Chapter 1

Damn! Long day! At least it's springtime and seventy degrees and I'm home and there's beer in the fridge. I decided to take a book outside and read. I mean, the Louisiana Gulf Coast, there's like twelve days of the year that you can be just plain comfortable outdoors. Today was one of 'em.

I was foot-sore, a day spent tromping around a construction site in rubber boots, feet sucked into the mud with every step, pointing fingers for a half-attentive electrical foreman about what needed to be fixed. And an hour's drive home.

Now I'm sitting there in that last bit of direct sunlight that I get before the shadow from my mobile home crosses my concrete slab of a driveway/patio, sipping my boutique beer and getting to chapter four of a military sci-fi paperback and I hear the back door of the adjacent mobile home fly open and a squealing female charges out, followed by a goodly amount of smoke.

"Ohshitshitshitshitshitshit! Damn things on FIRE!" she squealed.

Did I mention it's normally a QUIET trailer park? This is a departure, for sure. Beer glass (animals drink from bottles) down, paperback down – face down – don't lose my place, and I stand.

"Help!"

"What's on fire?"

"Dryer!"

I jog to the back of her house and pull the main breaker. Most dryer fires are due to too much lint on an electric heating element. This is step one. Step two occurs as I hit my keyfob to pop the trunk of my company car and grab the fire extinguisher, then head towards the door.

No visible flames in the still open door. I went inside. The smoke is already thinning.

I turned and exited. Sherry was standing there wringing her hands. My next door neighbor. Cajun chick. Her husband was that hardly-known breed of welder who followed pipeline work, often on the road for weeks. Sherry Gant used to follow him.

It's amazing what you find out by talking with your neighbors over a beer or two. Sherry had an associate's degree in office administration and was now employed with one of the service companies that populated our little corner of the state. In addition to a not too bad income, she had insurance that worked well for them as he jumped from one employer to the next.

Lets talk about what I'm seeing there. Cajun girl. Dark brown, almost black hair. Olive complexion, brown eyed. Twenty or so extra pounds made her rounded, voluptuous, something definitely worth recreational viewing as she walked. I know. I've watched her pushing a mower across her little patch of lawn quite a few times.

"Want a beer while the smoke clears?" I asked.

She looked at me, the concerned look changing to a wry smile. "Yeah, I guess so."

"Sit!" I commanded. "Be right back." I went inside, grabbed two, one for her, the other to be my second one. And a glass.

"Here!" I said, handing her the glass. "Hold still." I poured her beer into it."

"Coulda just drank from the bottle," she said. "But thanks!"

"It's better from the glass. If you have GOOD beer. And you LIKE beer. You can smell it. Feel the little mist when the bubbles break."

"Thanks for rescuing me," she said.

"Not much of a rescue. When things clear out, we'll unplug your dryer and turn the electricity back on. At least you closed the door to the rest of the house. Shouldn't be too much smoke."

"Smoke," she said. "Every damn smoke alarm in the place went off."

"I know. I heard 'em. They've stopped. You may need another dryer, though."

"Oh, sure. Ted took off for North Dakota last week. This shit always happens when he's gone."

I surveyed her expression. Exasperated. Hmmm.

"Look, you're having an episode. Would it help if I ordered pizza or something, then we can get a look at that dryer?"

"I don't want pizza. Had it for lunch," she said. "Sorry."

I sighed heavily for effect. "Well, so much for that idea. Lemme go unplug that dryer." I did that, then turned the main breaker back on.

"You're gonna have to reset all your clocks now."

She smiled. First smile. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it. I'm just being neighborly."

"Delivery pizza's twenty bucks. For twenty bucks we could go to the diner up the road," she said.

Okay, that perked up the old ears.

"You wanna go out to eat? Isn't that kinda..."

"Kinda what? We go up the road, eat the buffet, come back here. It's not like we're gonna hump on a table or something." She laughed. "Don't be silly."

Sorry. I'm thinking of that round ass in those jeans and humping is part of the thought stream. I didn't say that, though. "Okay. We can do that. Sounds good."

"Let me finish my beer."

"Yeah," I said. I raised my glass to her. "To your new dryer!"

She laughed. "Cute! Real cute!"

We took my truck to the aforementioned eatery.

"Stop looking all nervous, Lane," she said.

"Sorry. I don't usually go to dinner with other guy's wives."

"Get over it. Ted's gonna be gone for a month. I might just want to go out to eat a time or two..." she smirked. "Besides, if you were bent on seduction, you'd damn sure have to be doing better than THIS place!"

"At least Olive Garden?" I asked.

