Garage

spwilcen

NSFW: Language and sexual situation

Just minding my business one day…

Garage

Most afternoons you’ll find me working in the garage.  As you expect here in the mid-south, on late spring and summer days at least one of the twin overhead doors is open letting stray breezes wander through. That keeps the sweat down, so it takes the better part of an afternoon before I admit I’m hot and thirsty and go inside for a cold cola or a glass of iced tea.  I can do this because like more and more white-collar workers these days, I telecommute. 

I’m an early riser, and my project work is solo until final stages, so I’ve got a good eight hours in by two in the afternoon.  Unless there’s a press to wrap a project or a conference call to suffer through, that puts me in the garage after a break for a good roast beef or pastrami sandwich and a quick read of the local paper.  It’s a good arrangement for me, a country boy at heart, more comfortable with physical work than with using my head, but that’s my lot.  To use my brain, not my back, to earn a living, that is.  My schedule is a good deal for my clients because I get twice as much done in one wall-clock hour than I would if I were chained to a desk in some corporate office.

In the garage, I putz.  I’m a fixer-upper.  Dad was a WWII veteran, a product of the Great Depression.  Studying under him for the first almost twenty years of my life, I picked up his habits of hanging on to everything – even things broken or missing odd parts – and fixing, or at least trying to fix anything ripped, torn, bent, mangled, scratched or not working as it should.  It has to be really far gone before I’ll give up on it and pitch it out.  I’ve learned by trial-and-error how to repair anything except things electrical and will spend hours refinishing a piece of furniture not worth anywhere near the effort it requires. 

This afternoon time is well spent.  It’s usually quiet in the neighborhood except for tradesmen in and out, and with my wife off at her office in the city.  I do some good creative thinking about work while my hands run autopilot on whatever project fills the afternoon.  Dad fixed things because his experience made him do it as a matter of survival even after it was no longer really necessary.  You could say I do it as a matter of survival too.  The therapy of it helps me shake off not infrequent petty frustrations.   Where dad was good at repair and making-do, I’m a novice and it’s never a matter of making-do.

Not only was dad the ultimate fixer-upper, he was also a lady-killer.  He was only six foot two but gave the appearance of being much taller.  He was solidly built with a presence about him that made you know, whether you were male or female, that he was a man’s man.  This impression is not from looking back or remembering him when I was a child, because I still have recollections of his bearing long after I myself was a man. 

Dad had a marvelous gift of gab too. I mean he’d talk your leg off if you were a man and could charm your pants off if you were a lady.  After mom left, I’m almost certain I can say that in a literal way.  Before that, I don’t know.  It was long ago, and I was young, so it never occurred to me to notice; if in fact, I’d have known what there was to notice.  Dad was good-looking in a Clark Gable way.  Unfortunately, I didn’t inherit either dad’s good looks or any of his charming repartee.  Neither is something you learn or train yourself into.  I think I’m a run-of-the mill guy.  Not ugly but certainly not handsome and definitely not a lady-killer.  Oh, and conversation with men is easy and normal, but any involved conversation with a lady is arduous and worrisome.

The wife and I live in an upscale but not posh subdivision evenly divided between fast-rising young couples and retired or semi-retired couples.  The wife is a social animal, familiar with all the neighbors for blocks around.  I tend yard work and the barbecue grill evenings.  Every chance I get, weather permitting, I spend my afternoons in the garage, putzing.  I doubt many of my immediate neighbors know exactly what I do for a living.  Once in a while a couple will stroll by as I mow the lawn or see me on the deck and come up to ask me what kind of flowers I have planted in one or another of the flower beds.  We’ll go through the introduction or re-introduction thing, explain professions or how they’re enjoying their retirement or whose kids are coming to visit next week.  If conversation gets to my work, and I explain whether for the first time or the second or third, eyes glaze over on the other side of the conversation and I get an “Uh, yeah.” 

