Neighborly Love

NEIGHBORLY LOVE

  A Seemly Sex Story

  by

  Bobby B.

  This story, like all Seemly Sex Stories, is pure fiction, an imaginary concoction of the seemly but mischievous mind of Bobby B. Any resemblance to any actual person or situation is completely coincidental.

  Copyright 2015 seemlybobbyb

  Table of Contents

  NEIGHBORLY LOVE

  About the Seemly Sex Stories series

  Other titles in this series

  NEIGHBORLY LOVE

  Hubert Nelson died suddenly of a heart attack at only forty-six. His unexpected death put his wife of almost twenty years in a difficult position. He was a banker and had always handled all their business and financial affairs, so Joyce Nelson had no idea how to deal with any of the many matters associated with the funeral and estate. This situation certainly isn't unique. However, most unprepared widows have children or other relatives able to support and help them. Unfortunately, Joyce Nelson had neither. The Nelsons had never had any children, and both of them were themselves from single child families, so Joyce didn't even have siblings or siblings-in-law to whom she could turn.

  It was as if a beneficent providence were watching over her, therefore, when the day after Hubert's death a potential helper rang the chimes at the front door of the Nelson home. When Joyce answered, at first she did not recognize the caller. That wasn't entirely due to any confusion caused by her bereavement, for though she knew the man at her door, she did not know him well. Aware of this, and in order to spare her the least embarrassment he casually mentioned his name, Marvin Kondragon, her neighbor from across the street. He said he and his wife had just learned of her husband's death and both were saddened. Indeed, he added, his wife had collapsed in tears when she heard the news. She was concerned about the plight of their suddenly widowed neighbor, and had asked her husband to walk across the street and offer any assistance he might be able to provide.

  Joyce Nelson apologized for not immediately recognizing her neighbor and thanked him for his offer of help. However, she continued, as welcome as his offer was, at the moment she didn't need a neighbor's help. She needed a lawyer's. Though they had lived across the street for years, Joyce and Marvin had never gotten well acquainted, so she didn't remember that, in fact, he is a lawyer. Without taking the least affront at her memory lapse, he reminded her of this, and said he was prepared to put his professional knowledge at her service.

  Joyce could hardly believe her good fortune. She asked how much Kondragon would charge, noting that until the estate and insurance were settled she would have very little money. He assured her there would be no charge. Even if he wanted to bill her for a bit of neighborly help, he added, his wife was so totally distraught at the sudden and tragic death of her neighbor from across the street she wouldn't allow it. With that assurance, the new widow eagerly invited Kondragon in and he immediately began helping her make funeral arrangements.

  Since there had been no forewarnings of Hubert Nelson's premature death, he had made no provisions for it. His affairs were completely disorganized. He had no will. He didn't even have a list of assets and debits. So even before the funeral, Joyce Nelson and Marvin Kondragon began to spend long hours together going over old tax records and all the many papers and documents from Hubert's office at the bank as well as all his many other potentially relevant papers scattered here and there about the Nelson house. The amount of time this took was far greater than either of them had thought might be required. So almost every evening after he finished his day's work, lawyer Kondragon would walk across the street to the Nelson house to help his widowed neighbor.

  Because Marvin was spending so much time with her, and because he refused to accept any payment, Joyce began to feel she was being an imposition. She tried to find some way she could, if not compensate, at least thank her helpful new friend from across the street. What she found is that Kondragon has a particular fondness for fancy, elaborate food, a taste he seldom was able to indulge because for his wife, Sue, cooking is a chore she neither enjoys nor does well. This suggested an excellent way for Joyce Nelson to show her appreciation, for she is an accomplished cook, a skill she had been little able to exercise in the past because Hubert had had no interest whatsoever in such meals. He had been a loudly and often professed "meat and potatoes" man. Steak and French-fries were all he had ever wanted to eat.

