Dear Spooky Ghost Girl Currently Haunting Apartment 4B,
I am the primary resident of this apartment, so I guess that makes me your hauntee. I think you’re a fantastic ghost with a lot of cool paranormal abilities in your tool belt. The way you temporarily paralyzed my entire body last month and made me miss the birth of my niece was super impressive. It irreparably damaged my relationship with my sister, but it was impressive nonetheless.
The reason I’m reaching out is because you and your spectral hijinks are starting to become a financial burden for me. I simply cannot afford to continue being haunted by you.
As you probably know, rent in New York City is not cheap. I made the mistake of moving into an apartment that’s slightly out of my price range. I figured I could offset the higher rent by living frugally and stealing toilet paper from work. However, my taste for the finer things in life, such as vegetables and a monthly MetroCard, has forced me to convert my living room into a second bedroom and take on a roommate.
And you’ve made getting a roommate basically impossible.
Every time someone agrees to move in, you scare them away by making the apartment walls bleed and possessing me to scream, “I have lice!” As good as you are at your job, I wonder if you would consider holding off on the spooks until I can collect a few rent checks and dig myself out of financial ruin. It would mean the world to me.
It’s not that I don’t think you’re scary. You’re very scary. But, I really need to get a roommate listed on this lease or else I’ll have to move back to Ohio and work at my dad’s tire shop, which scares me way more than you do.
You also have to stop replacing all of my mail with horrifying letters written by my long-dead ancestors. Again, it’s very impressive that you can do that. It truly scared the crap out of me to read a letter from my great-great-grandfather telling me I would soon join him in the afterlife. I just wish you hadn’t replaced my ConEd bill with that letter. Because of you, I didn’t pay my electric bill for the third month in a row and now a collection agency is hot on my trail. I’m afraid some stocky guy is going to show up at my apartment and break my knees with a crowbar.
Yes, I’m also afraid of you, but right now, I’m mostly afraid of getting my kneecaps smashed. Stop making my mail disappear, Little Ghost Girl. You’re bankrupting me, you inconsiderate ghoul.
While we’re on the subject of respecting property, I would really appreciate it if you stopped making ghostly indoor tornadoes out of all my furniture. My stuff is mostly secondhand, so it’s not sturdy enough to endure being spookily levitated around my apartment and then dropped. Have some respect for my belongings.
Also, whenever you drop my furniture, you scuff the floor and chip the paint off my walls. How the hell do you expect me to retrieve my security deposit at the end my lease if you keep damaging the apartment? My landlord is a very thorough man, so he’ll notice even the smallest of dings. Unless you’re planning on giving me a security deposit worth one month’s rent at the end of my lease, then stop damaging my home, Little Girl Ghost.
Please, I’m begging you, stop keeping me awake with your demonic screeching and rumbling. It’s all very scary. I am shaken to my core every time I hear your symphony of horrors. More importantly, you’re making it impossible for me to get a good night’s sleep and deliver on my objectives and key results at work. I was up for a promotion this month, but thanks to the constant abominations in my home, I’ve been fatigued and distracted all month, and the promotion went to Carl instead. Carl! The guy who forgets his password every day and has to have the IT guy reset his company account every morning.
Don’t you understand, Terrifying Ghost Lass, that people of my economic bracket simply cannot afford to be haunted?
Please go haunt a rich family who just moved to an old manor in backwoods Connecticut or something. You have nothing to gain from haunting me, a 27-year-old with $58 in my checking account.