Renting the Football Bad Boy

1. Isla

ISLA

The first thing I notice from twenty yards away is the piece of paper stuck to the front door.

Terrific. Exactly what I wanted to find once I pulled up in front of the house I share with my grandmother after an endless day of classes. All I wanted to do was put on my comfy clothes, start up a playlist, and get my homework done. But no. The homeowners association had other ideas.

The notice is taped to the door at eye level. Somehow, that feels personal. Like they measured my exact height before taping it to the front door, just to make sure I couldn’t possibly miss it on my way inside.

Not that I could miss it even if it were hung way over my head. Not with the words NOTICE OF VIOLATION printed in capital letters at the top of the page. At the bottom is printed Cardinal Oaks Association: A Friendly Community.

Do they not see the irony here?

I peel the notice off the door without bothering to stop and read it, because I already know what it says. The same thing it always says. Livestock is prohibited per Section 4.3 of the community bylaws.

Livestock. I own chickens. It’s not like there are cows grazing in the backyard. I don’t have pigs wallowing in mud.

This is the fourth notice I’ve received.

Grandma swears up and down that the homeowners association’s bark is worse than its bite, but I have to wonder.

Eventually, they’re going to get tired of leaving notices that go ignored.

They’re going to take action. And then what?

It’s not like we can pretend we weren’t warned.

Once I’m inside the house, I call out, “Grandma?” Not that I need to call out.

All I have to do is follow the sound of the music coming from down the hall.

The little ranch house is the perfect size for the two of us, but on days like this, when my grandmother is obviously feeling good and in a party mood, the walls feel a little closer than normal.

I’m not sure what I’ll find as I walk slowly down the hall with the letter still clenched in my hand.

I can smell her hairspray and perfume through her closed door—I swear, the woman is determined to create her own personal hole in the ozone layer.

I read somewhere that used to be something people worried about.

Obviously, she didn’t get the memo. Either that, or she chose to ignore it, the way she always ignores things that don’t interest her. The list is pretty long.

Her bedroom door is open a crack. I tap my knuckles against it before easing it open. One never knows what they’ll find. Thankfully, she’s fully dressed, giving her hair another heavy spray. At this point, it’s basically a bleach-blonde helmet.

“Oh! Where did you come from?” she calls out over the Madonna song blaring from her stereo.

I have to turn the volume down, since I don’t feel like screaming.

“You didn’t hear me come in, I guess.” I sit on the corner of her bed and take in tonight’s outfit.

She’s standing in front of her full-length mirror wearing a leather skirt shorter than anything I’ve ever personally owned.

She decided to pair it with a leopard-print top in a shade of neon green that almost offends my eyes.

Like, leopards don’t come in neon green.

Realism isn’t her thing. Otherwise, she wouldn’t dress this way at the age of sixty-three.

“How do I look?” she asks, doing a spin before returning to the makeup she’s applying. “I went through five different outfits before deciding on this one.”

Yes, and the remnants of her decision-making are strewn across the bed. There are times I wish I felt as free as she does. Of all the things I could’ve inherited from her, an ounce of her “I don’t give a damn” energy would’ve been nice.

Instead, I cringe inside at the sight of acid-wash jeans with rhinestones along the back pocket.

A crop top I’m glad she decided not to wear, since I doubt it would cover much more than her boobs.

A dress that I seriously hope has a lot of stretch to the material, as from where I’m sitting, it looks like something a toddler could wear.

For somebody who makes it a point not to attract attention, this is basically my own personal nightmare.

“Where are you going tonight?”

“Out for dinner. Then maybe dancing at that retro club downtown.” She sets down her mascara on top of the cluttered dresser before digging through a drawer and pulling out a pair of neon-green leg warmers that match her top almost perfectly.

She tugs them on over her bare calves, explaining, “I knitted these myself, you know? Took me two weeks. My hands don’t move as fast as they used to, but they still move. ”

“Who are you going out with?” Do I sound casual? I’m trying to sound casual.

“Somebody from the app. You haven’t met him.”

The app. I had a feeling. “So, what’s his name?” Do I sound neutral? I’m trying to sound neutral.

