“Hopefully you didn’t break anything coming in here, and you did have to pee and all, so I guess I forgive you.”
“Oh good, I was worried, a little. You got anything to eat in this place, I’m starving.”
“Not much. Do you like pizza?”
“Sure, especially here in the Philly area. The pizza in Kansas is terrible in comparison. I’m big on sausage and onion.” That’s exactly how cat likes her pizza, I think to myself
“Me too, I’ll just call it in and pick it up, in a few. What about something to drink?”
You got any of that Blue Moon? I really like that beer.” So coincidental, she loves Cat’s Pizza and my beer.
“I’ll pick some up. You wanna go with me?”
“If you don’t mind, I think I’ll take a shower.”
“Uh, no I don’t mind, and uh, I guess you know where the bathroom is.?” I was sounding like an idiot.
“I don’t know if you can hear your washer running. I know you’re deaf, so you probably can’t. I put in a load of my clothes in while I was waiting for you. Also, you didn’t offer me a tour of your lovely home here but don’t worry, I took a tour on my own. This place will suit me fine for the next few weeks or so.” I could hear the washer now that she mentioned it. And at this moment I was feeling so bowled over. I have never felt so powerless around anyone, and for some reason, I was loving it. Maybe it was her matter of fact, no-nonsense, demeanor, or the alternating smile or smirk on her face that she used so well to cast her spell on me. The way she tilted her head and scrunched her eyes when she finished a sentence or all of it. “How did you know I was hard of hearing?” I said, trying to sound normal.
“Maybe it’s because you are older than dirt, or maybe it’s because you forgot to remove your hearing aids in the presence of a young girl that you’re flirting with.” She said laughing as she spoke. I had to laugh too, not knowing how to take her at all.
“Don’t worry, you’ll get used to me. I’m a sarcastic little brat, that’s for sure.” Now go get that pizza I gotta get naked.
I went to the liquor store first. As I’m driving there, I’m thinking to myself. She did say, ‘I gotta get naked’. Now I’m trying not to think of her naked, but it’s impossible. Thankfully some nitwit almost backs into me as I’m pulling into the parking lot, which brings back to reality.
The pizza wasn’t quite ready yet, so I perused my device. I googled head jokes. They didn’t have exactly what I was looking for, just jokes like Yo Mama jokes: Yo mama’s head is so small that she got her ear pierced and she died. Yo Mama’s head is so big that when it rains, she don’t get wet.
“That’ll be twelve fifty.” The girl at the counter said. I paid her and carried the box to the car. My cell made that text noises. It was Neighbor Ed, my long-term neighbor friend. The message said, ‘Neighbor G. I don’t know if your home yet but earlier I saw a hot young girl on your porch, and then it looked like she tried to open one of your front windows. I was gonna call the cops, but she seems to have disappeared. Were you expecting someone?’
I texted back. ‘That was probably my great niece, she said she might stop by today. She might be staying here for a few days.’ I lied.
‘Okay, just wanted to alert you is all. I’m looking forward to meeting her.’
I didn’t text him back.
As I entered, I could hear music coming from Alexa in my office upstairs. It was an old Doo-Wop song by The Duprees. “You Belong to Me”. I can hear Tac trying to sing along with it. She may have many talents, but singing was not one of them. She sort-of sounded like a seal in heat. It made me think of Cat though as she hated Doo-Wop, especially The Duprees, a strange non-coincidence, I thought.
“Lucy, I’m home,” I shouted out, trying to sound like Desi Arnaz and realizing at the same time she likely never heard of him. The music stopped and she came running down the steps, this time barefoot, wearing red jogging shorts and what looked like the same top. Her hair was still wet. She came right up to me, smiling, and said kiss me you old fool. And I did, thinking it would be a peck, but it was more than a peck, no tongues mind you, but more than a peck. The root beer smell was much stronger now, and I was, you know, feeling something.
It was so nice out, I suggested we go out on the back deck to eat. “Just go out there pick a seat and sit yourself down. I’ll take it from here.” I brought out two sixteen-ounce cans of Blue Moon with the screw off wide neck openings, the only way to drink canned beer, once you’ve tried it. Next, I bought out the box of pizza, some napkins, and two paper plates.
