“Rob?”
“Damn it, Ted!” The American jumped at the sound. “What is it this time?” he asked irritably.
He bent down to pick up the book he had dropped in his fright when his neighbor, as was his bad habit, leaned on the stone fence between them.
“Pauline parked again in a way that takes up half the sidewalk. If she can’t drive properly, she shouldn’t even try. I’m begging you.”
“For heaven’s sake, Ted. She only stopped on the sidewalk long enough to drop off the girls! Then she pulled into the garage.”
“I have no way of knowing how long she parked illegally,” the quarrelsome neighbor replied in a stern voice. “All I know is that when I wanted to approach my own front gate, I ran into difficulties. As for your two unruly, shrieking children, who create more noise pollution than anything I’ve ever encountered, I won’t even mention them.”
Rob hated how Ted regularly “showed up” on their terrace, disregarding their privacy. Especially because the dividing walls were built one hundred seventy centimeters high. The only way to “peek” into the neighbor’s yard was to stand on something. Even though the yards were visible from each terrace, the residents respected the walls. Well, most of them. Ted had no sense of boundaries.
“Surprise!” Pauline lifted a large, gray plastic crate.
“What’s that?” the girls asked curiously.
“A gift for Daddy!”
“Flowers?” Vanda wrinkled her nose.
“Exactly!”
“But Daddy’s a man,” Emily said sternly, crossing her arms. “We don’t give flowers to men! We give them drawings or kisses.”
“You’ll see how happy he’ll be.”
She was right. With a satisfied smirk, Rob placed the potted artificial flowers one by one on top of the wall. He made sure to arrange the terracotta pots so that they only occupied half of the thirty-centimeter-wide surface—the half on his side, of course. He was delighted by his wife’s ingenuity because, until now, he had only imagined sticking rusty nails up there.
“Rob?”
He could almost feel Ted’s breath on his neck. This time, he wasn’t startled, as he had just sat down at the small table with a bunch of grapes in his hand. Confused, he lifted his gaze toward the voice.
Ted stood over the wall, holding two pots in his hands, his eyebrows raised.
“Are you trying to hide from me, Rob?”
“Ted,” the American’s voice was laced with irritation. “What’s gotten into you?”
“Oh, come on! You’re the one in a bad mood?” Ted protested. “Then what should I say? I can’t even rest because those two little beasts are shrieking right next to my wall.”
“It’s eleven in the morning, for crying out loud! They’re just playing. But fine, I’ll tell them to move to another room and be quieter.”
“Thank you,” Ted replied stiffly. “Though, they’re not playing,” he added with a grimace. “They’re arguing over who can burp louder. According to Vanda, Emily burps just as disgustingly as her mother.”
Rob turned red.
“I see. Well then, if you can hear everything so perfectly, would you mind just calling over next time? They’re both terrified of you. You know, they use you to scare each other.”
“Rob! Have you lost your mind?”
This time, the angry outburst was music to the American’s ears. He stepped onto the terrace with a proud grin, mockingly smirking at his neighbor.
“What were you thinking? This is dangerous!” Ted fumed.
“Oh, really?”
“Take it down. Right now!”
“No.”
“Then you’ll regret it!”
“It’s on my fifteen centimeters, and I can put whatever I want there!”
“No, you can’t!”
“Oh, yes, I can!”
When they ran out of arguments, both stormed into their houses. Pauline shook her head disapprovingly.
“You shouldn’t have hidden it.”
“Oh, but I should have! I’ll decorate my side with whatever I please.”
“I wouldn’t call those dense artificial ivy garlands hiding pigeon spikes ‘decorations’…”
“I would. And it’s not my fault that bastard keeps leaning on the wall.”