With one or both of the garage doors open as I do my afternoon therapy, sometimes into the evening, the neighborhood has learned what keeps me busy out there.  That gets invitations to neighbors’ houses for a brew and “Oh, by the way, do you think this is worth fixing, that is, if it can be fixed?”  It’s a pretty good social tool for a guy not graced with tremendous personal magic like my dad was.  Gets me over awkward silences when I really, honest-to-god, can’t remember she’s a nursing supervisor and he does something-or-other for the morning newspaper I read as accompaniment to my pastrami sandwich. 

Sometimes I’m doing really well if I can remember ‘she’ is Margaret and ‘he’ is Bob.  I’ve carried home small projects concluding a casual walk-by visit with neighbors after, “gee, could you?  That would be just super!”  Sometimes a neighbor just shows up with a project looking for an idea on “how,” or out-and-out wondering if I ‘have time’ to take a crack at the odd bits of a broken whatchamacallit tossed into a box.  So far, I’ve had to pronounce just a rare few beyond my abilities to restore or repair.  Except for a few of the other neighborhood guys pretty darned good themselves, it’s usually easier to do it than to explain how to do it.

Yeah, I’m one of those ‘older’ guys but I try to keep myself in reasonable shape.  That comes from an understanding of my mortality and figuring not to make it any easier for the Grim Reaper than necessary.  Before I power on the computer in my office, I knock out thirty minutes, give or take five, of pretty rigorous weight work after a few minutes of warm-up stretches as I remember them from my old karate days.  Following that with the “S, S, & S” routine – the last ‘S’ a good hot shower – gets the day off and running and with my first cup of coffee, I’m at my desk by five-thirty sometimes or little after six at the latest. 

Unless we talk of ‘Nam years or favorite oldies and what we were doing when a tune on the radio first aired, most folks haven’t a real clue about my age.  Guys close to my age probably have a pretty fair idea but only because most of them know how old they are, and it doesn’t require math to give me the same age.  I imagine they might also wonder how it is I don’t look as old as they do.  If they don’t, I’m wasting thirty to forty-five minutes every weekday morning.  I have no problem communicating up or down the generation gap as a rule but have two issues to deal with there.  First, there are fewer of the “up-the-generation” guys around.  Second, it’s still a struggle to understand the “down-the-generation” guys.  Once in a while one of these younger guys will ask how I keep the crabgrass under control, and not be tremendously impressed with my secret.  It’s brute force – you see a patch of crab grass; you yank it out.  Youngsters prefer chemicals, thinking it faster, certainly easier.  Often as not, that doesn’t seem to work, and they come back asking again as if I lied to them the first time. 

So there I was, a run-of-the-mill guy, in my garage one early summer afternoon.  The radio was softly working a tune that with the first few bars made me stop and think back a few years, while I tuned the lawn mower.  You know, draining and replacing the oil, cleaning and re-gapping the spark plug, changing the air filter.  You know, too, the song you remember from high school or college when you were sure you’d met the woman you’d marry and repopulate the world with.  But didn’t.  Ah.  More meaningful, the work at hand, the mower tune-up drill you should go through at least once a year.  I had it up on the bench with a five-eighths box end wrench on the blade bolt.  Why not, I thought, as long as I’ve got it up here, give it a good cleaning on the underside, pull the blade and sharpen it?  The wrench wasn’t doing the job and I’d dropped it twice.

“Hey!” 

A female voice, but not one recognized as one of the youngsters in the subdivision who know the air tank is usually primed and, if the garage door is open, it’s a good time to get your bicycle tire pressure checked and your chain oiled.  Maybe chat a bit.  This voice didn’t sound young.  I was pretty sure it was female, a bit huskier than most of the women I knew around here, but since it came from the open door and I was on the other side of the garage with the door on that side closed, it was not an easy make.  I supposed it could be one of the older boys who was at that awkward point where their Adam’s apple started to nub-out and the voice originating near there was intermittently alto, then tenor, then alto.  I was at the bench along the side wall with my back to the open door, a couple of odd sawhorses from the last project parked where otherwise my truck would be.  It was hard to tell.  The voice, I mean.

