"Yeah, bye."
I shove my phone in my pocket and make my way to the garage, trudging through piles of newspapers and magazines scattered all over the kitchen floor. Who the hell lives like this? It's a damn fire hazard, not to mention a hazard just trying to walk through all this shit without tripping. If I didn't know the old man died of a heart attack, I would've guessed he'd tripped on all this junk and killed himself.
I open the door to the garage and find it's even worse than the house. More stacks of newspapers, along with other random junk; old typewriters, some books, cardboard boxes holding God-knows-what. I spot a couple lawn mowers in the corner but they probably don't work.
The lawn's a disaster so that's my first priority. Even if I'm able to get one of those lawn mowers to work, I'm not sure if it'll be able to cut through the two-foot high weeds in the yard. If it can't, I'll have to go into town and buy a high-powered weed cutter.
The garage door creaks and the wood near the hinges threatens to split as I lift up the door. A dark gray field mouse scurries past my feet to the driveway. And then another sneaks out. The garage is probably full of them.
Standing there looking out at the sea of weeds, I'm tempted to just spray them all with chemicals and forget trying to grow grass. A manicured lawn isn't my priority right now, but dead weeds would look even worse than the live ones so I decide just to mow them down.
I go back in the garage and roll the two lawn mowers out to the driveway, then go around to the back of my truck and get my tools. I brought a container of gas, assuming I'd need it for the mower. After filling each one with gas I attempt to start them and as expected, they don't work.
An hour later, I've disassembled the newest of the two mowers, the parts lined up in front of the garage. There's some noise next door and I turn my head and see Callie leaving her house. She's changed into jeans and a brown t-shirt with some kind of white logo on it. I think it says 'Lou's' so it must be her work uniform. Her hair is in a ponytail which is pulled through the little opening in the back of her brown baseball cap, which matches her t-shirt.
She's a cute little thing. Petite, but shapely. Nice curves that fill out her jeans. She seems too cute to be such a hothead. When I saw her, I thought she'd be all quiet and sweet, wanting to welcome me to the neighborhood, but instead she exploded at me like a damn firecracker. That's what she reminded me of, a firecracker, with her verbal outbursts that seemed to come out of nowhere. Even after I convinced her I wasn't trying to kill her—which I thought was both concerning and hilarious—she still came at me like a charging bull. One moment she'd be fine and the next—BAM!—back to yelling at me. Weird. And yet it puts a grin on my face.
"Hey," I yell, dropping my wrench and walking over to her. "You want some help?"
She's standing in front of her garage, trying to lift up the door.
"No, thanks. I've got it." She's struggling to make it move even an inch off the ground. Her knee must still hurt because she's trying to open the door while balancing on her good leg.
I reach down and lift up the door. "You going to work?"
She turns to me, putting her hands on her hips. "Stop doing things for me."
"Why?" I smile at her.
She seems surprised by my question. "Because I can do things myself."
"Maybe before your knee was hurt, but now, you need some help."
"Actually, I don't." She glares at me.
I lock eyes with her. "I think you do."
"You're wrong."
"I'm never wrong," I say in a cocky tone. "Ask anyone."
"I don't need to, because I'm telling you right now that you're wrong. I don't need your help or anyone else's."
"Really?" I wait for her to admit she's wrong and when she doesn't, I say, "Okay." I reach up and lower the garage door back down. Then I walk back toward my house. "Have a good day."
She mumbles something and I hear the squeak of the garage door as she attempts to lift it. I get back to work on my lawn mower, sneaking glances at my neighbor as she curses to herself while yanking on the door, balancing on one leg.
"Hey!" I hear her yell.
"Yeah?" I keep my eyes on the lawn mower handle, tightening some bolts.
"Could you come over here a minute?" she yells.
"Why? What do you need?" I yell back, my eyes still on the lawn mower.
There's a pause, and then, "I need some..."
"Some what?" I almost laugh when I say it.
She's mumbling curse words again. There was a 'damn' and a 'shit' and I might've heard something about a lunatic.
"What was that?" I yell. "I didn't hear you."
"I need some help, okay?"
I finally look at her and see her standing as she was earlier, her hands on her hips. It's supposed to be an angry stance but given that she has all her weight on one leg and her other leg is bent slightly with just her toe touching the ground, she looks like she's posing for me.
My laughter can't be contained as I approach her.