Chapter One

AARON

“Dude, check it out, shovel cock.”

Turning from my bent-over position, I look at one of my best friends, Racer, making an ass of himself in my front yard. Between his legs, he’s placed his garden shovel at crotch level and is making circles with it.

“Clever.” I shake my head at him. Racer is a hard-as-hell worker, but has a penchant for getting off track when he’s been working for too many hours without a break. I can’t blame him.

I sit back on my heels and wipe my forehead. It’s abnormally warm for October in Upstate New York. The sun has been relentless this afternoon, beating down on our backs, and the humidity has caused me to soak through my shirt, hence it’s on the ground next to me.

“We’re almost done,” I say, taking in my front yard, appreciating the hard work we’ve put in.

Racer lies on the grass with his arms and legs spread, his eyes closed, and looking massively pathetic. “This is taking forever! Why do you have so much vegetation?”

“Makes the place look nice.”

Racer sits up on his elbows. “Smalls, you have an old-lady garden.” Smalls, what my friends call me, despite my towering height and broad shoulders.

“I don’t have an old-lady garden.”

Racer points toward my front door. “What’s that?”

Turning my head, I spot what he’s pointing at. “That’s a welcome flag.”

“It has a watering can on it,” he deadpans.

“It was on sale at A.C. Moore.” I also liked the colors and thought it would match perfectly with the color of my flowers, but no need to divulge that.

“And what about that?” Racer points to my right.

I don’t even have to look to know what he’s pointing at. “That’s Herald. He protects the lower garden.”

“He’s a garden gnome texting on a fake toilet.”

I thought it was funny. Gnome texting on the toilet, come on!

I clear my throat and take off my gardening gloves. “You know when I invited you over to help me, I didn’t invite you to harass me.”

Racer, who looks like he rolled around in soil for a good ten minutes, smiles at me. “Well, I didn’t know when I came over for some free pizza, that I was going to be harassed at how to properly turn soil.”

“You can’t just flip it . . .” I let out a frustrated breath and drag my hand down my face. I should have asked Tucker to come and help. Out of my two best friends, he would have been the one to ensure we had this done within two hours. “There is a process, Racer.”

“I can see that by the way you’re getting into a tizzy about it.”

One thing to know about Racer, he likes to push buttons. He has a heart of gold, but if he has the chance to irritate the fuck out of you, he will.

I put my shovel to the side and sit on the grass. I bring my knees to my chest and hook my arms around my knees. “I like having a nice-looking front yard,” I say solemnly.

And it’s true. It’s nice to not have overgrown weeds, or dead grass, or old furniture, or . . . cigarette butts or fucking bongs everywhere. It’s nice to be able to walk outside of your house and take pride in what it looks like, rather than be ashamed that you’re the only rundown one-story house in the neighborhood. There is a reason I take pride in the way my house looks, a very good reason.

Possibly in hearing the tone in my voice, Racer drops his teasing and sits up straighter. Growing serious, he says, “It does look really good, man. I haven’t been over here a lot with all the jobs I was taking on, but now that I’m here, seeing everything you’ve changed, you’ve really done an awesome job. You should be proud of yourself.”

See? Heart of gold. No doubt in my mind, though, in minutes he will switch back to dickhead. It’s who he is.

Only two people know the real me: Tucker and Racer. We have a bond that goes deeper than being friends, or working together, or even owning a construction company together. We’re brothers. And the past few years have really tested that bond with Tucker and the hurdles he had to overcome when it came to his past, and with Racer, who just recently started to level out his financial problems. We’re not ashamed to tell each other anything, because we know when things get tough, we’ll be there for each other.

Although, with Racer and Tucker both falling in love recently, my time with them has been shortened.

I get it, though, new love and all that. Still, I sometimes miss our late nights hanging out on the back of Tucker’s truck, taking down an entire box of Little Debbie snacks while drinking Mountain Dew and sharing the latest gossip. You read that right, gossip. Fuck, I miss the drama Racer would bombard us with. You would think there isn’t any drama on a construction site since it’s a bunch of guys, but oh no, there is some soap-opera level stories coming from the wooden frames of the worksite.

And I miss those stories.

I miss my guys.

“I’m pretty much done with the house and all the renovations,” I say, trying to sidestep Racer’s compliment. It was nice of him, but it still makes me feel awkward.

“Even the master bathroom?” Racer falls in line with the conversation without blinking an eye.

“Yeah, laid the last tile last weekend. It looks good up there.”

