Mrs. Billingsley and the New Neighbors
by Sally Stevens
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Table of Contents parts 1, 2, 3 |
part 1
It was a lovely morning, and Mrs. Billingsley took her mug of coffee and the newspaper and went out to sit on the wicker swing, thinking she would enjoy for a few moments the burgeoning flora and fauna of the front yard. It had truly blossomed into the showplace of the neighborhood. It was amazing what a proper irrigation system and ten or twelve thousand dollars’ worth of landscaping could do.
Before long, a large U-Haul moving van rumbled down the street and turned into the driveway of the house next door. The house had been on the market for quite some time with no results and, finally, the owners had bent and advertised it for lease. Mrs. Billingsley was curious about who her new neighbors were to be. Apparently, this was their moving day.
The U-Haul van pulled forward toward the front of the house and stopped near the front door. The driver got out, stretched his road-weary form and then went around to the back of the van and unlocked the rear doors. A young woman climbed out from the passenger side.
Mrs. Billingsley tried not to be obvious about staring at them, but she did manage to observe discreetly through the vines at the end of the veranda that the young woman had long, stringy hair and a pale, undernourished look about her. She wore a wilted cotton frock that fell to about six inches above her ankles. Birkenstock sandals completed the somewhat time-warped quality of the picture.
The driver of the truck was a slightly overweight but muscular-looking man, dressed in black denim, with hair that looked like it had been dyed a sort of mahogany brown. On his wrists, he wore black leather cuffs decorated with silver studs. When he walked toward the front door, Mrs. Billingsley could see a patch of pale scalp peeking through the back of his head.
“My,” she thought, “not exactly the sort of neighbors one would choose if one were selecting from the New Neighbors catalog.” But, not being one to fall victim to snap judgments, she determined that as soon as the move-in process got underway, she would take a tray of lemonade over and introduce herself.
The couple fumbled for a moment at the front door, trying various keys, then succeeded finally in opening the door and disappeared inside. After a short while, a car pulled up in front of the house and parked on the street. Two burly fellows got out, went up to the front door and knocked. The man who had driven the moving van opened the door and they all sort of slapped each other on the back, in a macho version of masculine hugs. With some pride, he escorted them in through the front door. A short time later, the three men came back outside and began to unload the items in the van.
Mrs. Billingsley noticed that the things they were carrying up into the house were a rather eclectic assortment of items that didn’t seem to really belong together. But then, neither did their owners. After the furniture and boxes had been transported inside, the movers guided a heavy motorcycle down the ramp from the back of the van and pushed it gently to the garage at the rear of the house. They treated the motorcycle with infinitely more care and affection than they had handled any of the household items.
Mrs. Billingsley decided it was time to roll into action. She left the veranda and went inside to make some lemonade. She freshened her makeup, spritzed herself with a bit of her new Jungle Gardenia cologne and carried the tray with the frosty pitcher of lemonade and four glasses out to the veranda, down the steps and across the driveway. She balanced the tray on one hip and knocked at the door of her new neighbors’ house. In a moment the door opened, and the mousy young woman stood smiling at her through the screen door.
“Hello there... I’m your neighbor, next door. My name’s Naomi Billingsley... My husband and I live over there in the house with all the vines. I thought you and your movers might enjoy a bit of cold lemonade. You’ve been working so hard... I’ll just leave the tray here on the porch. Welcome to the neighborhood, and don’t hesitate to knock if there’s anything you need while you’re getting settled.” Mrs. Billingsley spoke as warmly as she could manage. Then she continued, “Don’t be afraid of the birds; they’re harmless, though they do have rather mean squawks.”
“Well, thank you so much, Mrs. Billingsley. That’s awful nice. I’ll get my husband... won’t you come in?”
“Oh, no, dear, I know how hectic things are in the middle of a move. When you get a bit more settled, I’ll come over for a cup of...”
She stopped in mid-sentence. The tall, mahogany-haired man with the black wrist cuffs appeared suddenly behind the young woman, glowering at her. The young woman acquiesced to give him center position inside the screen door and said a little tentatively, “This is my husband Ivan, Mrs. Billingsley. Ivan honey, this is our new neighbor, Naomi Billingsley. She just brought over this nice pitcher of lemonade. Wasn’t that sweet?” The young woman’s southern drawl, which Mrs. Billingsley hadn’t noticed at first, was becoming decidedly more pronounced.
Without changing his glower, the man’s eyes accosted Mrs. Billingsley’s body through the screen door. She could feel it, even though she was unaccustomed to receiving this kind of attention. She tried not to notice, but the blatancy with which he explored her breasts and then the rest of her, was difficult to ignore. It was almost as though he was intentionally trying to make her uncomfortable.
“Nice to meet ya. Why don’t ya come on in, Naomi? Real neighborly of you. Don’t s’pose we could borrow a cup of vodka could we? I never drink this stuff straight.” He continued to leer as he opened the door and smiled a little, amused at his own joke, then raised the pitcher of lemonade as if in a toast.
“Oh, no, thank you. I really can’t stay. But welcome to the neighborhood.” She thrust the tray into his hands and turned to leave, wishing she had told the young woman that the birds were rabid and there were crocodiles hiding under the vines.
“Thank you, Naomi. We’ll bring the tray back over this evening,” the young woman called after her.
