Saturday Afternoon

I return from the French double doors leading outside and head back over to the trash bins, placing the compost bin back in its slot and relining it with a paper bag. Once that's done, I take the black garbage bag from the bin in its slot, and walk around the house collecting from the various cans up and downstairs before heading back outside to tie it off and stick it in my city approved garbage can.

Returning from that I stand in my living room thinking of what needs to get done next. Laundry was in progress, and I look to the various detritus along the hardwood floor of my living room and head over to get a broom.

Suddenly, I see someone standing too far up on to my back steps for comfort. They are looking straight at my deck. I don't recognize the person from the row of townhomes I live in. Why are they looking at my deck? Was this a really shitty attempt at a break-in? On Saturday Afternoon?

I stand there for a moment, stunned, looking at the person who looks up and sees me seeing him through the glass of my doors. His huge puff of hair shakes as he gives the universal body language of "Oh Shit!" and he skitters away. I'm too slow to get his attention to ask him what the hell he was doing, and why he felt the need to look at my deck.

Instead, I see him disappear around the corner at the end of the block. My mind flashes to the night where I was on my back deck when I caught a guy trying to break into my neighbor's car. I flash to the sound my voice made when I said "HEY" as loud as I could and took off after the guy as he disappeared around the corner. I flash to the fact that even though I'm pretty quick, he was quicker, and I never got a good look at him.

Petty crime is something my neighbors and I are always on the lookout for. While I don't necessarily live in a crime-infested hellscape, bored kids are bored kids, and an open car can be seen as an invitation to enter.

All of this processes through my mind as I look over and see Kathleen's Toyota Corolla, with its back passenger door wide open, and a weird kid up in my proverbial zone. I was a bit ruffled.

I unruffle promptly as I see Kathleen's head poke up from her car.

"Hey, who was that?"

"I don't know. He just came around the corner and was looking really creepily at my deck, and then he went over to your deck, and then he went around the corner."

"Weird, right? Like who does that, then I saw your car door open. A few years ago the old owners of your place almost got broken into."

Her posture and demeanor shift to one of concern. I am also concerned. While this guy wasn't exactly BTK, I appreciate that Kathleen lives alone, a first time homeowner, and fairly security conscious. A while back she asked me to keep an eye out in case I saw her ex-boyfriend, Kafi, said like "Coffee", creeping around.

"Like almost. Like it was late at night and I just yelled at the guy and he ran off. Most crime here is just bored kids anyway, you know? What are you doing, anyway?"

"Oh! Actually, maybe if you're okay with it, I'm putting a car seat in and I have no idea what I'm doing. Do you know how this works?"

I am a dad with years of car seat installation experience, specifically in Toyotas.

"Yeah sure! I'll be right over."

I throw on my steel shanked rubber boots crunch through the packed down snow over to Kathleen's car door. She is wearing light brown Kamik boots, which are more appropriate for the weather.

Inside the car, she has a car seat mount for an infant that she's clearly been wrestling with and trying to mount into the back of her car. Kathleen doesn't have a baby. Nor have I seen any guys around, not that it's my business.

With a heavy subtext of 'this is an interesting development', I say "What's up with the car seat?"

My excitement levels off as she explains that a friend of hers will be visiting with a 9-month old. We talk about the brand and what she's tried to get it into place or how it even fits. A moment later I'm knee-deep in the passenger seat figuring it out when our boy walks back round the corner. Well, not boy. Young man, we'll say. Older teen young adult.

From behind me I hear Kathleen say "Hey." and I poke my head up from the car to see our older-teen-young adult walking pretty close to Kathleen's front bumper.

He sees both of us and says "Hey" to no one in particular. It's by no means a private walkway, and people do often use it, but OTYA was slow rolling his walk past us, past my house, and he began approaching my opposite neighbor's place.

With a heavy subtext of 'Who the fuck are you and why the fuck are you here' I ask "Do you live around here?"

I expect him to give the same answer everyone gives at this point: they point vaguely and get the fuck out of here. Instead he throws a curveball and says in the most suspicious way possible, "I'm... staying here." He waves vaguely at our block.

Subtext becoming more clear, I say "Not at JP and Steph's you aren't. You been around here long?"

"I'll be here ... a while." He does a nondescript hand gesture before shoving his hands in his pockets. I finally take a good look at him before he walks away to the far end of the block.

Kathleen and I talk about how weird that interaction was, and I ask her to try to get a photo of the guy. I also get a good look.

He's definitely more of the OT than YA, as he did not bother to remove his giant-ass headphones while talking to us. He's got a blue puffy coat on, dark pants, and light blue skate shoes that are more appropriate for May than January.

I get back to the task at hand, and as I'm pushing the release to lengthen the left-side mount strap thinking to myself 'man that's great, I wish my car seats had that' and yank out enough slack to get a good enough length to spelunk into her seat cushions.

Seeing me struggle, she goes to the other side to see if it would be easier on the driver's side than passenger. It's about the same on both sides on my in-laws Camry, Rav-4 (both old and new), my parent's Venza, and one of my Aunt's Prius.

I say "It's really about the same. You see these plastic dots on your back seat?"

"Yeah, I never really noticed them."

"That's showing you where he hooks are. On your side feel between the cushions."