  So Joyce began preparing elaborate little snacks for Marvin to eat while they were going through Hubert's papers. She enjoyed the preparation, and he enjoyed the eating. In fact, they both found these snack breaks so pleasant they soon were spending more time on them than they were on getting the estate in order.

  Perhaps because her food rewards were so satisfying, Marvin soon found that Joyce needed more than legal help. Hubert had been a bank officer with little or no interest in or aptitude for things mechanical. Accordingly, numerous little home repair tasks had accumulated at the Nelson house, jobs Hubert had been either unwilling or unable to do. Marvin Kondragon is quite different. He is at complete and happy ease working with tools. In fact, unlike most lawyers, whose undergraduate educations are in history or English or the social sciences, his bachelor's degree had been as an engineer. Accordingly, the Kondragon house was perfectly maintained, and Marvin had little occasion to practice his handyman hobby at home. So gradually he visited Joyce more and more often to do things like fix a leaky faucet or replace a broken light switch.

  The folks in the little city wherein the Nelson and Kondragon homes are located are no more nosey and gossipy than folks in any other town. But Marvin Kondragon's visits across the street to Joyce Nelson's place were so frequent, and they lasted so long, the couple soon became the talk of the town. Persons of a charitable disposition commended the generosity of Mr. Kondragon, going so often and so far out of his way to assist his poor recently widowed neighbor. Cynics, however, had a different take. They were sure Joyce was maintaining Marvin's interest with much more than artichoke-stuffed Portobello mushrooms. The cynics were right. Less than six months after Hubert Nelson's funeral Marvin Kondragon moved himself with all his clothes and tools across the street into the Nelson widow's home and filed for divorce from Sue.

  Sue Kondragon, it is generally believed, is an emotionally fragile person. For example, she had been so distraught she had cried uncontrollably and inconsolably at Hubert Nelson's funeral, the funeral of a man who was merely her neighbor from across the street. In fact, she had been in much greater distress than the widow herself. So everyone expected Sue to suffer a total emotional collapse at her husband's abrupt abandonment. But she surprised them all, for she took Marvin's desertion and divorce in stride with a composure that would have graced a queen. With calm deliberation and head held high she went about her life without complaining to anyone about how her husband had taken her request for him to assist a widowed neighbor beyond anything remotely reasonable or proper.

  One day some months later as Sue Kondragon was walking into the supermarket she encountered Mrs. P. Pendergast, one of their town's busiest busybodies. It was the first time Pendergast had seen Sue since hearing about the Kondragon divorce and Marvin's remarriage to widow Joyce, and the officious older woman was full of indignation at such scandalous behavior. She cornered the recent divorcee and began to vent her spleen against the perfidious Marvin Kondragon. Sue, however, didn't respond in a similar vein. She neither cursed nor condemned her ex, simply saying that divorces happen and one must make the best of it.

  "Well, my dear," Mrs. P. insisted, "your dignity in this terrible situation brings you more honor than I can express. I cannot tell you how much I respect and admire your composure and willingness to forgive. I doub
t whether Hubert Nelson would have been so forgiving. He was always so devoted to Joyce. Why I can't imagine what he would have said about his wife taking up with a married man before the grass had even begun to grow on his grave."

  Pendergast could only marvel at Sue Kondragon's answer. The divorcee had no need to divulge herself as she did. But maybe Sue's forgiving composure had slipped a bit, and she wanted to pay back in kind the new Mrs. Kondragon for the theft of a husband.

  "I think I know exactly what Hubert would have said" Sue answered. "He would have said it was a damn shame we never realized Joyce and Marvin would take to each other so well. If we had known, Hubert and I would never have had to spend almost twenty years sneaking around to cheap motels."

  END

  About the Seemly Sex Stories series:

  This is another Bobby B. Seemly Sex Story. Most of the stories in this series would be classified as romances, but a couple concern human sexuality outside a romantic context. Since sex is basic to romance, the series title is suitable. But though these stories deal with sex, they don’t do so in a smutty or salacious way. Rather, they treat the topic in a seemly