Chapter 2

Priscilla waved to the five young adults. The blond man posed and preened, smiling with a self-confident swagger. The morbidly obese young man waved, pushing his greasy hair back, the third young man stared vacantly at Priscilla. The red head gave a smile and wave and the blonde actually turned her back on Priscilla.

“You go to college?” Carmen Perez asked when Priscilla called to invite her mother to see her new home.

“No, Mother,” Priscilla admitted.

“Bye-bye,” Carmen sang out and disconnected the call.

“But, uh, should see the college students right next door,” Priscilla said to the dead air. “Now, those college students are some real winners, hear Mother?”

Priscilla, ‘Delilah’ as she was known to the customers of The Captain’s Table used her long strand of beads, running the strand between her legs, pressing the strand tightly against her black satin covered crotch. She ran the strand up and down her body, ran the beads over her breasts, between her breasts, smiling her fake smile.

When she’d worn her rope of real pearls, the reception had been positive. Priscilla estimated she’d pulled in nearly two hundred dollars more in tips that night. The next day, she’d stopped off at a small arts and crafts store and purchased white glass beads, slightly larger than her real pearls and made herself a sixty inch strand; she didn’t want to chance damaging, or worse yet, losing her real pearls.

Leaving the bar early in the morning, Priscilla nearly drove to her apartment. At the last moment, she remembered she now had a home and drove to 210 Conway Road.

She almost drove past the house; it was a weathered white wooden house among other weathered white wooden houses. There was a streetlight in front of 206 Conway and a streetlight in front of 212 Conway, leaving her home in darkness. Thankfully, when the garage door slowly went up, it caused the interior light of the garage to come on.

Walking from garage to bedroom, she smiled. Her home. At just twenty years of age, she Priscilla Perez was a home-owner.

The next morning, Priscilla went onto the small concrete pad that formed the miniscule back porch, yoga pad under her arm. She looked around; there was an eight foot tall wooden fence enclosing the back yard. Leroy Burns had put the fence up just to piss off Tom Jensen; the neighbor directly behind the home. It was a good, sturdy fence. Between each one by six board, the builder had nailed a one by two inch strip, leaving no gaps whatsoever.

Priscilla stripped off her tee shirt and shorts and moved from pose to pose, completely nude. Her ankle length black hair was piled on top of her head; she usually tied it up like that to keep it out of her way as she exercised.

An hour later, golden brown skin glistening with sweat, Priscilla gathered her mat and shorts and tee shirt and let herself into her home. She smiled as she closed the sliding glass door; her home.

“Need to change out these appliances,” Priscilla thought as she prepared her breakfast.

“Need to get a better tub,” Priscilla thought as she took a leisurely bath.

“Need to get a better job,” Priscilla thought when Jason called, begging her to come cover the early shift.

When Pricilla pulled out of the garage, the blonde next door was outside. She pointedly looked away when Priscilla waved.

“Oh, ooh, that really hurt, stuck up cunt,” Priscilla said aloud as she drove away.

Pricilla let Jason know she wasn’t happy; she was supposed to be off today. Then she hurried to get dressed to go on the stage. The DJ announced Delilah was in the house and she strutted onto the small stage, sixty inch strand of pearls dangling down.

“Damn, love what you do with them pearls,”” Jason admitted after her set.

“Uh huh,” Priscilla said, zeroing in on an old man that was staring intently at her.

It was still daylight when she arrived home. The blond man and the freakishly tall young man were in the front yard, playing Frisbee. Priscilla did not wave to them. She did smirk when the blond man intentionally-accidentally struck her car with the plastic disc. She didn’t acknowledge him when he ran up to retrieve the Frisbee.

There was a small sole-proprietorship hardware store a few blocks away, on Roselawn Way. Priscilla despised the big box stores; they had little leeway when it came to pricing. Small mom and pop stores, Priscilla found she could usually get a deal. And the proprietor or manager usually knew what the hell they sold in their store, unlike some kid that got a week of training and then were turned loose on the floor of the large chain stores.

“Grass is dead or dying; yard looks like crap,” Priscilla said. “And honestly? I don’t feel like cutting it.”

“So what you thinking?” Chad Campion asked.

