Wealthy Tenants Gladly Pay Extra For Filth, Crime And Vermin
Student housing usually involves shoddy accommodations, sparse furnishings, and tenuous landlord–tenant relations. But some students, unburdened by day jobs, student loans, or financial limitations of any kind, require a bit more to maintain tolerable daily comfort.
For these students, a new rental package is being offered by Le Mons, the luxurious downtown housing facility built last year to accommodate the rising number of upper-crust students in attendance at the University (following the recent toughening of admissions standards at east-coast schools). Students are able to special-order such services as standing pools of urine, random sporadic gunfire, frozen corpses on their doorsteps, and the new Infest-O-MagicTM process, which brings authentic Manhattan-style cockroaches directly into the customer’s home.
“Let’s face facts,” Le Mons owner Ruth Hazelwood said. “My tenants aren’t just any ordinary kind of people. They’re used to the very best, and have high standards for their cultural environment. It is important that, as displaced Manhattanites, they continue to enjoy the elite lifestyle they’ve grown accustomed to. By providing them with these services, we not only insure customer satisfaction, we can charge their parents even more.”
Le Mons resident Horace Greenworthy, a sophomore who recently had his apartment infested with assorted vermin, agrees. “As a native of New York, I’m entitled to fineries that lesser folk must be denied,” he said. “Why, back home, in the cultural nexus of New York, I can’t leave a dish of food out on the kitchen counter for more than two minutes before the entire thing is swarmed by hungry bugs. Now, thanks to Infest-O-Magic, I have the same situation here.”
Options like Infest-O-Magic are quite costly. But so far, the exorbitant fees have deterred few renters. This comes as no surprise to Hazelwood, who likes to boast that her clientele are so well-off that many have never even seen money in its traditional cash form.
Hazelwood has hired a round-the-clock staff of muggers, rapists, and beggars to insure that the crime rate around Le Mons remains at a level at least nine times higher than that of the surrounding community. “I was initially worried that I might turn into a commoner after moving out here and mingling with the lower gentry,” said Le Mons resident E.C. Mauer, “But I knew I’d be all right when, upon entering the building’s homeless-strewn lobby, I was beaten and robbed by a gruff, ethnic gentlemen. It felt just like home.” Mauer also expressed pleasure at the fact that cab fares to and from Le Mons are five to eight times more expensive than regular fares.
His sentiments were echoed by Linny Gold, another tenant. “No offense is intended to the locals,” she pointed out, “but we don’t come from the same primitive rural backgrounds that they did. I’m sure there are many nice folks who grew up in smog-free, low-crime communities. But then again, how many of them have seen anything as fabulous as Miss Saigon?”
In order to insure that Le Mons residents won’t be forced to mingle with the poor on a social level, visitors are not permitted anywhere in the apartment complex. Hazelwood emphatically warns that any students not from the east-coast attempting to socialize with Le Mons leaseholders will be shot on sight.
