Photo credit: Old Shoe Woman / Foter / CC BY-NC-SA
George Byfield jumped out of his car and went screaming onto his lawn without bothering to close his car door.
“What in tarnation do you think you’re doing? Get your dumb Mexican asses off my lawn!”
The men stood staring at him.
“What? You don’t understand English? This is America, goddammit, and you’re trespassing!” George grabbed one of the big bins used to dump refuse in and started hauling it towards the street.
The men looked at each other. “Es loco?” said one of them.
Another shrugged.
A third went to the truck, dug out some papers and brought them to George, whose face had gone red. The man tapped George on the shoulder.
George whirled around to face him, shoulders hunched and hands curled into fists.
The man pointed at the paper and George managed to calm himself enough to focus on the print. It read “514 Blueberry Lane”.
George tore the paper out of the man’s hand to get a better look. By examining it a little closer, he found a name.
He marched to the next house over and banged on the door. “Joe Mattern, you get your lousy good-for-nothing ass out here right now or so help me I will knock this door right off its-“ His fist went through the doorway and almost punched Joe in the face.
“George, what the hell is going on?”
“That’s what I’d like to know! I come home to find these hooligans,” he gestured wildly at the men behind him, “all over my lawn. They have a piece of paper with my address and your name. Now, just what the hell is that all about?”
Joe took the paper from George and examined it. “Looks like they got the address wrong. I’ll call them.” He leaned out the doorway and said “Espere, por favor,” then ducked back inside.
“You’re damn right you’ll call them. And you’ll tell them, if any one of them set one foot on my lawn again, I’ll skin ‘em alive, you hear?”
“Calm down, George. It was a simple misunderstanding.”
“Misunderstanding? Look at my lawn!”
“Don’t worry, I’m sure they won’t charge you for it. It was their mistake after all.”
“Charge me for it? You bet your ass they’re not gonna charge me for it. I’d like to see them try.”
George contemplated what horrors he would concoct for the lawn service if it tried to charge him while Joe called the lawn service company. George wasn’t paying attention to what Joe was saying, but after a moment, he heard his name.
“George, do you want them to finish the job they started on your lawn? If they stop now it will look incomplete.”
George turned red again. “Of course I don’t want them to finish their abomination! It’s my lawn!” He thumped his chest. “I mow the grass. I trim my own goddam bushes. I’m not some pansy who can’t be bothered to take care of his own goddamn property!”
“All right. All right.” Joe put up a hand, palm facing out, then turned his attention back to the person on the other end of the line. He soon hung up and told George, “They said they’d call the men out there right away. It should only be a matter of minutes and then they’ll get off your lawn and start work on my lawn, as promised.”
“Good!” George shook a finger at Joe. “See that it doesn’t happen again.”
“Absolutely.”
Finally mollified, George went back outside and glared at the men until they had moved all their equipment off his lawn.
The end.