After we were done, Ben allowed me to wash the dishes and clean up while he went to sit on the porch. He still hadn’t hooked up the dishwasher I’d bought him over a month ago. Shaking my head, I did it for him and hoped he’d use it in the future. Stubborn old goat.
I sat beside him an hour later, both of us rocking in our chairs and watching the sunset in the distance. I could feel my chest expand with each breath, and my inner beast was impatient to roam. He could wait a little, though.
“How’s work?” Ben asked.
“Busy. Still trying to solve that case I told you about a few weeks ago.” He always liked to hear what I was doing down there with the “city critters” as he called them.
“So, nobody burned their house down again?” he asked, referring to the time, a few years back, when a policyholder tried to claim a stove exploded and caused the fire. I had gone out there the next day, and I could smell the lie all over him. The arson investigation proved me right.