Bad Neighbors, Part 5

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All was quite during the Winter months. I had completely lost contact with Alan, and in April of 2014, I took a trip to Michigan to visit family. I was there for three weeks, and toward the end of my visit I received a text message from my ex-wife. It said that the Culpeper County Sherriff’s Department had contacted her and would like me to call them. They had given her a detective’s name and phone number to call, but no other details.

The next day, I called Detective Clark as requested. "Thank you for calling us, Mr. Shilling", he said. "I’m sorry to interrupt your vacation, but there’s been an incident at your tent."

"An incident?" I said.

"We received a report that your tent was being used as a PCP lab", he continued. I immediately thought of Alan, but I didn’t say anything. "We got a search warrant and searched your place", he said. "I’m sorry about all of this. The man that made the false report is in custody in West Virginia. Your tent is fine. We put everything back in its place and I hope you won’t even notice we were there." Holy crap! My jaw dropped.

"Who was this guy?" I asked.

"He was a close personal friend of Alan, your neighbor", he said. I knew it!

"Wow. That doesn’t surprise me", I said. As soon as I heard that the guy was Alan’s friend, I became convinced that Alan was somehow behind all of this. Here it was, late April, and I was still sporting my silver tarp and hadn’t yet moved. Alan had been quiet and patient up until now, but had his patience finally worn out? I didn’t want to give too much information about Alan to the detective just yet. First, I wanted to hear what else he had to say about this other guy. "So what made this guy believe that my tent was a PCP lab?" I asked.

"Well, apparently he had visited Alan and saw your tent, and took it upon himself to check it out", he said. "He told us he went into your tent and looked around. He said it looked like a PCP lab. There were mason jars, a gas stove, firearms, and tunnels outside nearby."

"Wait, so he just saw the tent and thought it was suspicious so he took it upon himself to check it out?" I asked.

"Yeah, that’s what he said", he told me. "He said he was ‘Alan’s protector’. He’s known Alan for many years and is apparently a very close friend, like a father figure."

"Well, it doesn’t surprise me that there’s a connection with Alan", I said. "I spoke with Alan a few months ago and he doesn’t like me living next to him in a tent."

"Well, we’re pretty sure there’s a connection there, too. But we don’t have any evidence of that", he said.

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