Chapter 1

Lying in bed after waking up, Mark Freeman had a few thoughts running through his mind. At this point in his life, he had no major complaints as things seemed to be going well. Living in Austin, Texas with its, liveliness, economy, weather, and no State income taxes were all pluses in his book. The property taxes were a little on the high side but all considered this was a nice place to live. He knew he was not alone in thinking this because of published articles he had read that listed Austin as one of the best places to live in the States.

In washing up this morning, Mark was aware that today, Sunday, was designated to be a day of rest and that is what he planned on doing. He would do his resting after he did his food shopping, picked up some light bulbs at Home Depot, gassed up his car, and purchased a power ball ticket. The morning news reported that there was no winner for the lottery and it had rolled over with the prize estimated to be four hundred and fifty million at the next drawing. Someone had to win and he thought why not him?

Mark was twenty-eight years of age, a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin which was referred to locally as UT. He was single and had been told by some friends that he was good-looking. His good looks had helped him in establishing some very satisfying relationships with members of the opposite sex. He hadn’t yet found a woman he wanted to marry and would admit that he wasn’t looking that hard to find her. In time he thought that would happen but he was in no rush to do it.

After he dressed, he took the elevator down from his tenth-floor condo to the garage. He was walking to his car and hadn’t walked that far when he heard, “Hey Mister.”

He stopped and turned to this voice and saw a lady standing by the side of a car who he assumed had called out.

“Yes?”

“Do you know anything about replacing windshield wiper blades?”

Mark started walking toward this lady saying, “A little.”

As he was walking toward her he recognized her as being Gloria Mendez. That was because the Texas Legislature was in session at the Capitol building which was right across the street from Mark’s condo building. Gloria Mendez was about Mark’s age and was a State Senator. He had seen her on the news being interviewed just about every other day by the local television reporters as to what was happening with the Legislature. Mark enjoyed watching her being interviewed since she was an attractive lady. He didn’t pay much attention to what she was saying as she leaned a little to the left and Mark leaned a little to the right.

Arriving at where she was standing he said, “What’s the problem?”

“The instructions say that after the old wiper blade is removed the new wiper blade should slip into the J-hook but the blade won’t slip in.”

Taking the blade from her he noticed there was an insert where the mount was on this new blade. He pressed on this insert and felt it click into place. With that done he slipped the blade into the J-hook and closed the latch to keep it in place. Taking the other blade from Gloria he walked to the other side of her car and in about a minute he removed the old wiper blade and replaced it with the new one.

“How did you do that?” asked Gloria.

“The insert wasn’t fully seated so I pressed down on it to seat it and then the blade could slip into the J-hook. To be honest with you, I had the same problem a few years ago and it took me some time to figure out what was the problem. You are now good to go.”

“Thank you for doing this as you certainly are handy. Speaking of that, do you know of a handyman I can call to have some problems fixed in the condo I am renting?”

“What are the problems?”

“When I go to bed at night I can hear the toilet every so often filling with water when it hasn’t been used and that bothers me. I also have some electrical problems. I told the condo owner about these problems and he told me to hire a handyman to fix these things and send him a bill. I was strongly tempted to tell him that was his job to do but he does give me a good break on what he charges for rent so I kept my mouth shut.”

“I might be able to fix those problems. Why don’t you show me your unit and let me see what’s going on.”

Mark followed Gloria to her unit at times admiring her backside in the tight jeans she wore. There was a nice jiggle to her butt as she walked.

Once inside her condo unit, he took off the lid on top of the toilet and noticed that the filling mechanism was not the flapper kind. This one was more modern and consisted of a large tube that was seated over the outlet. He could see that to stop the leakage he would need to replace the gasket on the bottom of this tube.

Gloria had turned on the lights in her bedroom and the bathroom and there could be seen a distinctive flickering to these lights. Mark took a look at the electrical panel and confirmed these lights were controlled by a fifteen amp circuit breaker.

Mark told Gloria he thought he could fix these problems but he needed to pick up some items and would be back later. She responded by saying that she needs to do some shopping herself which had them both agree he would be back at her unit no earlier than five.

On the drive to the store, Mark thought about Gloria. She was one good-looking lady with a nice figure. He remembers some guy commenting that when he saw a good-looking lady saying he wondered what kind of a lover she would be. Mark mentally chuckled to himself because he wasn’t that way. When he saw a good-looking lady he went right for the jugular because he wondered how she would look naked. Gloria with her long dark hair that came down both sides of her face to the tops of her breasts and having a pretty face had him thinking she would look terrific.

It didn’t take Mark long to do the shopping and purchase the items he needed. He was back in his unit and after putting his food items away and replacing a light bulb he watched television resting and killing the time till it was five.