I didn’t turn around, just replied, “Hey yourself.  What’s cookin’?” Kind of aiming my voice over my shoulder and wondering why the five-eighths seemed not to be right for the blade bolt.  I had no idea if it would be Missy from down the street with a slow leak in her front tire.  Maybe Elwin to talk baseball cards – always a struggle for me because I don’t follow the sport, but I try.  Not for me. For Elwin.  Not since Mantle, Maris, Matthews, Minoso, Mays and the like, I really don’t know the names of the current crop of super stars.  That makes Elwin feel pretty good, because he’s always able to stump me with questions and impress me with recitations.

Who the hell would name their son ‘Elwin’?  Went with his dad one Saturday to see him play baseball and he’s not a bad player – pretty good arm for a pre-teen playing the hot corner.  But a name like Elwin?  Maybe, I was thinking, it would be a good idea to come up with a nickname for him and see if it couldn’t stick once the other ballplayers heard it a time or two. Too bad he doesn’t have red hair or throw lefty – that’d make it a cinch.

“Just passing by,” the voice said.  “Saw your garage door open and wondered what you’re working on this afternoon.  Looks like you have a lawn mower problem.” 

Older.  Older female.  Confident.  Maybe a bit bossy.  Bossy is okay, we guys just don’t care for nagging or hen-pecking.  A lady just used to getting her way is okay.  That suggests her husband at least voices his opinion.  His opinion seldom matters but it’s the principle, you know?  I turned to see who the voice was. 

“Nope, just tuning it up and sharpening the blade.  I’m between projects so it’s a good time.”

Definitely older.  Most certainly female.  There are a few good-looking women in the neighborhood.  Only a few.  Some of them my age, some of them ten years or twenty years younger.  Some youngsters just hitting late-twenties – only now starting families.  This one maybe thirty-five and maybe if she were made-up for an evening out on the town, she’d be something to make you look twice.  Okay, three times.  Today, she was dressed for exactly what I was doing – putzing around in suburbia.  Whatever a mom would be doing in the afternoon.  Waiting for the kids to get home from school; weeding the flower bed; jogging; visiting with neighbors over afternoon coffee; going to or coming from shopping. 

Her clothing was a bit more casual than mine.  I was dressed so that spilled oil wouldn’t cover me and what got on my jeans wouldn’t, couldn’t, ruin them.  She certainly wasn’t going shopping dressed as she was.  Maybe that’s the way one dresses for the mall in mid-afternoon.  Not a lot of coverage.  Okay for yardwork or a long afternoon walk.  Sandy blonde hair snatched back into a subtly sexy ponytail in the way only an older woman can do it, light-colored eyes, though with the sun at her back I couldn’t tell blue from green.  Broad shouldered.  Moderately tall, five-six or maybe five-eight.  Leggy, in fact.  Okay, you got me – once I got a look, I recognized her, not by name but by looks – one of the few in the neighborhood with an ass worth watching. 

I’m guilty.  Of watching.  My wife knows it.  She allows it’s okay as long as I don’t embarrass the ladies or myself.  In return, I don’t stew when she watches Brad Pitt or that good-looking Clooney guy.

I offered, “Ah, you’re from several houses up the street, aren’t you?  The one with the redwood gazebo and the lovely red roses?” 

