Rob Thompson - Summer 2024
I felt anxious on Saturday morning as I pulled into Nora's driveway. Last night had gotten out of control. I had been laying in bed next to Emma, early in the morning when Nora's text messages reached me, asking when I would be at her house.
James had already arrived and was seated on the porch.
"Hey! Where were you? I have been waiting here for twenty minutes!" he called out.
I frowned, confused. "What do you mean?"
"Nora's off to the dump with her dad. She texted me you'd be here by ten."
I had just dropped Emma off at her place, lingering far longer than I should have. I had texted Nora before, but misjudged the timing. But there was no point trying to explain that to him.
I forced a smile. "Oh sorry! Got delayed on the way."
I reached in my pockets for the key and unlocked the door. I was here so often that Nora had given me a spare set.
"You up for some yard work? I don't feel like staying inside on a day like this." James was back to his usual self, he did not hold grudges.
"Yeah, sure."
We headed back outside, and I unlocked the shed for us to grab tools. I picked things up where I had left them last week, but this time, with James on wheelbarrow duty we made much better progress.
As the morning wore on, the air grew hotter, thicker, and my shirt started to cling to my sweaty skin, so I took it off.
I paused for a second, wiping my forehead with the back of my hand, when I realized I hadn't seen James for a while. And now that I had put my tools down I could hear voices coming from the front of the house.
Curious, I made my way there. Nora and James were engaged in conversation with a portly man holding a clipboard.
Nora looked agitated and James was clearly trying to keep his cool. The other man did not seem to care and was standing his ground. As I got closer, I caught the tail end of the conversation.
"...but you must see how ridiculous it is! The debris was only there overnight." Nora's voice had none of her signature warmth.
"The person who notified us sent dated pictures, your pavement was covered for two consecutive days." The man with the clipboard opened his mouth to keep talking when he noticed me.
His mouth stayed open and his eyes landed on my face, slowly making their way down my naked torso. Surprised by his reaction James and Nora turned to look at me, but neither of them seemed put off by my half-naked appearance.
"Hey everything alright?" I asked, ill at ease with the tension.
"Mr. Anderson here is with the neighborhood HOA, and apparently someone complained about the state of my front yard."
Nora clearly sounded pissed. This did not bode well for me as she had promised that she would deal with my and Emma's shenanigans from the previous night.
I looked around and the front yard did not look that bad to me. Nora knew about the homeowner association's rules and had made sure that it would be the first part of the house we worked on.
Sure, we would store the debris from both the house and the backyard there, to make it easier for Thomas to pick up, but to file a complaint about it seemed excessive to me.
Mr. Anderson was still frozen, his eyes still glued to my bare torso. I held out my hand. "Nice to meet you, I'm Rob Thompson."
The man blinked, clearly startled. His blush deepened as he hesitated, then awkwardly shook my hand. "Uh, Martin Anderson."
I flashed him my best sultry smile and maintained direct eye contact for just a bit too long. Sure enough, he blushed harder and quickly looked down at the ground.
Finally he found his tongue again. "Anyway Miss Jennings " he stammered, turning to Nora with as much authority as he could muster. "This is only a warning for now, but next time around I will have to issue a fine. Have a nice day." With that he turned around, not waiting for her to acknowledge his reprimand and fled down the street.
I turned to face my friends. James stood there with an amused smile, clearly entertained by my little show. Nora on the other hand was nonplussed, her arms folded across her chest.
"I'm glad you had your fun, but I could've gotten the name of the person who complained from him, and squared things out with them." Ouch. Nora's tone was cold and cutting, which I was not used to. My worries that I had pushed too hard last night were starting to feel validated. Had I done serious damage to our friendship?
"Oh, I did not think about that." I was trying my best to sound apologetic.
"Yeah, you don't think a lot these days, do you?" With that, she turned on her heel and stormed into the house.
I was stunned for an instant, before James asked me. "Do I even want to know?"
I shrugged and we went back to work. As we got closer to noon and the sun climbed even higher in the sky, James followed my example and took off his shirt.
We worked in a comfortable silence until Nora emerged from the house, wearing the clothes she used when she had to paint walls. She was holding her phone in front of her.
"Hey you two, pose for me!" She did not sound like she was enjoying having to ask us to do that.
"Huh. Why?" James' voice made clear he was baffled. For my part I had come to expect weirder things from Nora over the past two weeks. I wrapped my arm around his shoulder, struck a playful pose, and made a V sign toward her camera.
"Your wife wants a photo of you two working, as payment for monopolizing her husband the whole morning."