“Tear it all up? Put in ground cover?” Priscilla asked, eyes firmly glued to a claw foot tub display.

“See you like that,” Chad smiled. “And look. Looks like an old time tub, don’t it? But. Ever see one them old tubs with Jacuzzi action?”

“How hard is it to put in?” Priscilla asked, imagining herself luxuriating in the beautiful tub.

“Going need a plumber. Internet will tell you, ‘aw you can put this in yourself’ but believe me, you’re going want someone knows what he’s doing. Oh. Or she’s doing.”

Priscilla took a picture of the tub, then talked with Chad about her idea of putting in ground cover. She bought a tiller, opting to buy his floor model at a reduced price, a spade, several pallets of star jasmine ground cover, and some pebbled stepping stones, as well as black plastic bordering. She also contracted to have a truck load of loam delivered the following morning.

“Ma’am, you, you’re not going get this all there in that,” Chad said, looking at Priscilla’s sub-compact automobile. “Tell you what; I can run it out to you, um, how’s eight sound?”

“And that. That’s why I buy local,” Priscilla smiled.

Buying local or not, Priscilla did go on-line and looked up the tub. She saw that Chad wasn’t trying to gouge his customers; he was only a few hundred dollars higher than a discount dealer. And adding in shipping, Chad was fairly in line with the pricing of the discount dealership.

Chad showed up a few minutes after eight pm and helped Priscilla put everything into the back yard. Looking around, he agreed with Priscilla; the yard did look like crap. But, he pointed out, so did everyone else’s yard.

Seven thirty in the morning, Priscilla started up her tiller and chewed her way through the dead and dying grass of her front yard. The blonde woman that lived at 208 Conway Road came out and screamed obscenities at Priscilla; didn’t she realize what time it was? The young woman’s words were not audible over the grunting gasoline powered motor or the clashing and thrashing of the tiller blades. Priscilla ignored the unhappy blonde and kept working.

The load of loam showed up while Priscilla was completing the front yard. Priscilla saw that she would also need a wheelbarrow and called Chad. He made a choking sound and apologized for not thinking of that; he would run one out to her in a few minutes.

Priscilla was tired, sweaty; she wanted to stop, go inside and take a shower. But she also wanted to get as much done as possible; thankfully, she had the late shift that evening.

“Yeah, them Chinese? They’re all industrious as shit,” the blond man said to his friends; all the occupants of 208 Conway Road had come out to watch as Priscilla labored.

“I’m Filipino, not Chinese, dumb shit,” Priscilla muttered.

The three males were watching Priscilla’s every move because she was outside in very short Daisy Duke Shorts and tiny black bikini top. The red head was outside, sketching in her large sketch pad. The blonde was outside because the three men were outside.

Chad pulled up in his store’s van. He opened the back doors of the van and showed Priscilla the three wheelbarrows she had to choose from. He smiled when she pulled out a wad of singles and fives to pay for the new wheelbarrow.

“Oh, hey! Think I recognize this fiver here,” Chad joked and she smirked, shaking her head.

“Uh huh, I know I’ve never seen you at The Captain’s Table,” Priscilla said.

Priscilla did as much as she could, filling in much of the front yard before exhaustion and hunger and the brutal sun drove her inside. She thought of calling in and asking Jason for the night off, but knew that he’d somehow use it to exact some revenge later on down the line.

She made it through her shift, made it home, and made it to bed. When her alarm roused her at six the next morning, Priscilla nearly stayed in bed. But, she had a back yard to tend to. She groaned, staggered outside, nude, and did her yoga poses. After an hour, she did feel better, did feel more energized.

At seven thirty, Priscilla started her tiller. She almost giggled, imagining how upset Darlene must be. Priscilla had learned that Darlene was the name of the unfriendly blonde woman. The immense tub of sweaty lard was named Henry, and the blond man that thought he was such hot shit was named Zeke.

The tall, gaunt man was named Frank; Priscilla had nicknamed him ‘Lurch’ because he reminded her of that character from the movie ‘The Addams Family.’ But she still did not know the name of the slender red head.

“Need get that out of here; thing’s dead,” Priscilla muttered as she worked around the red bud tree.