Brilliant conversationalist.  Remember I warned you of that when I described my dad.  She did have my attention, whatever reason brought her up the driveway off the street and away, I assumed, from her afternoon walk.  As my eyes got used to the extra sunlight, I saw she wore a thin, loose-fitting black-on-white polka-dotted blousy thing and some kind of not-pants and not-skirt thing, whatever they call them.  Not short and not full enough to be a skirt – black and tight coming down short of mid-thigh.  I never knew if those are shorts or in fact a skirt.  One thing difficult not to notice was that she wasn’t wearing a bra.  Excuse me, but I am alert, with pretty damned good eyes.  Her tits were modestly large, about the size of small cantaloupe, apparently firm with lovely dark brown nipples standing at attention.  If they weren’t already hard, I believe you’d better stand back when they transition – you could be impaled.

“Yes, that’s our place.  I was bored and walking the neighborhood.  I saw your garage door open and heard a wrench drop so I knew you were out here working on something – you’re always working on something aren’t you?”

She walked inside a bit, out of the bright warm sunlight into the cool shaded unoccupied side of the garage.  Too bad, the sun was good for her, and for the gauzy blouse.  My eyes wasted time adjusting from looking out into the bright mid-afternoon to the subdued light of the garage.

“Well, I work out of my office here at the house and I’m usually done by two.  I like to stay busy and there is no shortage of odd things to stay busy with.”

“What do you do for relaxation?”

“This is relaxation.”

“No.  I mean like for fun.”

“I used to fish.  Gardening and travel are good.  And if not working the grill, going downtown to a really good restaurant.  Maybe taking in a show.  Visiting with friends and family.  Been known to toss back a good Scotch or a really good ice-cold beer if the grill’s running and the conversation is easy.  If the wife is not completely wrung-out at the end of the week we sneak out to a friend’s ranch and ride horses.  Or she rides by herself if there’s some ranch repair I get to help with.  In that case the ladies ride, we work, then while we guys work on cold brews, the ladies sip wine and plan a super evening meal – letting us know when to fire-up the grill.  After dinner, those that smoke, do.  We sip good whisky – wine usually, for the ladies, stare at the stars and argue politics, or world events, or most anything but never sports.”

“Sounds like good clean fun.  My husband’s a dentist.”

“I think I knew that.  What do you and your husband do for fun?”

“Oh, we have a daughter and she keeps us busy and I play tennis once a week.”

“We have children, but they’re on their own and mostly don’t want us around except on special occasions.”

“And I work out.”

“That shows.”

“Oh?” 

“I mean you don’t look like you need to be worried about fat.  Um, that didn’t come out like I intended.  I meant it to be a compliment.”

“I’m sure you did, and that’s how I took it.  Thank you.  I see you working in the yard a lot.”

“I do that.  I actually enjoy it.” 

“Most of the younger men like to have someone else do that.”

“I think if they had the time, they would like to do their own yard work too.  It’s a guy thing – hunting, fishing, working with your hands.  There’s a sense of accomplishment that comes with that.  I can see it if you’re in the office all day and into the evening making a career or if you are all done with that and have health problems or would rather spend your time playing golf.”

“You do a lot more than yard work.  Everyone in the neighborhood knows that.”

“I’m a physical guy.  Always have been.  Sweat is therapeutic.  For me, anyway.”

“I’ve seen that.  That’s not rare in a man, but it is unusual.  Sweat usually comes from the gym, playing handball or running.  I kind of like the idea of working to sweat instead of playing to sweat.  It’s kind of sexy.”

I had nothing appropriate to add to that.  The brief silence was a little awkward.  But the looking was nice.  She came fully inside out of the bright sun and my eyes had adjusted.  She locked eyes and began.

“So.  Do you wanna fuck me?”

“Pardon?”

“Right here, right now.  Take that mower off the bench and put me up there.”

“That’s not a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“I can think of a number of really good reasons.”

“Like?”

“First, you’re married…”

“My husband’s queer.” 

I have to confess that was an avalanche, but I continued, “…and I’m married.”

“So?”

“So, you have to agree my wife’s probably the best-looking woman in the neighborhood. I’m happy and have my hands quite full with her.” 

“You don’t think I’m good looking?”

