ANOTHER YEAR... onward! (Part 152b)

ANOTHER YEAR... onward! (Part 152b)

I can’t say for certain that Moira was avoiding me but it almost seemed like it. Her office, if you could call it that, was in the far recesses of the second floor. When I visited the second floor the only way to see her was to walk through the entire mortgage department, through the back half of the accounting area and then down four steps into what was really a file room. When she was hired it was the only area available. So, when she showed up at my desk one lunch period I was pleased. I asked if Gee (the Trustee/attorney) had made any progress on getting the mess with her former house straightened out. That brought a bit of a smile to her face and she told me that Gee thought he’d been able to track down her husband. For her to get any money back from the down payment she and her husband had made on their house he’d have to sign the formal complaints against the mortgage broker, seller and company that had issued their mortgage. I got the distinct impression that she didn’t think that would ever happen but offered that if it did she was in line to get back some $1,500 or so. But that wasn’t why she was at my desk.

She was there to tell me that the brothers who owned the mobile home park where she was living had sold it. I knew there was talk that they might. She was concerned about it for a number of reasons. First was the fact that the unit she was renting was owned by the brothers and they had worked out a 'deal' with Moira on the rent for the space. The new owner wanted her to be paying the going rate and she just couldn’t afford it. I told her I felt a call to Brucie, one of the brothers, could/would take care of that. The second was more of an immediate problem. The new owner was not going to be selling new or used units so let the maintenance man go. Not only did he work on setting up new units and preparing the trade-ins for sale but the brothers made extra money by making him available to take care of problems that residents had with their units. Moira had a sewer back up and had no idea how to go about unclogging it other than with a plunger which hadn’t worked. I’d done just that sort of work when I lived in the park and knew that a ‘plumber’s snake’ would probably take care of it. I started to ask if she’d called a plumber and she said she didn’t have the cash to pay one so hadn’t. That’s when she gave me one of those ‘looks’ that said “Would you PLEASE do me a favor and take a look at it?”

Aside from not having a ‘snake’ I felt it really wasn’t all that much of a problem. I asked if she was headed home for lunch since she lived just six or seven minutes away. She said that she couldn’t because she was working on a project with Bette for the Trustees meeting. When I told her I wouldn’t be able do it after work she immediately reached in her purse and pulled out a set of keys. All I could so was smile and reach for them. A cheap ‘plumbers snake’ was around $5 or $6 and there was a hardware store just down the street. A quick stop and I was on my way. I’d helped her move in so knew exactly where her unit was. There was a car parked out in front so I backed up and took the first empty space. I had the ‘snake’ in one hand and the keys in the other as I climbed the three steps to the door. Without hesitating I put the key in the door handle and turned it. Only three steps in I had to stop.

Like almost everybody else I’ve unwittingly thrust myself into embarrassing situations and this was one of those times. Right smack in front of me was a girl with reddish brown hair down to her shoulders straddling the bare legs of an unseen person. She had on a blouse and bikini panties but that was all I could see. The sight unnerved me enough that I let go of the door handle and it opened far enough to hit the doorstop. When it did the girl let out a scream and jumped up and off the boy leaving him fully exposed (but ‘deflated’). He, seeing me, reached back trying to grab his pants while the girl picked up her skirt from the floor. With them preoccupied I quickly pulled the door shut behind me as I headed back to my car. I was about to start it up when it came to that I’d done nothing wrong. I sat there observing the situation and after about five minutes the boy came out and got in the car parked out in front of the unit. I thought he was going to leave when I heard the motor start but he just sat there. A few minutes later the girl appeared and got in the car and they drove on down the street.

I was conflicted as to what to do. Going in and fixing the toilet wasn't the question... it was what, if anything, to say to Moira. Going back to when I helped her find a place to live I was aware that she, as a single parent, had her hands full with her two teen aged kids. The boy, a senior in high school, had been particularly upset about moving because he was on the varsity football team as a starter at his old school. He was leaving friends... again. (Moira told me that the latest move was the fourth since he started junior high school.) At the current school he was only a substitute player. The girl had always seemed sullen to me. During the move she sulked and pouted and was of little help. She was only 15 and a sophomore. I never got a good look at the boy either in the house or when he was getting in his car so didn’t have much of an idea of how old he was. I still hadn’t made up my mind when I headed back inside. A glance at my watch told me I better get the problem fixed quickly or I’d be late getting back to work.

To be continued...