"Iffy. You'd have to be one smooth-talking devil to get by with Olive Garden."

"What if I ordered wine with the meal?"

"You DOG!" she squealed. "Am I gonna have to start watching out for my next door neighbor?"

I watched her eyes. There was a sassy smile lingering there.

We talked about work, hers and mine.

"You're gone a pretty good bit," she says. "Company car. During the week. I'm assuming that's work?"

"Oh, yeah," I replied. "I cover a big area. Lots of nights in a hotel room."

"That's fun," she replied sarcastically. "Me 'n' Ted did that for a while, but it's hard. Pipeline work ain't usually near decent hotels. He still had to drive a lot. And I was stuck in a hotel room. I'm glad I have this job. It's an excuse to stay home."

"But no Ted."

Eyes flashed. "There is that. But I visit friends; my family is all within an hour's drive. What about you?"

"ME?!?"

"Yeah. I used to see that little red car in your driveway all the time. Ain't seen it in a while. Blonde girl drove it."

"Oh, now I'M the one with nosey neighbors!"

"Just paying attention to my surroundings, is all."

"Tracy. Tried. Wasn't gonna work. She moved on."

Dark eyebrow raised. Unspoken question.

"She thought I was a lot better financial prospect than she found out to be true. Two ex-wives ransacked my savings."

"You still make good money, though?"

"Yeah. But that was the excuse she used. Can't say I miss 'er that much, but it was nice to wake up next to somebody from time to time." At least I didn't leer.

"Oh. I don't know how I'd handle bein' single now. I could do it, you know, financially. But personal..."

"I don't recommend it."

We finished dinner, argued about her paying for her own. She lost.

On the way home I mentioned that I could look at her dryer. After all, electrical technology is my forte'.

"No, I'll just get a new one."

"If Ted was here?"

"Wouldn't let 'im touch it," she laughed. "He might be a hell of a welder, but he don't know diddly about electricity. I'd have to beat him to keep 'im from trying, though." She paused. "No, I'll get a new one delivered tomorrow. If those clothes in it didn't burn, I'll wash em again."

"You can use my dryer tonight if you need it," I said. "Least I can do."

"Oh, thanks! I do need to dry some delicates."

"Delicates? Who still calls them 'delicates'?"

"Me, being restrained."

"You don't strike me as being the restrained type."

"I have my moments."

We pulled back into my driveway. "I'll be right back," she said.

I went inside, and true to her word, there was a knock at the door. I opened it and she came inside with a laundry basket full of wet undies. "Where's your dryer?"

"Back here," I said. I led her to the laundry room. She had the dryer running in a couple of minutes.

"You have another one of those beers? I forget what it's like to drink something that doesn't say 'lite'."

"I got a fridge full of them. You wanna be careful."

Smirk. "Why?"

"The usual reasons. Male. Female. Etc."

Giggle. "What's the et cetera?"

"Well, a little buzz and..."

Smile. "Let me tell you something, Mister Lane. I know something YOU don't."

"Like what? You're really a dude named Nathan?"

"Not unless things changed when I went to the bathroom."

"Then what?"

"Realist."

"Do tell."

"Me 'n' Ted, we both know that weeks apart, there might just be some itches that need scratchin'. We agreed, after a week apart, eatin' ain't cheatin'."

"The Bill Clinton Defense."

Giggle. "Now, about that beer."

I poured two more.

"And that works, exactly how?"

"For me, not so much. Got me a rabbit in the drawer next to the bed. But if Ted needs a therapeutic hummer, I'm okay with it. He comes home for the good stuff." Giggle. "That's ME!"

"Oh." Inwardly I was just a bit disappointed. Things had been looking up. Some of those things deflated.

We flipped through the TV channels, found something. "One more beer," she said. "I need to go pee."

"Delicate little thing, aren't you?"

Giggle. "Okay. You're right. I need to shake the dew off my lily."

"Better." I was imagining a pink lily as I poured two more beers.

By the time the dryer buzzed, so were we. She was giggly as she loaded her clothes back into the basket.

"I'm gonna take these home and fold 'em, Lane. It might be dangerous for me to stay over here much longer. Another one of those beers, and I dunno..."

"Then get yourself home, Sherry," I said, hating to hear my own words. "Let me get the door for you."

I opened the front door. I didn't think she NEEDED to squeeze past me, but I definitely enjoyed the friction. At the bottom of the steps she turned around to look at me. "You! You're trouble."

"Me?!?" I laughed. "I'm just a kindly old neighbor guy."

Okay ... hanging around with Sherry gave a fertile imagination fodder for an unusually productive whacking off that night.

Chapter 2 »