“No.  I mean yes.  I mean, no doubt about it, you’re a great looking woman. Damn good-looking woman.  If I said otherwise, you’d think there was something wrong with me.  And there’s not.  I mean, damn, I’m saying all the wrong things here.  You know what I mean.”

“So, you wanna take me right now?”

“Given the right circumstances yes, but reason three: neighborhood kids will be out of school soon, if they’re not already, and they pop in all the time.  None of them call ahead to make sure it’s a good time.”

“That makes it more exciting.  Maybe we’ll get caught.  I’m a great fuck.”

“I bet you are.”  I knew I was not saying the right things.  I wish I’d taken notes when my dad was talking his magic.

She grinned and took a couple of steps closer, standing about a foot away.  Face to face and making me uncomfortable.  I could smell her then over the gasoline and dried grass lodged under the mower deck.  Not one for spending a lot of time really close to any ladies other than the wife, I didn’t recognize the perfume, but it did doing what perfume was intended to do – sending signals to my brain suggesting something soft and sweet and succulent.  She had a small line across her forehead where sweat matted down her bangs, turning the tips a chestnut brown.  There were two small tips of another brown I was trying my best to ignore.  So maybe “soft” didn’t apply here.

“So, let me show you.”

“Show me what?”  That was a puny attempt at humor, maybe to put her off the hunt.  It didn’t work.

“What a really good fuck is.  My gay husband hasn’t touched me in years and I’m horny as a toad.  I need screwing and I think you’re the man for the job.”

“While I really have to admit, that’s enticing, reason four: I don’t know you and you don’t know me.”

“Meaning?”  Her eyebrows lifted as if to add, “How long are you going to work avoiding this?”

“Meaning, if either one of us takes a present home to our wife, husband in your case, there will be hell to pay.”

She smiled.  “I haven’t been with anyone except my husband since we got married twelve years ago.  Two years after we were married, he came out of the closet – just after our daughter was conceived – and I think he was happy to do it, so he didn’t have to keep up the heterosexual act – do the heterosexual thing.”

“Ah, if your husband is gay – that means he’s at risk for picking up the newest disease and bringing it home to share with you.  And you then to share with me.  Um, or whoever.  Even assuming abstinence makes you hospital fresh – you know nothing about me…”

“I’ve seen you out working in the yard.  You look good to me.”

“I’m talking about disease.  You know nothing about me.”

“You have something?”

“No.”

“Well, okay then.  We’re good to go.”

She closed the gap between us, what there was of it, and put her right hand down on my crotch, found my pecker, squeezed authoritatively, and smiled impishly at me.  No, not impishly, evilly.  I’d not had time to react.  In a mental way, react.  I wasn’t expecting to have to react.  Mentally.  I was standing in my own garage, minding my own business.  I still was, more or less trying to mind my own business.  Minding my own business was becoming progressively harder.  I mean more difficult.  I wasn’t certain I knew how to react.  I was thinking, I’m a tough guy, she can’t hurt me, I’d best talk her out of this.  I stood, uncomfortable, and, thank you, also quite comfortable with my left arm dangling with the five-eighths wrench still in hand and my right arm half at my side, half forward and up, trying to make up its mind if it needed to calmly and firmly take hold of her hand and remove it from my crotch.

“I see, you are beginning to agree with me,” she said, “that this could be a good thing.”

“No doubt.  It would be a good, probably a great thing.  Number five or six, I’ve lost count: what about fidelity?  I mean your husband?”

“My husband can worry about himself.  He does anyway.  I don’t give a shit about him, fidelity or anything like that.  I want to get laid.”  With that she completely closed the gap so only her right arm was between us, her hand still firmly massaging my painfully stiff pecker with authority.  As she took that last of the safety zone, she gave an extra squeeze, looking up at my face to see if she’d discovered the point of pain for me yet.

