To all my hopeless romantics: don’t be afraid to write your own happy ending.
“Ryker?”
“Yes, sir?”
“You’ll be with Matt again today.”
“Okay.”
After receiving my orders for the day, I made my way out of the office to meet Matt. It was mid-June, school had let out at the beginning of the month, and I was at work for the second week this summer. Since I was a week away from turning sixteen and still couldn’t drive, I had to tag along with one of the other employees. I didn’t necessarily mind because I was still getting the experience and hours, while two of us could tackle the job faster than just one.
I worked for a company that provided both landscaping and pool cleaning services. Given that I was part of a two-person team, we were typically given the larger jobs. That meant we’d likely have to do several properties that would require both services.
This job was my full-time summer job. I worked full days Monday through Friday and half days every other Saturday. On Fridays and Saturdays, I also worked part-time at the movie theater. Sundays were my day off, and I usually spent the mornings at home with my parents.
I hopped in the passenger seat, buckled up, and Matt took off.
“We’ve got one lawn to do in Rising Sun, and then the rest of our day is going to be spent in Norfolk,” he told me.
“Sweet,” I returned.
Rising Sun was the town I lived in. People from all walks of life lived here. Some folks were wealthy, and others were just making ends meet. My family was in the latter category. We weren’t starving, but we also weren’t the kind of people who needed to hire a pool cleaning service company because we didn’t have a pool. Both of my parents worked blue-collar jobs. My father was a plumber, my mother a seamstress. They made a decent living and had meager savings, but we wouldn’t be living in the mansions like so many of the people in Norfolk lived in.
Following the completion of our first lawn in Rising Sun, which took us only thirty minutes to accomplish, Matt and I had finally pulled up at the first house in a neighborhood that had four client homes we’d be working at today.
It was an hour before lunch when we finished the first mansion. Matt and I decided to move on to the second one, get the pool cleaned, and have lunch before we finished up with cutting the grass.
Most of our clients, particularly those that lived in a neighborhood like this, were set up with contracts. It was nice because we wouldn’t need to wait around and speak to the homeowners to get our work done. In fact, they weren’t typically home anyway.
So, that allowed us to get our work done quickly.
Which is precisely what happened at the second mansion. The pool, though large, was done just in time for us to break for lunch. Matt and I went back to the work truck to grab our lunches, and he said, “Hey, I’m going to give my girl a call. Hope you don’t mind.”
I shook my head. “Not at all,” I replied.
To give him some privacy, I lowered the truck bed’s tailgate and sat there to eat. While I ate, I looked around at all the homes. It was mind-boggling to think that people made so much money they could live in homes like this. I found myself wondering if they were simply working to pay their bills and afford these homes or if they just had that much money that a home like this was a drop in the bucket.
When I finished my lunch, I decided to unload the first mower. I knew I’d get started, and Matt would follow shortly afterward. He’d take his full thirty minutes for lunch because he spent that time on the phone with his girlfriend. It didn’t bother me. I just wasn’t the kind of guy who liked to sit around. I enjoyed working.
And I couldn’t necessarily blame Matt. If I had a girlfriend, I was certain I’d probably spend my entire lunch break talking to her, too.
Figuring we’d do what we’d done on the first mansion, I decided to tackle the lawn in the rear of the home while leaving the front for Matt.
About five minutes after I started, though, I realized I wasn’t alone.
A girl, who looked as though she was close to my age, was sunbathing. She was beautiful. More beautiful than any other girl I’d ever seen.
I did my best to focus on my work, but it was tough. This girl wasn’t the kind of girl a sane guy would ignore. I wasn’t too proud to admit that it took me a bit longer to complete the mowing in the back yard because I was too distracted by seeing her there in her bathing suit. But what attracted me most to her was seeing her so engrossed with the book in her hand. She wasn’t reading some girly magazine or celebrity gossip tabloid. I didn’t know what book she was reading, but I liked that she seemed to be completely absorbed in it.
A week away from turning sixteen, I only ever had two things on my mind. Girls and cars.
The cars were the reason I worked so hard. I wanted to buy my first car this year. I’d saved up all last summer and hoped to have enough money within the next few weeks to get something decent. The girls were… well, any teenage boy’s fantasy.
Seeing this girl, I had to admit I felt something stirring inside me. With her tanned, toned figure glistening under the sun, I knew she was a girl I wouldn’t soon forget. As much as I wished I could have approached her, I couldn’t.
She was completely out of my league.
And considering I’d have a summer filled with weekly visits to her family’s mansion, I couldn’t risk the humiliation of being turned down by her.
After a full day of working out in the sun, I was a bit relieved to be inside the air-conditioned movie theater. I’d work until my shift ended at midnight and ride my bike the ten minutes back to my house before crashing for a couple of hours and needing to get up early the next morning to do it all over again.
For a Friday night, the theater was unusually quiet. We had a steady stream of movie-goers, but not what was typical for a Friday evening. I guessed that the first night of the week-long yearly music festival held in one of the neighboring towns being that night was the reason for the poorer attendance.
Even though I liked it when it was busy because it made the hours pass by quickly, I felt different tonight.
Because at around twenty minutes past eight o’clock, she walked in. The girl from the Morgan mansion.
Yes, I’d done some research once Matt and I were back in the car. As it turned out, the last name of the property owners was Morgan.
From the moment she walked through the door, I watched her. I had been anticipating a gaggle of girls to join her at some point, but they didn’t. She simply got her ticket and bought herself some popcorn and a soda. When she walked up to where I was standing to check and validate tickets, I locked eyes with her a moment.
Damn, she was beautiful.
She offered me a friendly smile. I glanced down at her ticket, smirked at the movie she’d chosen, and tore the ticket in half. Keeping one half of it, I handed the opposite half to her and said, “End of the hall, make a left, first theater on your right.”
“Thank you,” she returned, her voice just a touch over a whisper.
I struggled not to watch her as she walked away and completely failed at first. But when a rambunctious group of younger kids had approached with their parents, I had no choice but to look away. After validating their tickets, I said, “End of the hall, make a right, first theater on your left.”