AND THE HEAT GOES ON… & on (Part 175d)
I was at the marina a
little after 8am Monday morning. I was hoping to see the owner but he
wasn’t there. There were two mechanics in the repair shop so I left the
outboard motor with them. Since they were busy I asked when they thought
they could take a look at it and was told to stop back around closing
time… 6pm and that worked for me. As I walked out of the shop I took a
look at the big sailboat at the dock on the creek, again hoping to get a
look at the two girls I’d only partially seen the day before. But
everything at the boat seemed to be quiet. To get the look at the boat I
had to walk to the end of the building. As I did I saw two girls. When
they saw me they sort of shrieked and then started giggling. They had
been headed for the building but stopped when they saw me. One of them
sort of bent at the waist and the other started laughing. The girl who
was laughing turned and started running back towards the dock and the
boat leaving the other girl still bent over. I’d been treated to a
fairly up close view of each of them which pleased me. My notes say they
were in their mid teens and cute as well. My memory tells me one had a
pony tail and the other shoulder length brown hair. The girl who’d been
left behind slowly started towards the dock while the other was laughing
and making fun of her from the boat. As I turned and headed for my car
my thoughts were that they were just teenagers being teenagers. At least
I’d gotten a look at the two of them.
As I’ve written in the
past, August was the slowest month of the year as far as lobby traffic
at the bank went. This particular week was one of Bret’s vacation weeks
leaving Trish and I to handle the ‘platform' dealing one on one with
customers desiring to open accounts. But that was the projection… not
the reality. I’d hardly had a chance to get settled at my desk when
Joanie let me know Morris, the branch banking consultant that the
Trustees had hired, was on the phone. As I’ve also previously written,
I’d been added to the Trustee’s branch committee but only as an observer
and had not been included in a few of their committee meetings. I had a
good relationship with Morris from having purchased the gifts we
offered for opening new accounts when the first branch was opened. When
I'd complained to him about the lack of information that was being
shared with me about the pending branch application he offered to keep
me posted with any progress or problems. The last I’d heard indicated
that the banking department approval was imminent so I was excited to
hear what he had to say. It wasn’t what I’d expected. He was calling to
let me know he’d be at the bank on Wednesday for a branch committee
meeting and asked if I’d be there. When I told him this was the first
I’d heard about it he told me he’d make sure I was there. I had to
wonder how that was going to happen. The cynical side of me made me ask
how long he’d known about it. When he said that it had been scheduled
over a week ago it made me mad. I thanked him and then hung the receiver
up. As soon as I did I wanted to kick myself for not asking what the
meeting was to be about.
That bit of information left me a little
unsettled and when I got a call from Bret it troubled me. We’d both
agreed that when on vacation it had to be an emergency for either of us
to make contact. My first thought was that something had happened to him
or a member of his family. They were OK but he wanted to let me know
about Ruthe’s husband. Ruthe was the woman who worked with Lynda at the
stock brokerage. Her husband had beaten her up a few times and I’d,
inadvertently, gotten involved on the backside of the last incident and,
following it, had tried to provide some moral support for her. The
husband, because his father was rich and politically ‘connected’, had
managed to avoid jail time. One part of the court agreement was that he
would move to Florida and the second was that he would not return to the
county unless summoned by the court system. Bret (and Trish) had gone
to high school with him and knew first hand that he was nothing but
trouble. Bret had heard from his sister that the guy was back in town.
Even though there was nothing I could do he wanted me to know. If
nothing else that news took my mind off the pending branch committee
meeting.
I was on my way to the marina a little after 5pm. Trish
and I’d locked the vault and had everyone on their way home. Any work
left on my desk would still be there in the morning so my focus was on
just how much it would cost me for the repair of the outboard motor. The
doors to the workshop were open but there was no signs of ‘life’. I
walked around to the front of the building to find both the mechanics
seated on the very small patch of grass in the front of it… along with
the two girls. This time they didn’t panic or react when they saw me but
one of them poked at the other and whispered something to her. My
impression was that she was somewhat embarrassed because she turned her
head to look out at the boats tied to the docks. One of the mechanics
recognized me and jumped up saying my motor was OK. He motioned for me
to follow him. Once around the corner of the building he commented on
the two girls saying something like they were “really sexy”. I didn’t
respond to his comment which got him to focus on me and why I was there.
The motor was on a stand just inside the open door and he led me to it
and pointed to a small lever, barely noticeable, under the cover at the
back of it. I’d never seen it, not that I’d really looked, but it was a
fuel shut off. After talking with him a bit we determined that when I’d
reached back to raise the motor out of the water I’d hit it, turning off
the fuel flow. Talk about feeling foolish!. He was really nice and
wouldn’t take any money. After loading the motor in the trunk of my car I
asked him what he knew about the two girls.
He might’ve been 20
years old and my question embarrassed him as he shrugged his shoulders
as his face reddened. I definitely remember smiling. Then he said that
he really didn’t know much about them but he volunteered that they kept
coming around the building to peer in the shop all day. Then he got
serious and asked if I’d noticed the brown haired girl was braless. I
hadn’t and before I could respond he added he thought the two of them
had been deliberately teasing them all day. I also remember asking what
he meant by “teasing”. He looked over his shoulder as if to see if
anyone was nearby before saying that he’d also seen them hanging around
the cockpit of the sailboat in just their underwear. At that point he
seemed to hesitate as if he’d said too much. I told him I thought he and
his co-worker were pretty lucky and that got him back to smiling. I
thanked him again for looking at the motor and got in the car. I’ll
admit I was tempted to go back to take another look at the girls… but
didn’t.
To be continued…
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