This story can be read in conjunction with "Redback". They are independent though.
Saturday arrived much too quickly and I was on my laden bicycle going to confront the challenge of the hedge. I was a nerd but I could sell my skills door to door, quote a price, set a string line and cut a hedge. It paid the university fees. Between cutting hedges, sleep and study there wasn't time for anything else.
The lady who employed me watched for a time as she sat on the steps of the verandah. I watched her too but being shy I was careful not to be obvious.
As the subject of so much attention my work rate was high and I made good progress. The sweat was flowing and my shirt was sodden.
Later, she brought me lemonade. As I drank I saw her hair was wet and she'd changed into a white, terry toweling dressing gown. It was, I thought, a little too small for her with a lot of cleavage showing. I did my best not to look as I handed the glass back and thanked her.
"Washing day, first me and then everything else," she explained and gave me a meaningful look.
"Everything!" she repeated, and walked slowly back to the house.
I continued to work. It wasn't long and she was stooping and stretching as she pegged clothes on the clothes line. Her belt fell from around her and the dressing gown opened at the front. I couldn't see any thing, my view was from the side. She gathered the dressing gown around her and reached for her belt. I knew she'd want to know if I was looking so I cut something with the long handled pruners.
The washing machine started a new cycle and I felt her watching again. I kept busy with the secateurs. Later, perhaps it was the smell of shampoo, I looked down. She was looking up at me. Our eyes met, I looked away and my eyes came to rest on her cleavage. I could feel myself flush red with embarrassment and checked to see whether she'd seen. She was looking at me, smiling.
"I've got cordial and cake on the verandah" she said, after some time. As I climbed down she held the ladder for me.
On the verandah we sat. She drank coffee. I drank cordial and ate cake. I tried not to but somehow I kept looking at her. The dressing gown was gaping at the top. I couldn't be certain but I thought she had nothing on under it. I could see a lot of one breast.
"Your shirt, it's wet and dirty. I'm washing. Give it to me." Her hand was out waiting. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to take it off but her hand stayed there, waiting. Eventually I reached down, peeled it over my head and put it in her hand. "Thank you," she said, as she looked at my chest. We sat, silent for a while, before I got up and went back to work.
It felt strange working without a shirt. I was sweating too, a wet sticky surface for all the dust and grime to settle on. I continued, cutting, sawing and pulling sections of hedge free. It was dirty work. The dust made me sneeze. Major renovations are always dirty. It didn't take long and I was black.
Moments later she was under the clothes line with a bucket of clothes, stooping and stretching again. She was facing me. I kept busy with the pruning saw, cutting the biggest branches I could find, half an eye on my work and the rest on her. The belt was loosening again. Every time she stooped I could see more. The neck line was becoming longer and longer.