“David. He’s twenty-nine.”

Jesus wept. Somehow, I manage not to roll my eyes, though it takes serious effort. “Grandma.”

She finishes with the leg warmers before giving me a wounded look. “What? He’s well above the legal age, and he’s not even the youngest man I’ve ever dated.”

Why doesn’t that make me feel any better? “What does he do?”

“How should I know?” she asks with a laugh before waving a hand covered in rings. “That’s the kind of thing you find out once you get together. All I know is he has a motorcycle. You know how I feel about motorcycles.”

I do, and I wonder how she’s going to manage to ride on one in a skirt that barely covers her butt when she’s standing up straight. But that’s not my problem. I have other things on my mind.

“We got another letter,” I say, holding it up for her to see. “The usual. We have ten business days this time. That’s the shortest deadline they’ve given us yet.”

She heaves a sigh. “They’ve been giving us thirty days for two years, sweetheart.

It’s all bark. Christine on the board hasn’t had a single original thought in at least a decade.

The rest of them go along because nobody wants to be the one who actually has to file paperwork, but they also don’t want to deal with her when she doesn’t get her way.

Trust me. Nothing is going to happen to your babies. ”

I really wish I could believe that. “What if they fine us? Or take it to a judge? I looked it up, you know? There’s actual precedent for homeowners associations winning these cases in this state—”

“Isla.” She turns away from the mirror to look at me directly.

Her face softens the way it does right before she says something that’s supposed to make me feel better, but does the exact opposite.

“I’ve lived through a husband, a hip replacement, and the eighties.

I think I can survive Christine from the HOA. ”

Then, because she has the memory of a goldfish, she gives me another twirl with her arms held out to the sides. “Well? Too much?”

I learned a long time ago that there is no correct answer to this question. “You look very... warm. Leg-wise.”

“That’s the spirit.” She blows me a little kiss before grabbing her purse off the dresser.

“Honestly, if they actually try anything serious, I’ll just hire somebody to scare them into backing off.

A big guy with a scary face, who doesn’t even have to say a word.

Somebody with lots of tattoos. Christine would have a stroke just looking at him pulling into the driveway. ”

She laughs at her own idea while dropping lipstick and keys into the purse. “There. Problem solved.”

To her, it’s a throwaway joke on her way out the door to meet with a man much closer to my age than hers.

So why am I still sitting here with rhinestones digging into my butt, imagining what she just described? Hire somebody big and scary, who doesn’t have to say a word.

I mean, in theory, it’s not a terrible plan.

People hire security all the time. That’s why bodyguards exist. This would just be a very specific, targeted application of the bodyguard concept, right?

Instead of aiming it at people who threaten celebrities, we’d aim it at homeowners association members who have a personal problem with the existence of chickens in a fenced-off yard.

I know better than to say any of this out loud, not that Grandma would hear me anyway. She’s already halfway out the door in her leg warmers, blowing me one more kiss and telling me not to wait up. There really isn’t room for me to go, hang on, what if we actually hired somebody?

It’s another minute before the roar of a motorcycle rings out.

I need to get a look at this guy. I hurry into the living room and peer out the window in time to watch Grandma practically skip down the pathway and across the sidewalk.

The guy is wearing a helmet—okay, so he believes in safety, that’s a good start—and he has inked-up arms thick enough to make my eyes bulge.

If he sees anything wrong with Grandma or her outfit, he doesn’t show it.

Then again, I’ve seen her profile. She kind of forced me to go through it and judge all of the photos she used. She’s not exactly trying to hide anything about herself, including her age and her addiction to hairspray, and the kind of clothes she wore when she was my age.

And then they’re gone, and the street goes quiet again. Without Madonna screaming her head off, I hear the soft, contented clucking coming from the backyard. My girls are no doubt ready to settle in for the evening, completely unaware that they are once again the subject of a housing dispute.

I go out to check on them, and as usual, the sight of them makes me smile. I don’t understand how anybody can have a problem with them. They’re not hurting anybody. They don’t make a mess, and they don’t make a lot of noise.

Okay, maybe Brad Pitt does, but come on. A white noise app easily blocks out his morning crowing.