Hick was kicked back in his recliner Friday night, after a hot day of working at his SUS2.5, stopping by the post office and bank for me, shooting the bull with his buddies, and taking a dip in POOLIO. He was waiting for me to drag myself around the kitchen with my hurt rumpus, and get out of the way so he could make his own supper.
It wasn't THAT hard, because he just had to open a storebought container of BBQ pulled pork, put some in a bowl to microwave, then slop it on a couple of hamburger buns. Oh, and get a dill pickle spear from a jar, and some Ruffles chips from the bag. Still, it's something that I usually do for him, but I was EXHAUSTED after making a trip to town and buying the buns. My rumpus was quite unforgiving.
At 6:30, Hick's phone rang. I didn't quite get the gist of it, except Hick kept repeating, "I'll be there Monday."
"Who was that? What are you doing Monday?"
"It's one of the old ladies at the apartments. She says her air conditioner isn't working. I told her we'd have to get somebody to fix it, and I'd be there Monday."
"She could DIE! Old people die all the time in this heat, in brick buildings! It's going to be in the 90s again all weekend."
"She has a fan. She kept saying, 'Well, I guess I'll just sit here and sweat by my fan.' And I thought, well, okay, you do that. I don't know what she wanted me to say. So I kept telling her I'd be there Monday to deal with it."
"I'm not sure that's enough. Doesn't she have people she can stay with? Family?"
"She can go sit in the lobby on that floor. It's air-conditioned. She don't even have to leave the building. I can't work on an air conditioner. I have to call the heating and cooling people."
"I guess that WOULD be hard to get somebody on a Friday night or weekend."
At 7:00, just as I called him into the kitchen as I was trying to sit down at the table with scratchers, Hick's phone rang again. He got up, and said he had to go to town.
"That was a lady at the apartments. She's locked herself out."
"I thought you were going to put a drop box there with a key."
"I AM, but I haven't had time to put it on the wall. So I'll go let her in."
It takes 20 minutes to get to the apartments. 20 minutes back. I was expecting Hick to be home around 7:50. His bedtime is usually around 8:00! Plus, he still needed to make his supper. Time dragged on. I figured maybe he had stopped to pick up fast food. At 8:25, Hick returned. With nothing.
"That was a long time just to unlock a door. I hope the AC Lady didn't see you there!"
"Oh, she did. I gave her another fan that we had there. I told her she should open up her windows and let some air in. It's cool right now. And I said she should go sit in the lobby if she's hot. That's where the Key Lady was waiting for me. She said it was plenty cool. I don't know if she will or not."
"Then another lady came out and started complaining about the little lady who just moved in. Said she has a mouth on her, and won't shut up, and has been knocking on doors, begging people for food."
"That's not your job! They're taking advantage of you!"
"Yeah. I ain't gettin' involved in that stuff. I want to say, 'If you can't get along, then maybe one of you should move somewhere else.' But I DID see that Little Lady getting a roll of toilet paper from one of her neighbors. So she might be a pest, asking for stuff. I don't think she's got nothin'. I might ask the cooks to give her some of those frozen meals they give people for the weekends. So she will at least not go hungry."
"This is the first of the month! And she's already out of money?"
"I don't know. She give me $700 for the rent. I'll see if they know somebody who can help her."
"So you went to town to unlock a door, but you also had two other ladies to deal with?"
"Yeah. I looked back at the old guy's notes, and he was charging them a $100 unlock fee if he had to go open their door. I'm not gonna charge anyone for that, but I need to get my key box done."
For the record, I'm still not keen on Hick having this job...
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