Read Second Hand: A Tucker Springs Novel 2 for Free Online Page A

tall grass around the base of Stacey’s sculptures that I couldn’t get to with the mower, and bushes and abandoned flower beds all around the base of the house. I pulled plants that I hoped were weeds and left ones that I hoped weren’t. It immediately became apparent that the mower and my hands were insufficient tools.
    I went into the detached garage. It had been set up as Stacey’s studio, and a few pieces of scrap metal still lay on the floor. I could have put my car in the garage if I’d put a bit of effort into it, but so far, it hadn’t been necessary. I’d probably want to deal with it before winter came, though.
    We’d lived in an apartment building back in Fort Collins and so hadn’t ever needed landscaping tools, but that was the type of thing tenants sometimes left behind, so I checked the corners of the garage. I did find the snow shovel that had died from the previous year’s epic snow, a plastic rake that was missing more tines than not, and one very rusty hoe, but that was it.
    I got in my car, intending to hit the nearest hardware store, but El’s flashing “BUY - SELL - PAWN” sign caught my eye, and I looped around the block to find a parking space. I had no idea if people pawned gardening tools, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to try.
    El was right where he’d been the last two times I’d been in the shop, reading a magazine with his feet up on the counter. He smiled at me and stood up as I came in.
    “Tell me you’re not here to buy more jewelry for your girl.”
I tried to smile back, although it was harder than I would have liked. “No jewelry,” I said. “I’m actually looking for yard things.”
“‘Things’? We talking ‘things’ like gnomes and plastic Bambis?”
“I was thinking a little less tacky and a bit more utilitarian.”
He laughed. “Fair enough. What’d you have in mind?”
“I need one of those spinny weed-chopping things.”
He rubbed the short hair at the nape of his neck. “It so happens I have not one, but two of those ‘spinny weedchopping things.’” He gestured toward the back corner of the shop. “You want gas-powered or electric?”
I hadn’t realized there were different types. “Whichever’s cheapest, I guess.”
He seemed to find that funny. He smiled and touched the rectangular bulge in his shirt pocket but didn’t pull the cigarettes out. “Not exactly aiming to make yourself my favorite customer, are you?” The way he said it wasn’t mean, though. His tone was light.
“Don’t take it personally,” I said. “I’m broke.”
He laughed. “You and everybody else who walks through that door.”
Twenty minutes later, I was home with my electric weed whacker. My neighbor Bill, a man only a few years older than me but missing most of his hair, stood watering his front yard by hand. I tried to look like I actually knew what I was doing with the tool and prayed I wouldn’t make a total fool of myself by chopping my own foot off.
The outlet in the garage didn’t work, but after hunting around in the bushes, I found one near the front porch that did, and after only a few minutes, I’d successfully spinchopped the tall grass around Stacey’s sculptures and all along the base of the house. Unfortunately, when I stood back and examined my work, my heart sank. The grasses and weeds had been overgrown, but with them gone, the cement foundation of the house was left exposed. The barren flowerbeds looked even more pitiful than before.
“You should plant some flowers.”
I turned around to find a cartoon character come to life. A young woman who could have been Velma from the old Scooby-Doo shows was standing behind me, using her hand to block the sun from her spectacled eyes.
“Excuse me?” I asked.
“Irises would be perfect, but it’s not the right time of year. Maybe something tall like lilies or columbines. Sunflowers are nice, too.”
Flowers would help hide the gray foundation of the house, and the flier had said the judges would