Racer claps louder than he needs to. “Now when you jack off, clean up isn’t so far away anymore.”

See? Dickhead.

“Can you keep your fucking voice down?” I scan my neighborhood. I live on a street surrounded by retirees. If I didn’t know better, I would assume I accidentally purchased a house in a senior living community. They all eat dinner around four, spend their time out on the porch—spying on each other—and asking me when I’ll be settling down with a nice “lady friend.” Mrs. Wickham is the biggest culprit of sticking her nose into my business. “You know I live near a bunch of old people, so I don’t need you shouting to them about me jacking off.”

“I wasn’t shouting to them, I was shouting to you.” He smiles . . . like an asshat.

“Want me to shout to them about how you once chafed your dick because you were jacking off too much?” It’s the first incriminating story that comes to mind to teach Racer a lesson.

Racer leans forward and points his finger at me. “I was twelve and didn’t understand the importance of lube.” Growing quieter, he adds, “And I told you that in confidence, man.”

I roll my eyes and turn back toward the garden where I only have a little section left to turn over the soil. We’ve pruned, weeded, and picked up all the leaves already. Even though Racer has been whiney, it’s been a productive day.

“While you’re sulking back there, can you make yourself useful and start bagging up the piles of dead shrubbery?”

Racer huffs behind me but starts to work. “Do I at least get to take some pizza home for leftovers?”

“What do you need leftovers for when you have Georgie cooking dinner for you every night?” Racer finally asked Georgie, his girlfriend, to move in with him. They’ve been in roomie bliss for the past month. He should have asked her to move in with her the moment they got back together, but he waited it out, wanting to make sure his financial burden wasn’t going to be hers.

“Dude, don’t ever fall in love with a girl who grew up rich. She has no idea how to cook.” He stuffs a bag with leaves and weeds. “She made pea soup the other night and added a pound of salt. She said the cap fell off but didn’t think much of it.” A laugh busts out of me from the image of Racer trying to down “salt” soup. “Laugh it up, man, but you almost lost me there. I thought I was going to die from too much sodium.”

“What do you mean?” I turn toward him, both my hands still on the ground. “Did you eat your whole bowl?”

“Of course I ate it. I wasn’t going to tell her it was gross.”

“Why not?”

“It’s called sex, man. Try it, you’ll find you do some pretty weird shit if sex is guaranteed.”

“So you ate salty soup for sex?”

“Yup.” Racer nods, no shame in his admission. “I would pretty much eat anything if it meant being able to be with Georgie. I fucking love that woman.”

Which is funny because they started off hating each other.

“When are you going to propose?” I stick my shovel back in the dirt and keep turning it over. I know there is an easier way to do this than by hand, but I like tilling my soil manually.

“Starting to save up for a ring now.” Racer beams. “It’s going to be a little while before I can afford the ring she deserves.”

“You know you don’t have to get her anything extravagant, right?” That’s not who Georgie is. She might have grown up on the fancier side of life, but she’s really down-to-earth and hard-working.

“I know.” Racer sighs. “I still want to get her something nice.” He pauses and then asks, “So have you found out who’s moving next to you yet?”

I shake my head. Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson recently moved into an apartment complex for seniors and chose to rent out their house to supplement their income. Smart move. Even smarter move, they’re paying me to be their property manager. I didn’t even blink an eye when I said yes. “They haven’t given me much information. All I know is that they move in tomorrow. Coming up from the city.”

“Maybe they will be young enough you can BBQ together without having to worry about them passing out on the table at five.”

“One can only hope.” I till the last section and then sit back on my heels again. “Done,” I huff out. “That took a little longer than expected.”

“Yeah, tell me about it,” Racer huffs. He might put on a show, but I know he really doesn’t mind being here.

Racer finishes picking up the clippings and ties the bag off just as Georgie pulls up. Racer looks over his shoulder and brightens immediately when he spots her, and for a moment, I take in the pure happiness I see in his eyes as he sees his girl. I’ve known Racer for a long time, and he’s a happy guy for the most part, a prankster more often than not, but I’ve never seen him happier than when he’s with Georgie.

When she gets out of the car, Racer calls out, “George! You’re here to rescue me.” He captures her in a hug and then dips her, rubbing his sweaty face all over her neck.

“Ew, you’re all wet.”

“You’re wet all the time with me, and you don’t hear me complaining.”

Fucking animal.

“Racer.” Georgie swats him in the chest. “Can you control yourself for a second?”

