We had barely finished unpacking the last box when the first warning arrived: a sheet of lined paper tucked under the wiper blade, the words written in thick red marker that bled into the rain. “One house, one car,” it said, as if the street belonged to a board game we had never agreed to play. My husband and I laughed while we brewed coffee, sure that whoever slipped the note was having a bad day and would soon notice we were parked legally, tires straight, tags current, and well within the public curb.
The next morning a second note appeared, this time taped to the mailbox like an official decree. It listed made-up fines, threatened mysterious “consequences,” and ended with a smiley face that felt more like a baring of teeth. We found out quickly that the author lived next door, a woman who watered her garden at dawn while glaring at our second sedan as if it were a stray dog that might soil her lawn. We waved; she turned the hose away. Still, we refused to let her fantasy rule our driveway, so we kept both cars exactly where city law allowed—one near our steps, one a few feet ahead.
On the third night the street exploded into noise. Sirens, diesel growls, and the metallic chewing of winches tore us from sleep at two in the morning. We ran outside in bare feet and saw yellow lights spinning across the asphalt like a cheap disco. Two tow trucks had our vehicles halfway off the ground, hooks biting into suspension parts that had never hurt anyone. Our neighbor stood on her porch in a fluffy robe, arms folded, lips bent into a tiny victorious moon. She lifted one finger and pointed at the clipboard each driver carried, as if to say paperwork beats ownership.
I shouted that we had no tickets, no signs, no right to be towed, but the operators only shrugged and said a “concerned resident” had called, claiming both cars were abandoned. The law, they explained, lets them remove vehicles after a citizen complaint if the engines are cold and the owners aren’t present. While we stood in pajamas pleading, our neighbor filmed the scene on her phone, probably hoping to post proof that she had cleaned up the block. My husband sprinted to knock on other doors; within minutes half the street was outside, half-dressed and furious that their own extra cars might be next.
By sunrise we had paid the impound fee, filed a police report, and learned the most satisfying word in municipal code: “retaliatory.” It turns out filing a false abandonment claim is a misdemeanor, and doing it while gloating on camera is practically a gift to prosecutors. Officers knocked on her door just as she was arranging garden gnomes around a new “Residents Only” sign she had hammered into the grass. She spent the afternoon at the station, and we spent it installing a cheap security camera that now waves at her whenever she steps outside. Our cars sit peacefully on the curb again, but every time she glances their way I start the engine just to watch her flinch, a small reminder that the street is long, the law is longer, and grudges are best left unwatered.
