The New Neighbor Mowed My Lawn the Week My Divorce Went Through novel · Chapter 16 of 24
Chapter 16: The Block Party
I sat up on the blanket with the plaid tucked under my arms and counted porches.
Eight lights were on, and in each doorway stood somebody in a bathrobe.
The retired teacher had his arms folded over a Cleveland Browns T-shirt.
The woman in the running tights held a coffee mug at two in the morning.
The man with the dog stood at the end of his walk with a leash in his fist.
The dog sat down in the grass and scratched its ear.
"Sorry," the man called across the court. "The dog saw a possum."
"It's fine," I called back.
"Carry on," said the retired teacher, and went inside.
The lights went off one at a time.
Tyler lay flat on his back next to me with his forearm over his eyes, shaking with laughter.
I stood up with the blanket around me, and I held out my hand.
"Come on, Rusnak," I said. "Inside."
On Saturday evening the whole court came out for the block party.
Somebody had strung paper lanterns between the mailboxes, and a speaker on a card table played songs from twenty years ago.
There were three grills going, a cooler of juice boxes, and a table of casseroles with index cards in front of each dish.
At the bend of the court, Marlene had set up a white pop-up canopy.
Under it was a banner on two poles that said SANDPIPER COURT SUMMER SOCIAL.
Below the banner, on a folding table with a paper cloth, lay a clipboard, a manila folder, and a small brass bell.
She stood behind the table in a navy blouse and her visor.
Her husband sat in a lawn chair beside her, holding a paper plate with a deviled egg on it and looking at the egg.
I walked up in a green sundress with Tyler beside me.
He had on a clean shirt and no expression whatsoever.
He kept his hand a few inches off the small of my back, not touching.
"You can touch me," I said.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of The New Neighbor Mowed My Lawn the Week My Divorce Went Through are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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