Warmer in the Winter

Regina Mills hated her neighbor, Robin Locksley, from the moment he moved in. He had done so early on a Saturday morning with his friends banging nearly every piece of furniture he owned in the process while Robin himself yelled at them from the yard. As an early riser, she had already been awake but all the activity had ruined her attempts to center herself with her yoga routine and she had to abandon it with a huff.

Dressed in her tight red tank top and black Lycra pants, she had stormed out of her house and nearly tripped over a box on the porch. She had had her doubts when she first moved into a semi-attached house but they had been put to rest over the few years she had lived there. Her previous neighbor, Kathryn, had been considerate and the two had become friends. They made sure not to make too much noise and to respect their shared wall as well as the shared porch. Regina had been sad when Kathryn moved into a house with her fiancé but she had also been happy for her friend.

Now, though, she wished Kathryn and Frederick had moved into the house next door so she didn't have to deal with her new and inconsiderate neighbor.

A man with closely cut dark hair stumbled out of the house and she scowled at him. "Are you the new owner?" she asked.

His eyes widened and he yelled into the house: "ROBIN! CAN YOU COME OUT HERE?"

"I'LL BE RIGHT THERE!" another man yelled back. Both men had British accents, though the man standing in front of her had a coarser accent than the one belonging to her new neighbor.

She glared at the man standing on the porch and he held up his hands. "I'll, uh, leave you to Robin."

He retreated into the house, brushing shoulders with a tall blond man who burst out onto the porch. Regina could tell that he was about her age and had gray hair at his temple with some mixed into to the scruff covering his jaw. Blue eyes focused on her and he smiled, revealing two deep dimples. "You must be my new neighbor. Robin Locksley at your service."

"It's nine-thirty in the morning," she said, ignoring his outstretched hand. She crossed her own arms as she scowled at him.

"Uh, yes," he replied, frowning as he pulled back his hand. "I know it's Saturday and I apologize about the noise. Did we wake you?"

"No, but that's not the point. You're making enough noise to wake the dead in our normally quiet neighborhood. Some people have children." She glared at him, hoping to shame him into feeling guilty.

He glared back at her. "It's nine-thirty. I'm sure most of them are up watching cartoons or whatever they do on Saturday mornings. Is your child still asleep?"

"I don't have a child," she replied, her heart and stomach clenching at the statement, "but that's not the point..."

"You're the only one out here arguing with me while I'm trying to move in at a time that the city even allows construction to be done, trying to convince me I'm guilty of a noise violation."

Her mouth fell open as her blood began to boil. She balled her fingers into a fist to keep from strangling him, though throwing a punch was still a possibly. "So you think that means it's okay to make as much noise as humanly possible?"

"Of course not," he replied with an exasperated sigh. "But there is going to be some noise. If you let me get back to moving in, I promise you it'll all be over very soon. And then you can go about with your peaceful day doing...yoga? Were you doing yoga?"