She really must have been hungry because she wolfed the first slice down like a starving hyena. She calmed down a bit after that, and said, “Ooh, you must think I’m a pig.” She took a giant swig of the Blue Moon and then let out a mighty belch. “Buuuurrrpp.” Laughing now like a crazy person, as she said: “EXCUSE ME.” Then she said, sort of smirking. “So how was your day, did you go visit some old codgers at the old age home?” She had one eye squinted but had a twinkle in her other eye as she stared at me. I thought to myself, this young, pretty, girl, is so disarming. She seems to be constantly flirting with me, but at the same time, she likes to make me feel so old at the same time.
“Oh, Oh, she blurts out. I have a head joke for you, are you ready?”
I’m thinking of the lame “Yo Mamma” jokes I just read and wondering if I could even remember them as a comeback to whatever her joke was going to be.
“So here goes. “This father has a son who just turned twenty-one. But he’s not a normal son he’s just, a???”
“Head”, I said
“Bingo. So, the father places the head-son on the bar. The son says, ’What should I drink dad? The dad says to the bartender, ‘Give my boy here, a shot of Jack’. The son knocks the shot down and low and behold, a fully functional arm pops out of the side of his head. He knocks down another, same thing. After about five more shots, he’s drunk, but he has a fully functioning body. He’s so excited about this turn of events that he runs staggering out into the street, gets run over by a Truck and gets killed instantly. The father runs out, followed by the local drunk. The drunk pats the father on the back and says? He should have quit while he was a head.” Once again, she’s wildly laughing and looking for my approval. I gave her the best fake laugh I have, as I thought the joke was terrible. “I knew you’d like that one,” she said, a bit more subdued now, as if she knew I was faking.
We finished all the pizza and had two Blue Moons each. I had a slight buzz going. “So, what now?” I asked.
“How’s about we go into your living room and watch a movie?” She seemed a bit buzzed as well.
I did my best to temporarily ditch my buzz, and I decided to ask her a point-blank question: “Why are you here? What is this whole thing about? Why are in my life at this particular moment?”
Her expression changed. She pursed her lips, and looked me straight in the eye, no smile, no wink, no effervescence, and said. “I have the answers to all those questions, and more, but you’re not ready for the answers yet. So, quit being an old fart and let’s find a movie to watch. I’ll turn it up loud so you can hear it, you old codge.” She said grinning once again. She helped me clean up and we headed to the living room to watch a movie.
We perused Comcast On Demand, and nothing that was new jumped out at us. We went to free movies, nothing. She suggested Turner Classics. It turned out they were having Christmas in July week, and just about to start was It’s a Wonderful Life. “I love this movie, can we watch it please, please, it’s right up your alley, the movie is about a hundred years old.” I expected as much from her.
“I’m surprised you have ever even seen this movie.?”
“You’d be surprised at the things I’ve seen Daddio?”
So, we settled in to watch the movie. If you don’t remember it, it was a Frank Capra flick starring Jimmy Stewart. He’s the main chara
cter, George Bailey who is about to jump off a bridge. They send an angel to rescue him, get this name, Clarence Oddbody. Anyway, the storyline was somewhat stolen from a “Christmas Carol”, with all manner of time travel and what ifs?
About ten minutes into the movie Tac wraps her arm around my arm holds my hand and lays her head on my shoulder. About halfway through the movie, I begin to hear her stomach growling a little. She looks at me and giggles. “It’s the pizza. I ate too much. About five minutes after that she pulls her hand away, and says, “put it on hold will ya? I gotta go sell some Girl Scout Cookies. That’s what we call it back in Kansas. I’ll be back in a jiff.”
I’m sixty-nine, sitting there on my couch, watching, It’s a Wonderful Life, it’s nine-thirty on a Friday night and a twenty-three-year-old is taking a dump in my powder room. It’s a Strange Life, would be a better name for this movie.