I could feel one nipple pressing into my arm. No doubts anymore.  If one was any measure, that is if they were a matched set, they were erect but supple, the mound of flesh behind also firm but yielding.  And damn, she smelled good enough to eat.

I lost.  Or she lost.  Well, I took hold of her hand with my right hand and pulled it away from where it felt, I have to tell you, pretty damned good.  She took the opportunity for one last squeeze, coming pretty close to the point of pain and I think she knew it because she smiled an evil smile and lifted her brows again saying with them, “You do know what you’re missing, no?”

As calmly as I could, I said, “this is not something I want for my wife.”

“I’m not asking for an affair.  I’m asking for a quick fuck.  Here,” she said as she stepped away and over to the closest sawhorse and sitting with just the cheeks of her ass on the crosspiece, lifted her dress-thingy and spread her legs, “Open for business.  Take your time.”

No panties.  I believe she was pretty much on a mission when she happened by.  No bra, no panties – ready to roll.  I don’t care what PeepShow magazine makes you think, there is no glamour in naked pussy.  Well, yes, there is, but it’s not like a work of art.  Okay, it is, if you’re a man.  I give up.  It looked good.  But not that good.

I must be made of strong stuff because I said, “Look, I’m flattered and it’s appealing, but your husband aside, my wife, well, it’s not something she’d like and so…”

“I’m not asking her permission.  Just fuck me.  Right here.  Right now.”  She didn’t raise her voice.  She more or less purred, her voice not the voice she came through the door with a few minutes ago.

“…And since it’s not something she would be happy about it’s not something I’d be happy about.  I have to admit you’re well prepared unless you run around like this all the time, in which case I have to pay a lot more attention to the ladies in the neighborhood.  Out of curiosity, did you bring a condom too?”

“No.”  With this a frown crossed her face for just a second.

“Well, there you go.  Tell yourself if it hadn’t been for that, you might be going home happy.”

“Would I?”

“No.”

“Aren’t you, I mean didn’t you have a vasectomy?”

“Yes.  How would you know or is that something everyone gets nowadays?”

“Your wife said you had one.  She also said you are monogamous.”

“My wife talked about my having a vasectomy?  You and she talked about sex, our sex?”

“You’d be surprised what wives talk about.  All the wives.  But knowing that and knowing I’m clean, I didn’t think it would matter.”

“It does.  Or it would have.  Oh hell, I dunno what I mean, but pregnancy is not the concern.  People bent on getting what they want have wonderful reputations for lying.  Well deserved, you think?”

“I’m not sure.  I’m trying to put a lot of things into perspective here.  Since my husband, well, you know it’s been a long, long time.  I’m not, I mean, I never considered whether or not I was being faithful.  My husband isn’t – faithful.  He’s gay.  He likes men.  I never thought about my being faithful – why should I?  And not thinking about it for me, I never considered it for someone else.  I’m thinking hard about a lot of things.  My daughter will be a teenager soon.  My youth is almost gone.  I have needs.  Oh boy, do I have needs.  I want someone normal to talk intimately with – I mean a man.  But most of all I want to get laid.  That’s a good thing.  At least I remember it was a good thing.  Maybe that will clear my head and then I can think about other things.  Other important things.  Right now, I want a good fucking.”

She half-hopped off the sawhorse.  Her pants-or-dress thingy didn’t exactly reclaim all of her thighs.  It didn’t seem to concern her.  Frankly, it bothered me she might recover and become concerned.  I broke the silence.

“Sex is not a good thing.  Sex is one of the best things there is.  You remember right.  A lady as good-looking as you shouldn’t have any problem finding someone willing to roll in the hay.” 

She blushed ever so slightly at this comment.  I thought she did, and I continued, “Maybe you’re not trying hard enough…”

“I’m trying now.”

“…or in the right places…”

“I picked this spot.  I picked you.  I picked today.  And I picked this outfit,” she said, turning around and lifting her skirt-thing, giving me an unobstructed view of her beautiful, marvelously naked, perfectly round and solid ass.  “Don’t you like it?”

