Painting Pearls

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.

The day after she applied the last bit of paint to the exterior, Priscilla discovered that her neighbors were not faring too well. Sitting in her recliner, sipping her protein drink while watching the local news, Priscilla heard the sound of water running. A check of the two bathrooms, the kitchen, and the washing machine did not reveal the source of the sound of running water.

Stepping outside, Priscilla checked the outside faucet in the back yard. It was not running.

Checking the outside faucet next to her garage showed a hose running from faucet to underneath the fence into her neighbor's back yard. Priscilla angrily twisted the faucet off, unhooked the hose, and jerked the faucet handle off of the faucet. She then stomped down on the end of the hose, cracking the plastic connection.

"Bitch," Darlene mouthed as Priscilla backed out of her garage later that day.

"Yes, Mother, I really should go to college," Priscilla smirked, waving to Darlene.

As she drove east on Conway Road, the woman that lived at 201 Conway waved Priscilla to a stop. Priscilla lowered her window, smiling at the attractive older woman.

"Listen, love what you did with your house," the woman said.

"Well, thank you," Priscilla smiled.

"How much to do my house?" the woman asked, pointing toward her two bedroom bungalow.

"Let me work up a plan and I'll get back to you," Priscilla promised.

While on a break at the Captain's Table, Priscilla called Chad and asked him what he thought she should charge. Chad helped her construct a working budget; materials, time, travel. His strongest bit of advice, don't sell it too cheap. Serious customers won't balk at a reasonable price; not so serious customers will take advantage of a price that's too low.

"It's got to be worth your while," Chad advised. "Oops, got a customer; got to go."

Priscilla was exhausted when she got home. But she gathered all of her receipts together, using the calculator function on her laptop to work it up. She then went on-line and 'borrowed' a contract template as well as an itemized proposal budget.

Dr. Patricia Beard looked at the proposal that Priscilla printed out, pursing her lips. She looked at Priscilla, looked into Priscilla's unreadable eyes.

"Well, this is a little more than I'd planned to spend," the university professor finally said.

"That is fine, ma'am," Priscilla said.

"Wait a minute. That's it? No negotiating?" Dr. Beard called out when Priscilla started to walk away.

"Dr. Beard, I'm already giving you a ten percent discount; the 'Good Neighbor' discount," Priscilla said. "You say it's more than you're willing to spend and it is a little less than I'm willing to take. So, no ma'am, there's no room for negotiation."

Two days later, Dr. Beard flagged Priscilla and agreed to Priscilla's price. Priscilla called Jason and quit her job at The Captain's Table.

"Fine, bitch, don't come crying needing a job," Jason snapped.

Priscilla and Dr. Beard agreed on colors and Priscilla and she signed the contract. With twenty five percent deposit in hand, Priscilla bought the paint she would need.

The next morning, Priscilla woke at five thirty. The air was hot, heavy. The ceiling fan in her bedroom was pushing the hot air around.

Head pounding from the heat, Priscilla sluggishly made her way to the hall thermostat. It read '87 degrees' and the vent was not blowing any air, although the AC was set to seventy four degrees.

Priscilla shut the unit off; there was no use running it if it wasn't blowing cold air. Then she heard a frantic knocking on her front door.

"Yes?" Priscilla called out. "Who is it?"

"Ma'am? It's Carrie. From next door?" Priscilla heard a thin voice call out.

"Carrie! What the fuck?" Priscilla heard another voice call out from a distance.

"Ma'am, please, Zeke, he seen me," Carrie called out frantically.

"God damned bitch, told you," Priscilla heard Zeke's voice as she fumbled with the dead bolt.

She opened the door and the thin red head from next door rushed in. Priscilla squealed and slammed the door shut just as Zeke rushed up the concrete steps in front of her door.

"God damned bitch; fucking kill you," Zeke screamed, savagely kicking the door.

"Yes, my neighbor; he's trying to break into my house," Priscilla screamed when the 911 operator answered.

"Henry, get your fat ass over here," Priscilla, and the 911 operator heard.

The door actually shuddered as Henry brought his immense weight against the door.

A police cruiser was only three blocks away and was dispatched to 210 Conway Road. Splintering was heard as Henry again rushed the door. Thankfully, the sound of the cruiser's sirens caused Zeke and Henry to run to 208 Conway Road.

Carrie Hebert told the two police officers that they'd been without utilities for the past week. That morning, Zeke and Henry had come up with the bright idea to steal the copper from their own air conditioning unit, the unit of 212, 216, and 209 Conway Road. Seeing the small amount of copper that the thefts had actually netted them, they decided to steal the copper from 210 Conway Road as well.

"That why it's so hot in here?" one officer asked.

"And my water," Priscilla remembered. "Y'all hooked up a hose to my faucet other day."

"Ma'am, I swear, I had nothing do with that," Carrie protested.

The officers radioed in for another cruiser. Zeke and Henry were led from the house in handcuffs. Henry was put into one cruiser, Zeke into the second cruiser. Darlene and Frankie stood, watching everything in stunned fascination.