“No need, no need. We’ve got plenty of trays,” Mrs. Billingsley replied hastily. And she hurried down the porch steps and back across the driveway to the safety of the tropics. “Mercy,” she thought, “Mr. Billingsley won’t find much to kibitz about over the back fence with Ivan. Pity. The Sugarmans had been such pleasant neighbors.”
* * *
Several days passed, and Mrs. Billingsley had tried to put the initial meeting with her new neighbors out of her mind. They’d gotten off rather on the wrong foot, and there’d been little contact since, save an occasional wave across the driveway as she drove her car out into the street. She rarely saw the wife, but “Ivan the Terrible,” as she and Mr. Billingsley had taken to calling him, spent a lot of time tinkering with his motorcycle in the driveway between their houses.
One day, as she was placing apple slices on the veranda railing for the birds and squirrels, she saw Ivan leave on his motorcycle, his helmet and black jacket indicating it might be for more than a quick jaunt to the Seven-Eleven store.
She decided to take his absence as an opportunity to walk over for the once-promised cup of coffee and get a better look at the young woman. This had seemed such a strange coupling, and her instincts told her that Ivan’s young wife might welcome a little civilized companionship from the outside world.
She took off her apron and went inside to get her latest copy of Good Housekeeping, thinking she would offer it as a gesture of good will. There was a nice article about hot weather recipes that looked fairly easy and seemed appropriate to share. A moment later, she was knocking on the door.
Soon it opened a smidgen, and the young woman peered through the screen. “Oh, Mrs. Billingsley, how are y’all? I swear I been thinking ‘bout running your pitcher back to you. I don’t know where the time goes! Me ’n Ivan was just sayin’ the other night how we wanted to have you an’ Mr. Billingsley over for drinks and maybe a little game of cards. I’m not quite settled, you know, but I just knew you’d understand. About the mess, I mean. Won’t you come in?”
“If you’re sure I’m not disturbing you, dear. You know, when we met on moving day, I never did get your name... Please forgive me, I don’t know what to call you.”
“My name’s Leila Mae Trowbridge, Naomi. I’m pleased to meet y’all again!” She opened the screen door for Mrs. Billingsley and ushered her inside.
The living room was rather dark, because the shades were half-drawn. Mrs. Billingsley’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the dimness. The room was still cluttered with unopened boxes. An overstuffed sofa stood against one wall and, on the opposite wall, were several units of sound equipment, stacks of CDs and videos and a very large-screen television set with complicated-looking gadgets and wires weaving all around the floor.
Near the couch was a Naugahyde recliner chair with motorized vibrator controls on the arm and, next to it, a dusty coffee table strewn with bottle caps, a large ashtray with cigarette butts spilling over the edges and a directory of cable TV channels.
“I brought you this magazine, Leila Mae. It has some real nice recipes I thought you might want to try.”
“Why, that’s just so neighborly! Thank you, Naomi. Would you like a cup of coffee? I got a pot goin’ in the kitchen. We can sit at the table out there and get acquainted.”
“That would be very nice, Leila Mae. Thank you.”
The two women walked to the rear of the house, through a dining area with card table and folding chairs featured in the center of the space, above which hung a crystal chandelier left over from the Sugarman era. Along the wall were four large metal file cabinets, and the card table was strewn with papers and another burgeoning ashtray.
Mrs. Billingsley thought perhaps the Trowbridges ran some sort of business out of their house. She could ask about that, and it would give them something to talk about over coffee.
Leila Mae filled a flowered mug and handed it to Mrs. Billingsley, then topped off her own white mug and sat down at the table.
“So, Naomi... do you mind if I call you Naomi? It’s so nice of you to come by. We don’t know many people yet, and I get sorta lonesome when Ivan gets busy with his projects. You know how men get so absorbed in their work. Leaves a lady to her own devices. Where we lived before, I had a good job workin’ at the hospital, but Ivan says he’d rather I didn’t work here. Says he likes to have me home when he gets through at the end of the day. He’s kind of old-fashioned, but he’s really very sweet.”
“Old-fashioned men can be very special, Leila Mae.”
“I was hopin’ you’d come by when he was home so you could get t’ know him better... He was kinda tired after all that movin’ when we met you the first day, and I’m afraid he wasn’t too friendly.”
“On the contrary, Leila Mae... he was extremely friendly.” Then she cleared her throat and continued, hoping she hadn’t been too obvious about her previous discomfort the day they’d met. “I just don’t like to intrude on folks when the man of the house is home. You know, a man’s home is his castle, they say.”
“Oh, you’re so right, Naomi. Ivan says that all the time. I wish he’d look for some office space to rent so we can move all that stuff out of the dining room and enjoy our little castle!”
“Does Mr. Trowbridge operate his own business?”
“Yes, he does, Naomi.” Lelia Mae’s brow twisted into a quizzical expression. “I don’t know exactly what it is he does, but he works real hard at it. He fills those little padded envelopes and stamps ’em and sends ’em off and, every day, he spends hours and hours at his table there. He was doin’ such interesting things back in Paris. The neighbors didn’t seem to like us much, but you know sometimes peoples’ buttons kinda get pushed. He keeps to himself and thinks a lot, and I know sometime Ivan is gonna come up with something truly salvational for mankind.”
“Oh, then you lived abroad?” asked Mrs. Billingsley, grasping at the glimmer of new hope that these people might be diamonds in the rough.
“Abroad?” replied Leila Mae, confusion showing on her sweet young face.
Copyright © 2025 by Sally Stevens
