"Oi missus! Have you got a spare?" A male voice shouted from the next yard.
I was sitting drinking coffee and smoking a cigarette as I looked down from the steps leading up to my flat to saw a tall mixed race guy in white work dungarees, miming smoking.
"Have you got a spare? I'm gasping." He grinned.
I smiled and waved before putting my cup down and going into the kitchen to get my packet. When I returned he was already standing at the door. He was much taller than me, probably 6 feet tall and very muscular, with a big Afro perm and lots of tattoos on his arms and even his neck.
"Oh!" I gasped and took half a step backwards.
"Sorry Missus, I didn't mean to scare you." He grinned masking a thick Irish accent.
"You didn't." I lied, then remembered the cigarette.
"Thanks Missus." He winked as he put one in his mouth and a second behind his ear.
"Cheeky bugger!" I laughed, and he shrugged his shoulders.
"I'm Phil by the way."
"Pleased to meet you Phil." I replied finishing my coffee then stubbing out my cigarette.
"And you are?"
"Rosalie."
I lived with my 6 year old daughter in a flat above some empty shops; and this handsome young man and his colleagues had just started renovating them that morning.
"Lived here long?" He asked.
"A couple of years."
"On your own?"
"Me and my daughter." I smiled; knowing a chat up line when I hear one.
"No fella then?"
I shrugged my shoulders and raised my eyebrows, which received a cheeky wink.
"That's a shame." Phil replied, then ... "for you." Then sexily chuckled.
"What do you mean?"
He grinned and theatrically shrugged his shoulders, "Just sayin."
"Hoy! Bollocks... get your arse back down here!" A gruff voice called out.
"That'll be my boss." He laughed; "gotta go... see ya later."
I didn't know if the last sentence was a question or a statement. He was cute and sexy too; there's no denying that and the black stud in his tongue intrigued me, but he must have hardly been twenty and I'm 26; but... but... since my last boyfriend moved out; or should I say I kicked his sorry arse out two months ago I hadn't had a dabble, relying on my trusty sex toys for satisfaction. Not that I hadn't had offers; but I wasn't in the market for another boyfriend.
It was my day off from waitressing 12-5 at Dino's Bar & Grill downtown, which allowed me to look after my daughter; but kept money tight. Hey ho, my chat with young Phil left me feeling pretty damn good about myself as I went about my housework with an extra spring in my step, only stopping to peek out of the window a couple of times, to see if he was working in the yard. He was once and looked up, but I jumped away from the window like a giggling schoolgirl.
At about 12.30 I looked out again and saw Phil and two others sitting in the yard eating their lunch. Feeling mischievous I made myself a coffee and took my cigarettes and sat at my kitchen door again.
I hadn't been there 10 seconds when one of his friends nudged him and he looked up with a big grin on his face; before miming smoking again.
"Hey missus!" Got a spare?"
With my stomach in knots I nodded and waved the packet. He was like an Olympic athlete the way he jumped over the wall and made his way up the steps two at a time.