Gayle felt a trickle of sweat run down between her breasts as she sat in her lawn chair under the tree by her driveway. She pulled the neck of her shirt out and blew down it, letting the air dry her. For the hundredth time this morning, she thought of what a bad idea this had turned out to be. Her friends had told her that she needed to get rid of the jerk’s belongings he had left behind when he had run off with that Hooter’s waitress, that she should just have a garage sale and at least get a little money along with the satisfaction of clearing out what he had left behind. She tried to tell them she was too far out in the country for a sale to be practical, that it was too hot for one, too. But they said she was just trying to avoid facing the truth, that she wouldn’t admit that as long as she kept his stuff she could pretend he might still come back to her. Finally she agreed to try it, even though she wasn’t convinced she’d ever sell anything. So now here she sat, sweating her ass off and with not even one person coming to see what she had. She thought to herself, “Okay, I’ll wait another half hour, and then if nobody comes by then, I’m outta here. I won’t even take his shit back inside, someone can steal it for all I care.” She picked up her magazine from beside the lawn chair and started to read again, her eyes trying to drift shut in the heat…..until finally she nodded off.

“Excuse me, miss, is there where the garage sale is?” The deep soft voice startled her awake, and for a moment she felt a bit of panic at the sight of the dark figure looming over her like a mountain. As she shaded her eyes and blinked awake, she realized although he was a big man, he also had a wide smile on his face at he looked down at her. His soft voice again, “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were asleep. I didn’t mean to frighten you.” His eyes swept over her, taking in her rounded breasts with the hint of nipples poking out at her shirt, then down her flat stomach and on down her smooth well-tanned legs showing beneath her loose-fitting pair of shorts, before coming back up to her face, as he smiled even more broadly.

Gayle swallowed hard and blushed a bit.