Robertson's AC couldn't send anyone out until Monday. Sighing, Priscilla dressed in bikini, painter's coveralls and painter's cap. She then carried everything to 201 Conway Road.

"My, you do believe in getting an early start," Dr. Beard grumbled when Priscilla began the task of scraping off nearly fifty five years of paint.

"Yes ma'am," Priscilla said cheerfully, although she didn't feel very cheerful.

She worked until eleven. Then, dressed in bikini and grubby tennis shoes, Priscilla walked to her home.

Opening the front door of her home, Priscilla gasped when a wave of overheated air rushed her. She quickly grabbed a protein drink and an apple and sat outside.

"Mother, the air conditioning's out at my house," Priscilla begged her mother when Carmen answered her phone.

"Oh? Maybe you go to college, you don't have that problem?" Carmen suggested.

"Mother, what's college got to do with my AC being out?" Priscilla asked.

"You go to college, they tell you how not to break it," Carmen suggested.

"Mother, some idiots broke it, stealing the copper out of it," Priscilla snapped, exasperated with the headstrong woman. "Oh. And they were college students."

"That's too bad," Carmen said, unyielding.

"Good bye Mother," Priscilla sighed.

By four o'clock, Priscilla had done all she could physically do, but she'd accomplished a good deal thus far. She told Dr. Beard she'd be back in the morning and Dr. Beard did request that it be after eight o'clock.

"I cannot, I am not staying in this house," Priscilla gasped when she was again buffeted with the overheated air of her home.

She jumped into a cold shower, quickly rinsing the day's sweat and flakes of paint from her skin. Then she wiggled into bra, panties and half tee shirt and Daisy Duke Shorts. She stuffed a change of clothes, a long tee shirt to sleep in, and red monokini and clean coveralls, Priscilla dashed to the garage.

Backing out of the sweltering garage, Priscilla looked over at 208 Conway Road. If it was that hot in her own home after almost twelve hours without air conditioning, what must it be like next door?

Carrie hadn't needed to come tell Priscilla what had happened to the air conditioning. She could have let Priscilla be completely unaware of what had happened. But the girl had knocked, tattled on her friends. Priscilla decided she couldn't leave the girl in the hot rental house.

Priscilla put her car in park and walked across her strip of ground cover then the scrub of dead and dying grass. She reached out to ring the doorbell, then laughed at herself.

"Duh, doorbells don't work if there's no electricity," she said as she knocked on the door.

Frankie opened the door and stared at Priscilla, a slightly vacant smile on his face. He didn't move when Priscilla asked if Carrie was there.

"Frankie, shit, you letting in all kind mosquitos, oh. It's you," Darlene complained.

"Carrie. Is she here?" Priscilla said again. "Does he speak English?"

"Carrie! It's that Chinese woman!" Darlene screamed into the hot, dark home.

"Chinese, oh! Hey," Carrie said, stepping to the door. "Frankie, damn it, move, huh?"

"Is he on drugs?" Priscilla asked, nodding toward Frankie.

"Needs to be, huh?" Carrie snapped, glaring at the tall, silent man. "What's up?"

"I'm going get a motel room; there is no way I can stay in my house," Priscilla said. "Listen, you, go grab some clothes, come with me."

Carrie disappeared into the dark interior. Priscilla was used to men leering at her, ogling her flesh, but Frankie's vacant stare made her nervous.

"Where you going?" Darlene demanded to know as Carrie barged out of the house, carrying a small nylon bag. "Huh? Hey, I'm talking to you, Carrie, I'm talking to you."

In the small car, Priscilla smelled Carrie's unwashed body. She could even smell Carrie's unwashed hair and the smell was close to intolerable.

As Priscilla drove to the Home Comfort Inn, Carrie kept up a non-stop chatter. Priscilla was finding it hard to breathe; Carrie stunk. She just muttered 'uh huh' and drove.

In the lobby, the clerk regarded the two young girls with suspicion. Priscilla explained that her air conditioner had been damaged and it would be Monday before it could be fixed. The older woman's face softened considerably.

"And hot like it is? Bet you was 'bout burn up," the woman said. "Y'all wanting a king sized bed or two doubles?"

"Doesn't matter as long as it's got air conditioning," Priscilla said.

The clerk showed Priscilla where she'd written '106' inside of the envelope flap for the key cards. Priscilla thanked the woman and led Carrie down the hall.

"She didn't say what room we in," Carrie said.

"Because there's others in the lobby, Carrie," Priscilla said.

She began to wonder if this was a mistake. Carrie did not shut up. Her mouth ran and ran, and got nowhere. Priscilla was used to peace and quiet. She was used to being able to hear herself think.

"How you know this is the right room?" Carrie asked when Priscilla paused at room 106.

"Don't," Priscilla shrugged. "But we got start somewhere, right? This one doesn't work, we'll try the next one and the next one until we find the right one."

Priscilla slid the key card in. When the small light blinked green, she opened the door.