“Absolutely,” I said as she dropped her skirt-shorts turning back to face me.  It would have been my turn to blush, but I’d already been expertly handled, which, I figured, put me well past being flattered into blushing.  She went on with a pout, “But there’s that disease thing with strangers and knowing me, that is, I’m okay, boy am I okay – I’m damned near virgin – and talking with your wife, I know you.  I thought you were a safe bet.”

We both heard the unmistakable pop and hiss of school bus brakes down the street. “Oh, is that a school bus?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“I have to go.  That’s the second bus and my daughter will be on it.  I’ll be back.  I want to know the ‘right circumstances.’  We’re not done yet.” 

She smiled, took two steps over to me, tiptoed up and gave me a light brushing kiss on the cheek,  and leaving her face near my ear as if she was ready to tell me a secret, put her hand back down in the danger zone and gave a sharp squeeze.  “Hope your wife gets home soon.  It would be a shame to waste a good hard-on like this.”

Letting go, she smiled an unsettling smile and turned to leave.  Entering back into sunlight at the open garage door she turned so the sun at her back all but removed her blouse and said smiling, “By the way, what size condom?”

“Unless you’re hung like a donkey – which I’m not – they’re pretty much one-size-fits-all.”

“I’ve never held a donkey, so I don’t know, but you felt big enough to me.  Your wife is lucky.”  With that, she giggled and walked down the driveway.  I watched.  And I enjoyed.  I think there was an extra wiggle.  Maybe not.  Maybe I’d just never paid attention before in the same way.  I have ever since.

Not two minutes later, barely enough time for my breathing to return to something close to normal, Elwin walked up the driveway. 

“Hey, Ms. K, is Mr. D busy?” Elwin asked.

“No, Elwin, he’s not busy at all,” she answered as she continued down the driveway, still with an unmistakable exaggerated swing to her hips.

Coming through the open door, Elwin cheerily sang out, “hey Mr. D!  We got out of school early today because the teachers are doing that teacher-workday thing.  You know, so they can be ready for when the parents come to PTA.”

I turned and started back to my bench and Elwin followed.  “So, Elwin, what do you think of the name ‘Duster’?”

“Duster?  If that’s a name, it’s kinda cool, maybe.  Better than ‘pudding’ or ‘sweet potato.’ What kind of name is ‘Duster’?”

“A nickname.”

“Whose?”

“Yours.”

“Nah, no, nobody calls me ‘Duster.’”  Elwin emphasized his conviction shaking his head and grinning up at me.

“I do.”

“Why?”

“Watched you play Little League.  You got a pretty good arm from third to first.  Blows the dust outta the first baseman’s mitt.  Have to call you ‘Duster’ from now on.”

“Okay by me.  That’s cool since that’s what it means.  I was gonna ask you to play catch, but I see you’re working on your mower.  Is it broke?”

“Broken.”

“Oh.  So, have you figgered it out yet?”

“It’s not broken.”

“You said it was.”

“What I meant was, it’s not ‘broke.’  If it were broken, it would be ‘broken’ you see?”

“Oh yeah.  Bad English, huh?  So whatcha doin?”

“Well I was tuning it up.”

“Okay.  I’ll ask dad to play catch when he gets home.  Or maybe Stubby Johnson is home.  If his momma will let him out.  Stubby – that’s not a cool nickname, huh?”

“Maybe it doesn’t seem so.  But I’d almost bet you when he gets older – like in high school – that’ll be pretty neat.  Every kid needs a good nickname.  Tell you what, I’ve kind of forgotten where I was here.  Let me get my glove and we’ll toss it around for forty-five minutes or so.  Until your dad gets home, Duster.”

Which is what we did.  My game was off. 

By the way.  Her eyes were green.

—

© spwilcenski 2022

spwilcenwrites 10/8/2022