And, again, when she started wheeling loads of loam from front yard to back yard, Priscilla found that she had an audience. She was sure that her Daisy Duke shorts and black bikini top were part of the reason. She was also sure that part of the reason for their rapt attention was that none of these college students had ever worked a minute in their lives. So, someone working was a real curiosity to them.

By the time the noon sun drove her inside, Priscilla had most of the loam spread out. After a hot shower, Priscilla fixed her lunch. She then called her new buddy Chad and asked him who he would recommend to remove a red bud tree from her property.

“That dead thing in your back yard?” Chad asked. “Tell you what; I’ll do it for two hundred if you can wait until Sunday.”

“And I want three crepe myrtles for the front yard,” Priscilla decided.

“Crepe, guess what? I got three of them right here,” Chad said. “Should I drop off your new tub with them?”

Priscilla laughed and Chad chuckled. She promised she would think very seriously about that tub and ended the call.

After a brief nap, Priscilla looped two twenty seven inch strands of white beads around her twenty six inch waist. They rested on her hips, calling attention to her golden skin, her red thong panties. Looking in the bedroom mirror, Priscilla wondered about getting her dark brown nipples pierced, thought of threading hoops with pearl beads through her nipples. Her sixty inch rope of beads went around her neck and she put her real pearl earrings into her ears.

Again, dancing on the stage, Priscilla, Delilah ‘masturbated’ with the long string of beads, rubbing her satin covered crotch with the beads, kneeling and running the strand over her breasts, between her legs. She smiled her ‘Ho’ smile as she accepted the sweaty, crumpled dollar bills from the customers.

Ground cover planted, crepe myrtles planted, stepping stones arranged, Priscilla still wasn’t pleased with the appearance of her home. The house to her left, the rental home, and the house to her right, which was still for sale now had a sign announcing that the price had been reduced were the same color of washed out white as her home. Up and down the street, most of the homes were tired, washed out colors.

“Okay, Handy Sandy, what you got in mind now?” Chad smiled when Priscilla walked into his store.

“I’ll take that tub; who would you recommend to put it in?” Priscilla said, pulling out her debit card.

“Buckmeyer,” Chad said as he punched in the ticket number of the tub.

“And I want to paint my house. What do you think?” Priscilla asked, wandering toward the paint aisle.

“You? Or hire someone to do it?” Chad called out.

“Me,” Priscilla said, already picking up a five gallon bucket of ‘Pink Pearl’ enamel.

“Don’t,” Chad said. “You’ll need to scrape off the old paint, sand down the rough areas, patch it, then prime it, and then finally get around to paining it. Once you get started? It’s not like you can stop and say ‘this is too hard.’ And I guarantee you, any painter you call out after you’ve started? They’ll charge you extra to ‘fix’ your mistakes. Even if there aren’t any mistakes; they’ll invent them.”

“You talked me into it,” Priscilla said, also setting aside a five gallon bucket of ‘Oyster Shell’ enamel.

Bucky Buckmeyer gave Priscilla a price to pull out the old tub and install the new tub. He recommended a friend to run the 220 volt line that the tub required for the Jacuzzi portion, as well as another friend to do the tile work underneath the new tub.

“Go ahead,” Priscilla sighed; Chad had neglected to tell her about all the extra odds and ends this tub would take

Scraping was hard, hot work. Sanding was hard, hot work. Priscilla would start off at seven o’clock every morning, dressed in white coveralls, long black hair underneath her painter’s cap. Usually before ten in the morning, she’d be down to grey flannel shorts and tee shirt. On the days she worked the early shift, she would stop right before eleven o’clock, put everything away, then drink a protein drink, shower and race to The Captain’s Table.

When she had the late shift, Priscilla sat outside and drank her protein drink, then wearily work for another two or three hours. On the days she was off, Priscilla would strip off the shorts and tee shirt after her lunch and continue to work dressed in her black thong bikini.

“Telling you, them Chinese? Man, they don’t never stop,” Zeke informed his friends as the quintet watched Priscilla work.

“I am not Chinese, you dumb shit,” Priscilla thought as she applied the soft pink color to her home.

The door, the wooden shutters and other wood trim was painted the oyster shell gray. Priscilla decided to do the overhang and the garage door in Arctic White and the crisp, clean color was a pleasing contrast to the pink and gray.