is my neighbor from across the hall really be a serial killer?

 killer struck the other day. No, not here in Santa Monica; but not far off either, just down the road in Redondo Beach. There’s always at least one active serial killer working the streets of LA at any given moment.

According to Action News Channel reporter Flint Rockway, seems this is the third serial killing in just six months, starting down in Compton, then over to Gardena, and now onto the more stuck-up coastline community of Redondo Beach.

They just announced it today because A, you can’t be a serial killer (no matter how good you are) until you have at least two killings under your belt; and B, when it’s a killing in Compton or Gardena, it’s not news.

It got me to thinking, though. I wonder if there are any serial killers living here in Santa Monica. Could be. Maybe Madam Maui is a serial killer. There’s no doubt she’s a cat killer, and now from all the ruckus this morning, it seems she’s a dog killer too.

I woke up this morning to a pounding on the door. Not my door, but Madam Maui’s down in 9J. Through my peephole, I could see it was the police. Seems the couple from the second floor now says their dog is missing, too. The couple claims that their Chihuahua, Breadstick, was last seen in the vicinity of Madam Maui over near Ocean View Park. Breadstick?

While Madam Maui steadfastly denied knowing the whereabouts of Breadstick, she was wearing this really nice pair of brown and white suede shoes when I saw her leaving her apartment later, around noon.

Maybe my young neighbors next door in 9A were serial killers. They were, at the very least, serial fuckers.

I heard my neighbor from across the hall driving up this evening, much later than usual. How do I know it was her? She still needs a brake job, that’s how.

My neighbor from across the hall is the perfect neighbor. She doesn’t have pets and she doesn’t throw parties. Sometimes I wish she did because maybe then I’d have an excuse to finally go over and meet her. If she did have a cat and it got lost, maybe I could be the hero who tracks it down. If she did have a party, maybe I’d be the cranky neighbor who asks her to turn the music down, but winds up staying all night instead. But no. Not her.

She’s the perfect neighbor, but that doesn’t necessarily mean she’s a serial killer. Isn’t that what they always say, that the axe murderer next door was the perfect neighbor?

But imagine if she was a serial killer. If she was the Night Stalker, I suppose that would make me the safest person in all of Los Angeles. Right? Aren’t the neighbors always the ones in the least danger?

Besides, God doesn’t make female serial killers. Or does He? Everyone’s heard of Aileen Wuornos. The media makes like she’s the only woman serial killer who ever lived. Truth is, there have been plenty of female Jack the Rippers, most of them much better at what they do than Aileen Wuornos. Sure, that was a great movie, but believe me, it was all Charlize Theron. The real Aileen Wuornos wasn’t nearly so interesting.

Besides, Wuornos didn’t even have a decent nickname. “The Florida Highway Killer.” Sounds more like a ride at Universal Studios than a proper serial killer moniker.

I don’t care what the media says. In my opinion, Aileen Wuornos was no serial killer. Serial killers don’t just murder by numbers, they do it in a sinister and memorable fashion. There has to be a method to their madness, a signature or a calling card. Wuornos had none of these.

A good serial killer needs at the very least to commit unspeakable acts upon their victims, like rape, torture, or a decapitation. Add to that having sex with a corpse, maybe even cannibalism, and you’ve really got something. All Wuornos did was go around shooting old pervs on the interstate. What’s so great about that?

But for the media to infer that Aileen Wuornos was the only woman serial killer ever, that’s just not accurate. If you want to know the truth, it’s all Hollywood’s fault. Why? Because no one wants to see some woman with a knife chasing a wimpy man around, that’s why. Teenagers don’t want to see it. Women don’t want to see it. Men certainly don’t want to see it. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, prefers the standard formula of misogynistic axe murderers chasing hot chicks around in their tight little underpants. Why not? Works for me.

If you want to know the truth, there have been plenty of women serial killers. Just because females are not inherently predatory, that doesn’t mean they can’t hold a grudge or be out for revenge just the same. Shucks, when it comes to holding a grudge, women practically wrote the book.

When it comes to multiple murderers, female serial killers go back hundreds of years. Like New Orleans socialite Madame Delphine LaLaurie, who tortured her slaves by sewing their mouths shut, gouging their eyes out, and cutting their stomachs open. Or Leonarda Cianciulli, also known as the “Soap Maker of Corregio.” Cianciulli not only murdered and chopped up her victims, she turned their mutilated bodies into lathery guest soaps and tasty little teacakes.

But when it comes to female serial killers, no one even comes close to the Countess Elizabeth Báthory de Ecsed of Hungary. Also known as the “Blood Countess,” in the late 16^th and early 17^th century Countess Báthory murdered as many as seven hundred young virgin women, bathing in their blood just to maintain her glow. Now, that’s style.

So, is my neighbor from across the hall really a serial killer? How could she be? She’s a nurse, after all. But being a nurse, I’ve come to find out, is actually more of an argument For serial killing than it is against it. Jane Toppan of Boston, Massachusetts, also a nurse, is believed to have committed thirty-one murders, performing gruesome experiments on many of the victims under her care. Kristen Gilbert of Northampton, Mass., induced cardiac arrest in her patients by injecting them with huge doses of epinephrine, then rushing to their aid as their lives slowly slipped away. She was a nurse, as well.

So again I ask myself: is my neighbor from across the hall a serial killer? A serial killer is usually quiet; a serial killer does typically live in a shitty apartment; and a serial killer, especially for women, is oftentimes a nurse. So is she, or isn’t she?

Truth is, there are not that many serial killers actually out there running around at any given time. According to John Douglas, former head of the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit, there are currently no more than fifty serial killers active in the United States today, and most all of those are men. While that may seem like a lot, remember that the US has a population of over three-hundred million. That means there is only one serial killer for every six million people or so. Statistically speaking, that means that in the metropolitan Los Angeles area right now there are no more than two or three serial killers currently plying their trade. The odds on me running into one of them right here in my own apartment building—right across the hall—are astronomical. I mean, I’m lucky, but not that lucky.

No, my neighbor from across the hall is not a serial killer. I was just making up excuses why I couldn’t go knock on her door.

I heard the elevator open. I heard shoes squeaking. It was time.

I went to the door and watched as my neighbor from across the hall opened her purse and slipped her key into the door. Then, she stopped for a moment and turned her head. It was almost as if she knew someone was watching her. That I was watching her. Serial Killer? I think not. Not with a puss like that.

After I saw her safely inside, I went back to watching television, which is, after all, where I get all these crazy ideas from in the first place.