Less than five minutes go by, the toilet flushes and Tac comes bounding into the room, plops down on my lap and says, “I wish I was just a Head, you Know, no intestines or anything, then you wouldn’t have had to put the movie on hold.” She’s laughing hysterically. I’m wishing I had never told her that stupid joke.
She settles back into the same position. The happy ending part comes and we both have tears running down our faces. She looks up at me, wipes a tear from my face and kisses me. Like a ten second, for real, kiss. “Sorry about that pops. It’s just that happy-sad tears are the strangest thing that humans do. It just makes me want to kiss somebody that’s all.
Not knowing what to say or do, I thought I might try to kiss her again. This resulted in an awkward pushback and she said, “Hey, whaddya take me for anyhow?” Of course, she’s laughing. Then she leans over and gives me a peck on the cheek, and says, “Your time will come Codge, just not tonight. Let’s watch Colbert.”
That’s what we did with her wrapping her arm around mine and laying her head on my shoulder again. It was a typical Colbert, with him blasting Trump and imitating Trump’s voice and inflections as he does every night. I often wonder what these late-night guys are going to do after he’s gone. He has created a cottage industry for these guys just by his existence. I’m sure there won’t be as many of them left after a while when he’s gone.
After about fifteen minutes in, I realized that my shoulder was asleep, and so was Tac. We never talked about sleeping. I have two bedrooms on the third floor, maybe I’ll wake her and escort her up there. I slowly eased my sleeping and completely useless arm out from under her and gently laid her head down on one of the sofa pillows. She was a sight to behold. A sleeping beauty if there ever was one. I decided to get her a light summer blanket and leave her be.
As I ascended the stairs to my room I got to thinking, should I tell the Buckers, about her, or introduce her to Neighbor Ed. I decided I would try to avoid that if I could. My little secret, I thought to myself.
Lying in bed, my mind went to Cat. I should send her a text or go to her work to see if we can work something out. I wanted to see her again so badly, but I was so afraid of a bad scene. She might just text me back something like, Stay out of my life. I just didn’t know what to do. I had to admit though, as sad as I was about losing Cat, this young girl sleeping on my couch was a welcome distraction, at least, so far.
Sleep came easy for me that night for some reason and I woke up about ten minutes before the alarm went off, as I usually did in more normal times. I figured I’d hop in the shower, get dressed and go down and wake Tac. We had never discussed her morning routine, and I wasn’t exactly sure what she did with herself in the daylight hours.
About five minutes later I was in the shower. I slowly turned the water hotter and leaned against the wall letting the hot water soothe my tortured soul. About a minute of this private time was all I was going to get. The curtain on the far side was flung open and in stepped Tac. So freaked out by this, I immediately turned my head back to the wall and feebly tried to cover my private parts. “Hey, grandpop, who are you hiding from? It’s just me. I’m not gonna bite you. It’s just that I’m one liberal chick, and don’t believe in wasting water. We’ll save about fifteen gallons a day if we time the shower thing together. Now turn around and take a good look and get that part over with. And I won’t laugh at you I promise.”
I turned slowly, trying to suck my gut in as best I could. There we were, face to face and naked as jaybirds, and she looked, well, twenty-three. Skinny with nothing big about her, just proportionate, perfectly proportionate, and did I say young. “See, I’m not laughing.” She giggled though. “Now turn around, wash whatever you wash, and then I’ll wash your back for you and that’s all we will ever do in the shower, and stop getting interested in me,” she said pointing down. Her saying that worked, I took my orders. I was whooped and speechless. I swapped places with her and just stood there trancelike. She did her thing and handed over the washcloth and I returned the favor. “Did I do Good.” was all I could manage to think to say.
“Yeah pops you’re like a maestro, now get out, and hand me that razor from my bag on the counter there. I have to do the shaving thing.”
I did this, wrapped a towel around my lower half, and proceeded with my shaving thing at the sink. I kept looking at myself in the mirror and shaking my head. Something very bizarre was happening in my world. This could not possibly be normal. She stepped out of the shower drying herself with one of my large towels, and said, “Would you dry my back for me?” This I did, closing my eyes and shaking my head again. Before I had a chance to say something she said, “Are you done in here? I have girl stuff to do.”
