How Close Could Two Alien Civilizations Get To One Another?

Here on planet Earth, in orbit around the Sun, we're the only intelligent-life game in town. There might be possibilities for either past life or microbial life elsewhere in the Solar System, but as far as intelligent, complex, differentiated and multicellular life goes, what's on our world is far more advanced than anything else we could hope to find. Intelligent aliens, if they're out there inhabiting another world, are at least four light years away. But must that be the case for aliens anywhere in the galaxy? That's what our Patreon supporter Jason McCampbell wants to know: