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"I'm just lucky I have a nice young man living nearby that I can borrow," she smiled, looking over at Jesse.
Jesse had listened to the conversation and wondered if there wasn't a solution for this store's problem. Full service was always more effective than hiring random outfits to do simple tasks. In the meantime, he had his hands full of screws and table legs and almost had the table top ready to put on the dolly.
"Excuse me, Mr. McCurdy. Would you have some cardboard I could use to protect the table?"
"Yes, of course. Come with me. I know I have some in the back of the store."
A few minutes later, Jesse had the table top shrouded in cardboard and taped to hold it in place. He was able to lift the top onto his dolly and they gingerly moved it out of the store to the parking lot and into the SUV. Jesse lowered the back seats to give the necessary room for the top, placed the legs and a package of screws in the hatch under the floor in the back, and they were on their way back to the apartment building. He made a quick pit-stop at the local hardware store to purchase a larger Robertson head screwdriver before returning to the apartment building.
Within a few minutes, they had arrived at the underground parking spot, unloaded the dolly, then the table top, and were on their way to the elevator. Fortunately, it fitted in the cabin with enough room for the two of them as well. The worst of the effort was done. Jesse installed the legs and set the table up in Mrs. Coultard's kitchen/dining area and made sure it was steady.
"There, all done," he grinned.
"Thank you so much, Jesse. You are such a big help to me. Here," she said, handing Jesse a fifty dollar bill.
"Oh, no, Mrs. Coultard, I couldn't take that from you. We're neighbours and where I come from, you don't charge neighbours for doing a favour. Maybe the next time you make a cake or some of those really great chocolate chip cookies, I could be bribed," he grinned.
Ellen Coultard was shaking her head. "Jesse, you have the same values that my husband had. When you helped out a neighbour, you didn't expect anything in return expect a thank you. I wish those days were still with us. Thank you again. I'm so lucky to have a nice young fellow like you as a neighbour."
"I'm pretty lucky to have a nice lady like you for a neighbour," he grinned. "Good neighbours are hard to come by sometimes."
She nodded, "So true."
To Be Continued
- COMMENTS
Anonymousover 3 years agoI've been working on cars since I was 12, when my uncle decided I should learn how to fix cars. That was 55 year ago. You are right on both accounts. I think coaster got his 1961 era cars mixed up with 2011 era cars... LOL
It's not nitpicking, at all, IMO. This is easily a publishable work. What sex there is, is tame enough for mainstream publishing. A publishing advance, (for research), and a real editor would work out issues such as the ones you pointed out; that's their job. In the Lit world, it's our job to point them out.
Speaking of 'our jobs', I find the dialogue is a bit formal. Real people are lazy talkers, 'do not' becomes don't.
One of the best tips I was ever given about writing was to read my work a loud at least once, during the re-write/editing process. Read as if you are reading to an audience, project your voice, modulate your volume/tone where appropriate; 'perform' the reading, if you will.
This will do, at least, two things for your work. 1. Any time you stumble, stutter or hesitate while reading, the passage needs work. 2. It will dramatically improve your character dialogue, making it much more natural sounding. As you read your characters' dialogue, you will immediately find where it is too formal.
Reading aloud takes more brain power than reading silently. Making your brain work harder while reading keeps your brain from playing tricks on you. You will see and read what you actually wrote, instead of what you wanted to write. You'll find those extra or missing words, the wrong verb tense, and see the homonym errors.
Hope that helps,
GeoD
Anonymousover 4 years agoCars nowadays (since 1990?) have electric fuel pumps. When run out of gas, to re-pump fuel to engine, turn key to ON. Fuel pump runs for a few seconds, indicated by faint hum. Turn key to OFF, then back to ON, a couple more times. Then start engine. Running starter to re-pump fuel, as indicated in story, will work. It's just unnecessary wear on starter, since cranking the engine is not what pumps the fuel as it did with the now-obsolete mechanical fuel pumps. Some of the information I found by Googling was erroneous -- you might do better with the owner's manual.
Similarly, the glass barrel-shaped fuses (with a metal contact cap on each end) indicated in the story, are even more obsolete. Present fuses are somewhat flat and use plastic for the insulative part, with two protruding flat blades for the external electrical contacts. Google "automotive fuse, picture."
For picture of obsolete fuse, Google "glass barrel automotive fuse."
Since I made a very small amount of my living fixing vehicles (plus my own), this is of interest to me, but maybe not to most readers. Plus, it does not really make a difference to the story.
So, 5 stars.
Paul in Oklahoma
arrowglassover 6 years agoSo glad you share your talent writing tales like this!