“Nope.” He nuzzles her neck, and I roll my eyes. Yup, both of my friends are in love. Good for them. Gives me more time to . . . hmm, to garden?

To sit around and stare at my walls?

To wind up playing gin rummy with my seventy-year-old neighbors on a Friday night?

Pretty much.

I need a hobby.

When Georgie pries herself away, she turns to me while Racer wraps his arms around her shoulders and holds her close to his chest. “How are you, Aaron?”

“Good. How’s the shop?” A few months ago, Georgie opened a bridal boutique here in Binghamton, and it’s been bustling ever since the grand opening. It’s how they met actually. He was the one who helped her renovate the entire space.

“It’s doing great. We’re all booked for appointments for the next few months.”

“That’s awesome.” I nod at Racer. “You here to pick up this fool?”

“Yeah, he owes me a date night, but from the smell of him, it looks like we’ll be going home first.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” He kisses the side of her head. “You can help me wash my taint.”

“God.” Georgie pushes off him. “Why is that even something you would suggest?”

Laughing to himself, he shrugs with a smile.

“It’s Racer,” I say. “You shouldn’t be surprised by now, Georgie.”

“I really shouldn’t.” Pulling him by the shirt, she says, “Let’s go. You owe me a romantic dinner.”

“Thanks for the help, man,” I call out as Georgie shoves him into her little car.

Once they’re gone, I pack up the rest of the clippings we pulled around the house, put them in the trashcan, and pack away my tools. Fall cleanup is all done, now I just have to maintain the leaves. Next weekend I’ll decorate the front with corn husks, wrapping them around the pillars, then have pumpkins filling my yard.

Yeah, I’m that guy. I decorate the outside of my house for every season. Every day when I walked home from school, I would pass this one house on the corner of my street. It was a white Victorian house. In my young eyes, it looked like a mansion, a perfectly manicured and put-together mansion. Every holiday the house was decked out in decorations. Whether it was bunting for the Fourth of July or wreaths for Christmas, the owners always made the house look welcoming and festive. Whenever I walked by that old house, I told myself that one day I’d own my own house and it would be decorated just like that.

Instead of an old sofa stained in cat piss sitting in the front yard, I have a single black light post. Instead of brown weeds suffocating the yard, I have beautiful green grass, trimmed and edged. And instead of a dilapidated porch littered with ashtrays, I have a wraparound porch with a simple porch swing I’ve spent many nights swinging on.

I snag my shirt from the grass and head inside just in time to hear my phone ringing. I jog to my kitchen where it’s charging and answer.

“Hello?”

“Aaron, dear? It’s Mrs. Ferguson.”

“Mrs. Ferguson, how are you?” I lean against the counter and rest my head against the cabinet behind me.

“Fine, dear, fine. I wanted to call you to let you know our new tenant will be moving in on Monday.”

“Monday, okay. Do you know what time?”

“I told her you won’t get out of work to meet with her for key exchange until after five thirty, so she’s aware of your work schedule.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Ferguson, I appreciate that.”

“Oh, you sweet boy. No need to thank me, you’re doing us a favor. She already sent in her security deposit and the first month’s rent.”

“Okay, so I only have to give her a key then?”

“Yes, but can you do something else, Aaron?”

“Sure.” I push off the counter and fill a cup of water from the faucet. Mrs. Ferguson has always been so kind to me, so of course I’ll help in any way I can.

“You’re so sweet.” She clears her throat. “The young lady moving in is actually retuning home to watch over her father, who has dementia. He’s living in the Susquehanna Nursing Home. She dropped everything when she found out he had a bad fall. She’s a school counselor and doesn’t know many people in town, as apparently all her friends she grew up with moved away. Do you think you could help her move in? I’m worried she’ll be too shy to ask.”

“Yeah, not a problem at all. Does she have furniture? I can get my buddies to help.”

“No, she’s using the furniture we left in the house.”

I take a big gulp of water and nod, even though she can’t see me. “Okay, not a problem.”

“Thank you. I figured a big, strong boy like yourself would be able to lend a helping hand.” I’m the muscle in the neighborhood, well, around the worksite as well, but especially in the neighborhood full of old bones. Whenever anyone needs help lifting something, they come to me.

I chuckle. “You’ve got that right.”

We exchange a few pleasantries and with a thankful goodbye, we hang up the phone. A new neighbor who doesn’t sound like she’s seventy. That might be nice. Who knows, we might become good friends.