Ogreness, Black Lake-book5

Chapter 3
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Five rings didn’t bring Ralph to the door. I strode off the stoop and glared up the street. No, I didn’t wanna knock on Gozer’s door. No shuttin’ up a troll once he gets talkin’. Very irritating creatures.

Okay, I had to admit I didn’t want to face Dave. Just a short block away. Maybe already be home. He’d never let me live this down. Take one look at the scratches up and down my arms, prolly have a few across my face, and every time he sees me for the next ten years he’ll ask if I’ve danced with any wolves lately.

He’ll give me grief every morning run. Every day on the basketball court. Every staff meeting. I spend too much time with the jerk. Never should have hired him. Or joined his mixed league. But the jerk knows his tech.

And he’s a natural leader. People seem to like him. Go figger.

I looked up toward Gozer’s. And maybe lurched. What was all that piled in front of the empty house next to Gozer’s? Looked like the pieces of a giant erector set, but these parts were all ecru-hued steel waitin’ to go into a highrise up North.

It all blocked the view of the houses up the block. That couldn’t meet code. HOA will be fixin’ this quick. Though I hate HOA's. My papa skipped a week mowing his lawn and received a nasty note from his board.

I pushed off to explore. Stood in front of a gazillion tons of beautiful rust-flavored steel when Gozer’s door opened. He strode toward me, coffee cup in hand, calf-length bath robe flowin’ open, chest bare, pajama bottoms, what, decorated with day-glow-yellow dolphins?

“Must be worth millions of Continentals,” Gozer groused.

More like dozens. One beam prolly cost a hundred grand.

“Surprised ya didn’t join us neighbors when the truck come unloadin’.” Gozer wasn’t a happy camper.

“It’s a blight,” he continued. “A danger. An insult to all of us. What is this, Sanford and Son. Despicable.”

“Last night, huh?” I mumbled.

“Ya out late or something?” Gozer asked. “What are ya gonna do about it?” He snorted those words and coffee slopped out of his cup.

“Me? Why should I do anything about—”

“Ya’re the only Range-privileged in the neighborhood with the power to make anything happen.”

I really don’t like being interrupted. And don’t like to be called Range-privileged. Not that I can hide the family I was born into. If I wanted to.

“Hey,” I said. “Our neighbor Silva was out for a run with an ogre hen this morning. We have a new ogre family in the hood?”

“Don’t change the subject.” Gozer growled. Trolls like to growl almost as much as us ogres.

I dared to tell him I was more interested in an ogre hen neighbor than a pile of steel. Of course he growled again. I asked him if he had his cell on him.

His face brightened up. “Ya gonna call yar guy about this yard of—”

“No. I locked myself out. Got to call my papa.”

Gozer’s chest did that trollish thing no other race can do. Supposed to be a laugh. More like a volcanic eruption in the esophagus. Yeah, yeah. Very funny. I locked myself out.

His eyes narrowed. “What happened to yar arms?”

I looked down. The sun was darin’ to peek over the horizon soon, so the blood coatin’ my arms was a little more dramatic. I mumbled about havin’ to take a detour in the reserve.

“Some detour.” Gozer drew his phone out of a deep pocket and handed it to me.

I dialed Papa. On the second ring he was grumpin’ about being retired and not appreciatin’ early morning calls from idjits he didn't know.

“Ya’re sittin’ drinkin’ yar coffee, readin’ the news, right?” I asked.

“Ike?” He harumphed. “Doesn’t matter. Retired is a thing. I put in my sixty years. Deserve my morning peace. And why are ya callin’ me on an unknown number?”

He was never one to be overly perky in the morning. Back in the day, maybe had something to do with draggin’ in from the office after ten in the evening most nights. Of the three days a week he was in the Range.

I suggested that some old goats love to hear from their adoring sons.

He growled high, which is an ogre’s laugh. “I hear from ya too often anyway. What. Was just last month, huh? Get a life, youngling.”

Mama was prolly swishin’ a firm fist at him. “Ya changed the code on my security thing. What’s the new one?”

He was silent.

“Used to be my birthdate,” I hedged.

He remained silent.

“Did ya write it down somewhere?”

“Ya locked yarself out?” Thankfully he sounded surprised.

I waited. Uh oh. He didn’t remember. I’d have to hunt down Dave. Last thing in the world I wanted to do.

“I’d been tellin’ ya—”

Yeah, yeah. Papa harangued me for six weeks. I told him, “If ya ever touch my computer again I’ll break yar arm,” and hung up.

I’d pay for those words on my next visit. Not from Papa. Mama would slap me around a couple times, maybe give a dreadlock a hard pull. Being the youngest of four, at least I get a break from serious repercussions. Have no clue why I’m her favorite. Maybe I'm not her favorite. Doesn’t matter if I’m forty, or fifty like my brother, we toe the line or answer to Mama. She can be meaner than a prison guard. Not that I've ever met a prison guard.

I dialed the office quick, left a message the crew was on their own for the day. They’d be ecstatic. The morning’s slippin’ by. I hadn’t taken a day off in five months anyway. They need to learn to survive without me.

“Ya know anything about that.” Gozer sloshed his cup toward the mountain of steel when I handed him his phone.

“Not my biggest concern this morning,” I said.

He shook his head, dreads swingin’, brow arched, not a happy troll. “They musta taken down the for sale sign, or buried it in all that.” Gozer sloshed what had to be an empty cup now toward the expensive debris pile.

“Not a portent of good neighbors,” Gozer continued.

I gave him a shrug as I turned up the block, and thanked him for the phone. I considered breakin’ into a jog, but the wrenched ankle seemed to be swellin’ up some while we talked.

As I neared Dave’s, his garage door opened, car backed out, and vroom, he pushed his little sports car as though a fire flicked at his skinny white butt. I ran after him, wavin’ my arms.

Jerk. Must have taken the shortest loop.

~ Nuel ~

Silva hadn’t stopped talking. How did I survive college with a human roomy? The wolves barely gave me a reprieve from her blah, blah, as we backed up to take the shorter trail home.

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