“Uh, yeah, I’ll just go and get dressed then.”
“You do that Mr. G, and do you have any tea? I drink tea in the morning. Could you fix me some, you sweet old bastard?”, She said this as she leaned forward, still completely naked mind you, with a cross-eyed look on her face.
“Uh, right, Tea.” I said, as I just realized how often I stammer and say “uh”, around this girl.
I got dressed quickly and headed downstairs to the kitchen. I put the water on to boil, went out to fetch the paper, and sat down on one of the bar stools at my small elevated granite table. The headlines were Trump, Trump, and Trump. I perused one of the stories just as Tac came bounding down the steps. The tea water was whistling, and Tac said, as she entered the kitchen, and went right to Cat’s tea collection on the counter. “What kind of tea do we have here? Oh, good, black tea.” She fixed it up to her liking and plopped herself down on the other stool. “I have to drink this quick and get to the High-Speed Line, I have a lecture early at Temple. I’m enrolled in a summer course to bring me up to snuff for my studies coming up right after Labor Day. By the way, that backwashing in the shower will cost you twenty-five dollars, cash?” She said with her hand out. “Everything has a price, you know that.”
“What if I refuse to pay,” I said catching on to the joke, sort of.
“Well, then I’ll just start taking showers with that old bastard neighbor of yours, the one I saw gawking at me yesterday when I was tryin the window from the porch. You know neighbor Ed.” We both laughed. Then she said. Seriously though, I’m gonna need twenty-five dollars a day from you while I’m here if you don’t mind that is? A girl’s gotta eat you know and have a few bucks for the transportation, and such. Can you afford me pops?”
“For you, back washer? Anything.” I said as I retrieved a twenty and a ten from my pocket.
“I don’t have a five, but I’ll save the change. You can give me twenty, 2molly.”
“Do you want me to give you money up front. You know that way I won’t have to dole it out to you.”
“Nah, you never know what might happen. I may not come back here. No guarantees for tomorrow, you know?”
She finished her last sip of tea. Gave me a peck on the cheek and said, “If I come back, you get lucky tonight. I’ll bet you’ll ponder that all day you old buzzard.” Wi
th that, she grabbed what looked like a tablet bag and headed for the front door.
“Do you want a ride? It’s no problem?” I called after her.
“Nah, I’ll walk. I gained a pound eating all that pizza last night. Leave the back door open in case I get back early. Ciao.”
I needed coffee bad. I headed to Starbucks. I didn’t go in right away. I sat in my car, an SUV that still held about half my tools. I hadn’t had any work in a few weeks and had nothing lined up. I was just sitting there thinking, I’ll have to rustle something up soon as life at 69 is boring during the day if you don’t have something to do. Maybe I’ll take in a movie later I contemplated.
It was then about 6:45 as I entered The Room of Broken Toys.
“Hey G, your late,” said Dennis
“Oh, let me guess, I missed the reading of the obit column.”
“Yeah, you did and guess who’s in it? Your favorite Borough Commissioner. John Smith,” The Mahoff chimed in chuckling. I can safely say that the news didn’t make me lose my sense of humor, as this guy was just about the biggest jerk of all times. We jokingly referred to him as John Smith because saying his real name out loud would make just about any of us sick to our stomachs.
“A toast then,” I said, as I raised my cup. May he be reincarnated as the first man not standing in some future war.” That got a few chuckles. Then Cheryl pipes in, “G, what did you find out about that bump to your head?”
“Well, I went to see my Neurologist, and she wants me to get some kind of head scan, but I’m gonna wait a few weeks and see how I feel.”
“That doesn’t sound too smart buddy, you better do as you’re told on that one.”
“Yeah G,” the Mahoff said, “bangs on the head are serious.”
“Yeah, yeah, I hear ya. Let’s just say I might do it then.” I was already tired of the room; I kept my opinions to myself for the next half hour or so and checked out of that asylum a little earlier than usual. I spent the rest of the day working around the house. I mowed the lawn touched up some neglected exterior paint areas,
She Came in Through the Bathroom Window Page 3
