The Lockdown

9

On Saturday morning, Andy was talking to his mother on the phone as Cam came out of his room stretching to wake himself up completely. "No mom, you should absolutely not do that. Out of the question. Let me call Pete if I can borrow his car again, and I will come by shortly and take care of it." Cam heard the apparently indignant tone of Andy's mom coming through the speaker, but Andy would not take no for an answer. "Ugh, Cam is here, he needs me for something, gotta go, see you later, love ya, bye," he said and abruptly hanged up.

Cam looked at him questioningly. "Is everything all right?"

"The porchlight went out, and my mom said that she will head to the store to get a new light and she wants to fix it herself. My dad used to take care of things like this. Since he died I try to come around to help out whenever I can and there is absolutely zero chance that I will let her go out in the middle of a pandemic even if she promises to wear two masks at the same time. Besides, she's likely to break a leg if she climbs up on that rickety ladder they have." Cam found his huffing and puffing hilarious. "I'll call Pete and borrow his car, I should be back for lunch the latest," he said.

"Can I come? Please, please, please!" Cam was literally jumping up and down in excitement. He was getting stir crazy cooped up in the apartment. Andy, at least, got out once a day to go to the bar but apart from a quick shopping trip, Cam had not seen the sun in almost two weeks. "With one condition," Andy said chuckling. "You stop laughing at me."

"No promises!" Cam ran into his bedroom. "Give me ten minutes for a quick shower and change and we can be on our way." He shouted through the open door.

It was a sunny spring day, not too warm, still Cam kept the window down the whole way directing the wind with his hand onto his face as if he wanted to force as much oxygen into his lungs as possible. "You are like a puppy just out of the kennel the first time ever." Even though he was getting a little cold, Andy let the younger man play around to his heart's content. The joy on his face was worth the discomfort. They stopped to pick up supplies at a store and they arrived to Andy's childhood home in no time.

His mom greeted them enthusiastically though Andy would not let her come outside the screen door. Cam met her once before when she visited Andy about a month after Cam moved in. She arrived early while Andy was still out running errands. Cam managed to entertain her until Andy got back, even made her laugh a couple of times. Later, she admitted to Andy that she came specifically to check on the new roommate. She approved, not that Andy asked. She did not get along with his ex-girlfriend and even though she desperately wanted grandchildren, she was relieved when they broke up. She thought Cam could be a good friend to her son until he settled down. She had the one grandchild so far; Andy's younger sister had a three-year-old daughter but they lived two hundred miles away in the state capitol and apart from the holidays their mother rarely saw them. She tried to visit as many times a year as she could but the pandemic made that impossible as well.

They fixed the porchlight in a couple of minutes and Andy thought that while they were there he should clean the gutters. There was a tree close to the left side of the house and left unattended, it tended to clog the gutters after a while. They carried the ladder together. The tree had a swing attached and when Cam saw it, he immediately dropped his end of the ladder, squealed with joy, ran to the swing and hopped on it. Andy snorted in amusement, put the ladder up himself and climbed up to clean the ducts. Half an hour later Cam had enough as he was getting dizzy, Andy finished with the gutters and they carried the ladder back to the shed behind the house. They returned to the porch which Andy eyed disapprovingly.

"My dad used to paint this every other year, but no one has touched it since he died and it's starting to look rather shabby," he said frowning. "So let's paint it," Cam suggested.