“Okay, but those shows are carefully orchestrated. They intentionally choose decent-looking people and probably manipulate things behind the scenes. You’re not actually taking reality television seriously, are you?”
Suddenly feeling dumb, I said, “Forget I mentioned it.”
The next thing he said took me by surprise. “When I was younger, I was overweight. I had a pen pal who lived across the country. I basically fell in love with this girl. I’d wait with bated breath for every one of her letters.” He exhaled. “I sent her a photo of myself at one point. And you know what happened?”
“What?” I braced myself.
“She never wrote back.”
Fuck.
“I’m sorry, Silas. That must have sucked so bad.”
“Well, let’s just say I learned my lesson the hard way at a very young age. As I got older, I placed too much focus on my appearance. It was always about getting a revenge body and not about being healthy. When I’m pumping iron, what happened when I was a kid is always at the back of my mind. I can’t say I regret being healthier, but that experience will always make me cautious of anyone who claims looks don’t matter. Should they matter? In an ideal world, no. But we don’t live in an ideal world.”
I took a moment to ponder his words and felt a bit guilty about wondering what his “revenge body” looked like. By the same token, now I’d feel weird about asking him for a photo.
Clearing my throat, I said, “I’ve been told I’m attractive, but who knows what people really see when they look at me. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And it truly doesn’t matter how good-looking a man is, if he’s a bad person with an ugly soul, I don’t want anything to do with him. And yes, I speak from personal experience with that.”
He changed the subject. “What do you do for a living, Lola?”
“Right now, I’m not currently working. I’m on a break from school. Working on a degree in cosmology.”
“That explains why you have the summer off with nothing better to do than try to get laid twenty-four seven.”
“Very funny. Believe it or not, I’m not trying to get laid twenty-four seven.”
“Just half the time?” He laughed. “I’m kidding. Anyway…a cosmologist? That’s cool. Doesn’t get any bigger than studying the universe. You must be pretty smart.”
“I do have nerd tendencies. I genuinely enjoy it, and that’s important. What do you do?”
“I dabble in a lot of things. Real estate and also landscape design. Not as exciting as studying the Big Bang, though.”
“Well, speaking of big bang, you saved me from probably another miserable ‘big bang’ experience with a man tonight. Thank you for your honest advice on that.”
Gosh. I couldn’t believe I’d just said that. I also couldn’t believe I was starting to really like this guy. Is that weird? Was I truly having a good time with Mr. Good Time?
We stayed on the phone for another hour that night. I kept wondering if he’d ask to meet up, but he never did. But maybe it was better this way?
Lola
TWO DAYS LATER, I was on the second floor when I looked down and noticed a man in a black hooded sweatshirt picking up all our clothes off the ground. Everything that had been hanging out to dry must have blown away last night. At first, I thought he was doing a good deed, but then I noticed him stuffing everything in a backpack. He was stealing our clothes? Was he some kind of freak?
Despite the landlord’s warning, we’d continued to use the deck to lay out our bathing suits, panties, and other garments. There was simply no other choice, since a lot of the delicate items would be ruined in a dryer.
What do I do?
Do I go after this guy?
Still unsure of how to handle things, I ran downstairs, but by the time I got there, the bandit had hopped on his bike and started to take off. Without thinking the potential danger through, I grabbed my own bicycle and began following him down the road.
After a couple of miles, I realized I was in Ocean Bay Park, the same area of the island where the landlord lived, at least according to the address on the correspondence we’d always received from him.
I stayed several feet away and watched as the hooded man parked his bike and took the backpack full of our clothes inside the house with him.
What the fuck?
After several minutes of debating whether I should knock on the door, I decided to call Summer and ask her advice. But before I could dial her, a notification lit up my phone, indicating that a new email had come in from the landlord. I opened it. It was addressed to all of us.
Thank you for your kind donation of undergarments and other clothing items for those in need. Because of you, this clothing will be dropped off later today at the local Salvation Army donation bin. If you care to continue to litter my property with lingerie and other clothes, I’ll be happy to make future donations on your behalf as well.
Clearly when you hung your shit on the deck this time, you hadn’t accounted for the fact that a wind storm was coming. I passed by to find everything thrown around on the property and some of it on the road. You know who gets in trouble with the town for something like this? Me. I get fined because of your irresponsible behavior. Not gonna let that happen again, so I’ll be doing a drive-by clothing collection run daily.
Sincerely,
M.S. Borden
Then he sent a link to a song on YouTube. It was “Blowin’ in the Wind” by Joan Baez.
What an ass!
I marched up his driveway with steam practically billowing from my nose and banged on the
