Page 9 of Never Kiss Your Neighbors

Diving into my emails, I do my best to make up for lost time, and things go smoothly until the app meeting. I’m in the midst of it, and taking a lot of notes, when the dog scratches on the back door, asking to go outside. I gesture for him to wait, but he gives me a look and paws more insistently. When you’ve gotta go, you’ve gotta go!

I carry my laptop to the back door, so I can stay present in the meeting, and balance it with one hand while I pull the door open with the other. That done, I return to the dining room table just in time for a question from the office manager.

About ten minutes later, when the meeting’s starting to wrap up, a flash of movement catches my attention. G is still outside—oops!—and I’m surprised he hasn’t asked to be let back in. He typically only stays out long enough to do what he needs to do. Occasionally, he sniffs around a bit, but he never just hangs around out there all alone.

Splitting my attention between the summary points from the meeting and my limited view of the back yard, I catch sight of the dog again. His head is down, nose to the grass, but then he lifts up, his jaw working on something.

Oh no, what has he gotten into?Just as I’m saying goodbye to the other meeting participants, poised to log off as quickly as is acceptable, something white flies through the air out back.

As soon as the meeting ends, I rush to the back door, where I find the lawn dotted with small white balls. It’s a sunny day, so it’s not hail, and the balls are bigger than a typical hailstorm, anyway, but there are a lot of them.

And G is eating them.What in the world!?

I slide into the clogs I keep by the back door and hurry out, yelling for him to stop, but he just looks up at me, pauses for a second, then continues chewing.

There are dozens of balls in the grass. Several dozen. As I kneel next to G, I discover that they’re not actually round; they’re more like little white cubes … no, more like short cylinders.

I pick one up and it squishes between my fingers. Is it a marshmallow? I sniff it, and it smells sweet. Looking around, I confirm that all of the white objects look the same, except that there are smaller ones too. Mini marshmallows.

What the hell is going on?It’s like something from the twilight zone. A cart full of marshmallows at the store this morning, and now a yard full of marshmallows? Either we’re heading into some kind of sugary Armageddon, or Ana laced the coffee with hallucinogens this morning.

I pick up the dog, because he clearly has no intention of stopping eating these things, and carry him back to the house. As I’m walking, a marshmallow zings by me and skids onto the back patio.

Where are they coming from? The sky is completely clear, though what would I expect—a cloud raining marshmallows? A plane flying by, dropping sweet samples throughout the neighborhood?

Another marshmallow comes flying in, and I finally see where they’re coming from: directly over the back fence. Are there kids over there having a marshmallow fight? Are they intentionally throwing them over the fence, trying to feed the dog?

Still in my arms, he makes a gagging sound, so I quickly set him down on the patio, keeping a loose hold on him so he can’t run back to resume binge eating. He stiffens and retches.

“Are you okay, buddy?”

After a moment, he licks my arm and wags his tail, letting me know he’s okay.

I set him inside the house, close the door, and return to the yard to try to figure out what’s going on. The fence is too tall for me to see over, but it’s built with alternating wooden slats, so if I stand close, I can see beyond it at a hard angle. This limited view only offers grass and shrubs.

Looking from the other angle, I see the corner of a house and more shrubbery, but no kids. At first, I don’t hear anything, either, but then there’s a thump, a click, and a whizzing sound, just before another marshmallow lands nearby.

There’s scratching at my own back door, where G is watching me, wanting to return to his marshmallow feast. When I go to check on him, there’s a spot of white vomit on the floor next to him.

I’d like to be able to put him outside, so he can’t make a mess all over the house if he continues to be sick, but the yard needs to be cleaned up, and there’s still an occasional marshmallow flying over the fence.

Luckily, there’s still time before I need to leave to get Jessie. Hurrying to the front door, I clip the leash onto G’s collar and set out for a walk around the block.

Our house is the third from the corner, so I go to the next street over, count three houses down, and ring the doorbell.

When the door opens, a very familiar face appears. “Hey, it’s the strawberry jam woman. How’d you find us?”

CHAPTER7

CAM

The gorgeous brunette from the store this morning is standing on my front porch.Hmm.She acted like she didn’t know us, so why is she suddenly at our door?

“How did I find you?” A frown on her face, she repeats my question, turning it back on me.

“Did you follow us here this morning?”

“DidIfollowyou?”

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