"Yeah"

"That's what I'm trying to clip this motherfucking thing on to." She laughs as I erupt in victory as I get the left strap buckled. Seconds later the right strap mounts into place with a satisfying click.

Kathleen give an excited little, hop, I guess, and thanks me.

"It's no problem, I've got the experience." We take a look down the block and see OT talking to someone from their deck. We agree that's probably fine. "Do you need a stroller or anything? I might have a spare."

"Actually, I got a stroller but I can't really figure out how to open it up?"

"Let me take a look."

We step on to her back deck, and she steps inside, to grab the stroller. We fight with it a bit and she manages to find the release on her end, and like a demented Autobot the stroller opens face down, wheels up. We upright it. I take a good look and mention she has 'good wheels' on it.

We shoot the shit and I ask about her friend, and about the kid, and that kind of thing, and Kathleen is engaged with me until I see her look over my shoulder. I turn to see what she's looking at but I already know.

OT approaches her deck with her and I on it. This time he understand the concept of boundaries.

"Okay," he starts "I would like to ... de-escalate the situation. I have one guy calling the cops on me down there if I don't go and it's a whole thing now and I just want to de-escalate." He says de-escalate very slowly as though this is only his fourth or fifth time saying the phrase.

Kathleen hangs back. She doesn't want to deal with this person.

"Okay," I say, with the obvious subtext of 'this had better be fucking good'.

"I am looking for something."

"Something. What something."

"I can't really tell you," he says, pulling the end sound of the 'you' higher and obviously straining.

"Okay. So you're looking for something."

"And you're staying around here?"

"Yes."

"And you're supposed to be here?"

"Kinda."

The answer makes me roll my eyes. "You're looking for something. What are you looking for– is it... drugs?"

His posture changes to be a bit more defensive, "Sir, the fact that--"

I cut him off "Is it a weapon?"

"What! Sir I am just here trying to de-escalate--"

"Is it a girl in a barrel or something?" I'm just having him on at this point.

"- -and you think that I would be looking for drugs–"

"Hey if it's drugs, whatever man."

"--or a weapon or... did you say girl in a barrel?"

Instead of answering I lower my voice and ask in a non-whisper, "Is it a sex toy?"

His face flushed, flustered at my line of questioning, and left sammering. We have de-escalated and I have established that whatever it is, it's not a big deal, and I'm gonna make him feel fairly uncomfortable as retribution for his earlier trespasses.

"Okay, okay, I'll tell you," he finally relents.

"Okay," I say, adding a pause, then lowering my voice again in a non-whisper, "Is it a sex toy though?"

"No!" he exclaims, clearly not sure what to make of my questions. "Do you promise not to tell anyone?"

"Yeah sure," I say. Kathleen is silent behind me.

He approaches slowly the deck with his fist up, and pushes it through the slats.

His pinkie finger extends, and I know what I'm looking at. I am a dad, and I know a pinkie promise when I see one.

I hook my finger around his.

He looks to Kathleen with the pinkie out. There is no way in hell she'll hook fingers with this guy.

I offer a quick way out of the ritual, "Kathleen, do you cross your heart and hope to die or whatever?"

She agrees. He sighs deeply and turns back to me.

"It's an animal."

"An animal. What kind of animal?"

"A cat."

"Okay, we haven't seen a cat. What does the cat look like?"

"I can't tell you because then you might know the cat."

"I don't know any cats. Kathleen do you know any cats?"

"No, I don't think so." I wasn't sure if the look on her face was amused or bemused. Maybe I shouldn't have said 'girl in a barrel' as one of the options.

"Okay, so you're staying around here. Where?"

"I can't say because then you might know the cat."

"Why is important I not know what cat it is?"

"Well, because it's not supposed to be out." Good lord. It's like pulling teeth.

"Okay, well we don't know any of the cats around here. If you tell us the color of the cat we can keep an eye out and I'll send you a text."

He hands over his phone and instead of texting myself, I call myself from his phone so that my call display will clandestinely pick up his details.

"Okay, we'll keep an eye out," I glance over my shoulder at Kathleen who's doing something on her phone.

"Okay, so your cat's missing. You're staying ... somewhere along this row... looking for a grey cat. How long are you around?"

"A ... while."

"Okay."

"I'm gonna go back in because I'm freezing. But I'll be out like every half hour looking for cat prints."

"Yeah you don't have like boots or something?"

"No."

"Yeesh, kids these days," I say, sounding like my father.

Once he's out of the area and back up the block, I pull out my phone and show Kathleen the contact information for our mystery man: Kevin Beaumont, with an 819 number. Quebec.

Kathleen tells me she's been on WhatsApp on the block chat talking to the neighbor on the end who was going to call the police, which we need like a hole in the head, and Jesse, the neighbor next to JP and Steph's, has replied from Japan.

Kathleen tells me that Kevin is actually Jesse's friend who was a "little brother" to her. He was housesitting while Jesse was in Japan, and her partner, Lisa, was out on assignment in Tel Aviv for a few months, so during their temporary hiatus, she decided to go to Japan, and have someone watch the cat.

It all made perfect sense to us, so I bid Kathleen adieu, let myself off of her deck, and over to mine. I wave and head inside to finish my long forgotten sweeping.