste bill mounted higher and higher, we ignored it and continued to pay our own.

When pay-per-lift bin charges were introduced a couple of years ago, we were happy enough to go along with them. After all, we reasoned, we didn't put out our bin every week, and this would make us more careful with the rubbish. But then the first bill arrived. According to the council, our bin had been collected every single week since the new system had started.

Fortunately, one of the people in this particular marriage (hint: it's not me) keeps a record of this sort of thing, so we had a note of every collection date. No problem, we thought. We'll just call up the Customer Care Telephone Number provided at the top of the bill to sort it out.

The affable voice at the end of the line told us that, if we sent a cheque for the appropriate amount, with an accompanying letter detailing the dates on which we had actually used their excellent service, everything would be fine. We duly paid the correct sum, attaching an explanatory letter. And so it went on. Each time, the council would take our money, ignore the letter and register the difference between the two as an outstanding debt on the next bill.

Then suddenly, after a long silence, The Occupier reappeared. For an ectoplasmic entity from across the Great Divide, he was keeping himself busy. According to the council, while we were generating enough waste material to fill Dublin Bay, The Occupier was being scrupulously mean, only leaving his bin out every second or third week, and (here's the really scary part) on more or less the same dates we were doing it. What hellish game was he playing with us?

THIS WEEK, OUR quarterly bills arrived again, one for us and one for him. As usual, we were being charged for every single week, regardless. As usual, he was getting away with murder, although he did have an outstanding debt of €800, which seemed to predate our arrival. Could it be this was his way of driving unwanted mortals from his patch? Why exactly had the previous owner sold up and moved to Australia?

As usual, I called the Customer Care Telephone Number. As usual, I explained about the bins, and the mistakes, and the unanswered letters, and, of course, The Occupier. As usual, there was the explanation that, well, actually, the Customer Care Telephone Number doesn't actually Care for its Customers over the Telephone. We'd have to write in . . . We'd written in before? Three times? Well, we must have received a response. We hadn't? Very strange. Could we write in again?

If you saw that horror movie The Others a few years ago, you may recall how Nicole Kidman, trapped in her lonely house with her two terrified children, a scary housekeeper and gardener, finally attempts to leave. But wherever she tries to go, she is enveloped by a thick fog which forces her back to where she began.

Anyone who has had dealings with Dublin City Council will spot the parallels. Fog, fog, everything is fog. And anyone who's seen The Others will ask the logical question. Could it be that the council is right? That The Occupier is in fact the true living inhabitant of our humble home? If so, where does that leave us? The answer is as inevitable as it is chilling.

Time for me to go back to the attic and rattle my chains. I see dead people.

Frank McNally is now writing The Irishman's Diary, Tuesday to Friday