Not to speak ill of the dead, but the guy that lived across the street was a complete ass. He is one of the few people that when he died, instantly improved the life of those around him. Over the past eight years I watched him abuse just about every person that came within earshot. From neighbors to the police and fire departments to the kids that walked down the alley next to his house, construction workers and even his own son, who moved out at 16, and his rarely seen wife Belinda. Belinda even left him once but was forced to return when she was arrested for DUI after John had turned her in and she lost her license. True story. I never talked with Belinda too much. She seemed nice enough but with John around you couldn’t get more than a passing word in.

Several years ago John was diagnosed with liver cancer…. or so he said. We are all sure it was from pickling his liver from all the cheap vodka he drank. On a normal day he was passed out by 2:00 pm which is why he never was able to keep a job more than a few days. Almost two weeks ago sirens alerted me that something may have happened at John’s house. An ambulance pulled up and I watched its crew roll in an equipment laden gurney. Not long after they rolled John out and loaded him up before driving off with no sirens. Two days after that a car was parked outside with out of town plates. The next day I saw his obit. Devoted husband and loving father my ass. For the next few days after that different locals stopped by with food and flowers. None of them neighbors. I was guessing people Belinda worked with or maybe family members. I didn’t go over. What was I going to do? Pay my respect with a hearty thank God he’s finally dead? I’m not hypocritical so I kept to myself, along with the other neighbors.

A few days ago I started seeing Belinda outside much more mowing the lawn or watering. At night she would sit in her enclosed porch for hours. Several times she I saw her walking to the community mailbox and she would smile at me from across the street and give me a fairly animated wave. She didn’t appear to me to be a grieving widow. She seemed rather happy actually. However I was the only one that thought that apparently as neighbors started asking if I had been over yet. They had concerns that she was over there all alone and grieving. Why me? Why can’t they go over? Seems no one wanted to. Its like they thought John’s ghost would haunt them or something. I finally reluctantly agreed and the next day when I saw her out to get the mail, I waved and jogged across the street.

She waited until I was stepping up over the curb. “Hello Michael,” not making eye contact.

“Hey Belinda, beautiful day.” She just grinned nervously and shifted her weight from one leg to the next so I got right to it….. no sense in dragging it out if she’s not comfortable. “How have you been doing?”

“I’m okay. Kinda lost but I’m dealing ya know. I mean…. John was an asshole but he was all I knew for 12 years.”

She still wasn’t making eye contact. Just absently string past me into space. “Belinda is there anything I can do for you?”

“Not unless you want to weed may garden for me. I haven’t quite been into it,” and she chuckled mechanically.

“I could do that tomorrow around ten?”

“Oh you don’t have to…” Finally she made eye contact. She seemed unsure and somewhat nervous.

“Belinda its fine. Gives me something to do.”

She just smiled then looked down again so I continued. “Look I’ll see you tomorrow. If you need anything just let me know. I’m just across the street.” I touched her on her shoulder and then turned and crossed the street. Poor lady I thought as I walked away. All she ever knew was him. What a fucking ass.

The next day rolled around soon enough. I fed the dog and got her out for a walk then came back, changed into shorts and a white tee shirt, grabbed my gloves, a bucket and my little shovel and went over to Belinda’s. I didn’t bother to knock. I just let myself in their…. her backyard. The gate to her privacy fence was not locked. Nobody locks anything in this small town. I walked straight to the garden. Mass of weeds. It looked like she watered plenty because the veg looked nice but the weeds were everywhere. This was no simple weeding. I set my ipod to random, put my earbuds in, gloved up and drove right in. I ended up having to soak the ground some in order to get the roots to let go and dropped the little bastards in my bucket.

Thirty minutes later Belinda scared the crap out of me when she grabbed my shoulder. I almost literally left my shoes on the ground when squirted myself with the hose and jumped. Panting and laughing at myself I pulled my earbuds out and was met with the hysterical laughter of Belinda.

“I’m sorry” she managed to get out. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve seen in a long time. I tried yelling at you but you but you didn’t hear me.”

“That’s okay. I was in my own world” I said still out of breath and dripping.

“Well let me get dressed and I will come out and help.” She turned and hurried back into the house.

I stood there for a second dumbfounded that I had not noticed her dressed in her robe and slippers. She really HAD thrown me for a loop. I wrapped the earbuds around my ipod and set it up on the table on the deck out of the sun and went back to work.

She did take her time. I was starting to wonder before she finally came out. I had to do a double take. The few times I went over to see John, before he became the drunken ass, Belinda was always at the computer in a chat room or playing online games. We never really talked and I had never seen her closer than from across the street, excluding a few day ago, until now. We were both approaching the magic 4-0 mark but she looked younger, just a bit worn out as you would expect, and very pretty. She was wearing cut off shorts and a white button down shirt with no makeup. She didn’t need any. Her blonde hair pulled back, baseball cap on her head and gloves in her hands, she walked over to me actually smiling. She’s skinny with really nice tanned legs.