Welcome to E. Mayberry

“Well if you had,” he said. “You would’ve gotten to the part where it says that owners don’t wear necklaces because they’re involved in a much more permanent procedure. You see this?”

He lifted up the sleeve of his shirt and turned over his arm so I could see the soft spot close to his armpit.

“Do you see or feel anything different there?” he asked.

I didn’t see anything but when I felt along his arm, my fingers ran over something odd beneath his skin. I traced it with my fingertips and found that something was implanted there. It felt like a small square.

“A patch is embedded there beneath the arm on all owners,” he said. “It makes us infertile and has the other qualities of your necklace only stronger.”

“So owners are even hornier than pets?” I asked.

He held me close to his chest again and ran his fingers through my hair.

“My horniness seems to never end,” he said.

In the distance I saw more horseplay going on over at the garage sale and it seemed the perfect break from our conversation.

“Can we go to the garage sale?” I asked.

“That’s where I was taking you,” he said. “Thought you might want to check out the other man’s trash. But hey, first…”

He pulled a phone from his pocket and held it up to the sky, lining us up for the perfect selfie.

“I’m happy,” he said. “And I want to remember this moment.”

He turned us so the cute older couple on the front porch could be seen in the background. We smiled and the old couple had no idea they were being included in our moment.

The garage sale turned out to be a joint venture between two neighbors I’d never met. Both ladies were in their mid-fifties and had helmet hairdos. They sat side by side on lawn chairs. One smoked from one of those ridiculous looking Holly Golightly(ish) cigarette holders while the other swirled a drink in her hand with one finger, even though the amber liquid had lowered to a level far beneath the finger. They both called out prices to onlookers.

We stepped up to one table and found a selection of books, most of which revolved around cooking or exercise and probably came free with the purchase of either pots and pans or a Thighmaster-like device.

Bastian busied himself with a table full of random tools and knickknacks. My attention was on the table to my right which was full of sex toys, bedroom enhancers as the handwritten sign explained. A glass dildo, two whips, a flogger, nipple clamps, a half-used bottle of strawberry scented lube, a basket full of thongs rolled up to resemble a flower of some sort. It looked like no floral arrangement I was familiar with. To me they looked like nothing more than a basket full of thongs rolled up to resemble a flower of some sort.

Most of the stuff on the table were things I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to buy used. My eyes were on the glass dildo when the whiskey stirring neighbor hollered out, “Five dollars! It’s fucking great! Great deal.”

She turned to her lawn chair companion and drunkenly whispered, “It is a great deal.”

“Thank you,” I said, “But I’m just looking.”

“How much for this screwdriver?” Bastian asked.

“Two bucks,” the Holly wannabe called out. “Everything on the table is two bucks. I’ll give you four for ten bucks.”

Bastian looked over at me with a wrinkled brow. She apparently hadn’t realized she’d announced the opposite of a good deal.

“Maybe I’ll buy them separately,” he joked and only I seemed to get it.

It was a great day. I wished Bastian never had to work again. He explained Monday in E. Mayberry was like a weekend outside the gates since the real world was always busiest during the weekends. Most of the owners in the neighborhood, if not rich by inheritance of some sort or retired, worked in a professional setting. Lawyers, doctors, dentists, bankers, and all other high-dollar earners not working in a popular entertainment field, made up the careers of most owners. It wouldn’t pay to have an actress or a recording artist living behind the gates. Any chance for that kind of possible publicity wouldn’t be beneficial to the community.

“I have an idea,” Bastian said. “Stay here for a second.”

Before I could ask for more info, he took off in the direction of our house. I watched as he jogged away, his strong calf muscles on display as he made his exit. I wasn’t the only shopper to gawk at my man. The others weren’t shy about it.

“Now that is a piece of ass,” the whiskey swirler said.

“Channel 303,” someone else called out.

My house, channel 303. I’d have to remember to keep the fucking TV turned off from now on.