Love Next Door (Lakeside 1)

Billy waggles his eyebrows and flops back on the couch, his attention returning to Garage Wars.

Mom leads me out the side door, onto the covered deck. It used to be a sunroom, but now it’s full of winter gear and old, half-broken chairs and projects. “What’s all this stuff?”

“Oh, you know your brother, always looking for treasures. Once he’s back on his feet, he’ll be able to fix some of this stuff up. There’s a whole set of chairs that he wants to have re-covered, and a table that he’s planning to refinish.”

It looks more like a relocated dump, and I have my serious doubts that my brother plans to do any of those things, but again, I keep it to myself, not wanting my negativity to rub off on my mom or make her feel bad. Half of me believes I might be veering into overreacting territory, and I can admit it’s in part due to the circumstances and the fact that I’m back here after promising myself I wouldn’t return. But I’m worried about the way our mom likes to brush things off, and the fact that Billy is loafing on the couch, drinking beer days after being in an accident caused by drinking and driving.

And now I’m being herded around the side of the house, past the shed, to where the trailer has been parked for the better part of a decade. It’s been set up, and the awning, which is full of patched holes and a few that still need mending, is strung with white lights. A set of camping chairs are perched to the right of the door.

The exterior hasn’t changed since we bought the thing probably twenty years ago, back when I was a kid. My parents had bought it with the plan to take us camping, but we already lived on a lake, and neither of their schedules was ever particularly conducive to taking more than a couple of days off. Even when they did get a week here or there, they preferred to stick close to home.

So when I was a tween and wanted to get away from my annoying little brother, me and my friends Tawny and Allie, and sometimes Sue, depending on whether we were on the outs or not, would have sleepovers here.

“Let me show you what I’ve done. I didn’t have much time, so a few things still need to be taken care of.” She pokes at the hole in the screen door before she opens it and ushers me in.

I probably haven’t stepped foot in here since I was eighteen. My high school boyfriend, Tucker, used to sneak over some nights, and we’d have super-quiet sex on the floor, which was the only surface that didn’t squeak.

I shake that memory like I’m trying to erase an Etch A Sketch design. It appears as though very little has changed since my teens. Everything looks exactly the same, but older, worn out, and full of moth holes. It’s probably not a stretch to believe that rodents have made a home in here at some point.

Directly in front of me is a small table, with benches covered in brown fabric on either side. To the right is a tiny sink and a hot plate; below that is the bar fridge. Past that is a door leading to a small bathroom with a toilet and sink—no shower, which means I’ll need to use the one in the house.

To the left is the pop-out with the bed. It’s a queen, and the comforter is the same one that’s been in my room since I was probably fifteen years old. Even my stuffed dog, Fluffy, who used to be white and is now a matted gray, is perched on the pillow.

“I know it needs work, but I hung new curtains! Do you like them?” She tugs at the end of a hot-pink curtain with a geometric pattern on it that makes me feel like the entire trailer is sitting in the middle of a very wavy ocean at dawn.

“They’re great, Mom.” I try my best to inject some enthusiasm into my response.

“There’s a tear in the canvas over the bed that I’ve patched with tape until I can get it sealed, but it’s been dry lately, and there’s no rain in the forecast, so you should be okay for a few days. And the bathroom works; I made sure of it. Your dad hooked up the water and everything.” Her smile is expectant and strained.

Next to the seventies- and eighties-era brown theme, the curtains are hard to look at. But I can see that she’s gone to a great deal of trouble to get this place ready for me, and she most definitely has done her best with the limited amount of time she’s had.