Be a Man

If anyone had thought it odd that there was a new, multi-story shiny office building in production towards the center of our mountain town, no one voiced their opinion. And the name they put on the front, Preston Inc., meant nothing to any of us. It wasn’t until the houses in the nicest district of town began displaying SOLD signs rather than For Sale or Rent signs that I became curious, and that others started to show interest. Until then, there were only half of these houses filled, and my own was one of these. Ours was the most modest of the large houses, but we were right next door to what I had deemed the most extravagant.

One by one, new families moved into five of these houses. One was fairly large, and the other four were fairly modest. When the sign in front of the house next door changed, however, the interest of the entire town was caught. The house was only two stories, but it also had a large basement and a three car garage. Other than that information, it’s entirely impossible for me to describe with anything other than big. It was an obnoxiously big-ass house, as if the owners had money and they wanted to show it.

Being a realty agent, Mom told us that the family would be moving in on Friday, and she had released that news on Wednesday. So, Friday rolled around, and Mom baked a few pies, a cake, and cookies for the neighbors. Her excuse for baking so much was that they might not like the gift she initially brought if she only took one. About two o’clock, no less than three moving trucks, a moving van, an SUV with a trailer, and a cherry red convertible pulled up into the driveway or in front of the house next door.

“Hullo!” my Dad called, a few moments later as he walked towards the house. “Hullo there! Need another hand?”

“Welcome,” Mom smiled as she and I walked up behind Dad to the man he was talking with. “You must be Mr. Preston.”

“Yes, I am.” the man said, and he smiled at us with the dazzling smile of someone who was kind of vain.

“Mrs. Thomas!” a voice called, and my mother turned.

“Hello, Mrs. Preston,” Mom flashed her smile again. “I hope the house is to your liking.”

“Oh, I’ve just looked around,” the other woman laughed lightly, “and it’s perfect! I absolutely love it, so spacious and cozy!”

“Mrs. Thomas? You must be the real estate agent Emily was telling me about.” Mr. Preston held out a hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. And you, Mr. Thomas.”

The adults shook hands, and I just kind of stood to the side, waiting for Dad to realize that he hadn’t introduced me yet. And sure enough, he looked around and put his hand on my shoulder with a light squeeze.

“Mr. and Mrs. Preston, may I introduce our daughter, Anna?”

“Nice to meet you,” I said in a polite voice.

“Oh, hello, dear!” Mrs. Preston greeted me cheerfully with a vigorous handshake. Mr. Preston was more composed as he shook my hand.

“Yes, hello, Anna.” was the greeting Mr. Preston gave.

“So, like I said earlier,” my Dad began conversationally, “would you like a hand with anything?”

“I think we’ve got it,” Mr. Preston grinned good naturedly at my father, “after all, this is what we pay the movers for.”

“Touché,” Dad grinned back. “I thought we’d offer.”

“It’s very appreciated!” Mrs. Preston beamed. “But I think we’ll be quite alright. Unless you ladies would like to help me in the kitchen? They were taking the appliances and kitchen paraphernalia in first, I believe. Right, honey?”

“That’s right, dear.” Mr. Preston nodded.

“We’d love to help,” Mom beamed. “Come on, Anna.”

I followed the two women into the house, and barely concealed my amazement. The living room had a high, vaulted ceiling and a chandelier-like light. There was a hall with a door to the left, then on the right an open door showed a bathroom. The end of the hall opened up into the (of course, large) dining room, which was so far empty, and then there was a huge bar and just enough space to walk through to get into the kitchen. The kitchen was no closet-sized room, either. There was a six foot long island in the middle, with a double sink. One of these sinks had a garbage disposal. There were tons of cabinets, and the stove, dishwasher, refrigerator, and microwave were already in place.

The next thing that drew my eyes were the six cardboard boxes on the island countertop not taken up by the sinks.

“Oh, they’re efficient!” Mrs. Preston giggled like a much younger woman. Not that I was calling her old, she could only be in her late thirties, at most. “That must be the dishes! You mind opening that one by you, Anna, dear?”

“Sure, Mrs. Preston,” I said, and I found myself already liking this easy-going woman.

“Nonsense, both of you just call me Emily!” she grinned at us. “We are neighbors, after all!”

“Of course,” Mom grinned. “I’m Pam.”

“Lovely!” Emily smiled. “What did you find over there, dear?”

Noticing this was directed at me, I replied, “Lots of pans.”

Emily laughed. “We can never have too many pans!”

“Yes you can,” there was a grumble, and the three of us turned to the two cardboard boxes with legs coming over to us. “There’s another box of them here, I’ll bet. It’s so heavy!”

“Oh, hush now!”

The boxes were placed on the bar, and the legs turned out not to belong to the boxes, but to a fairly tall young man with dark brown windswept hair and what I assumed were hazel eyes. “Geez, Mom, how much stuff can you cram into a box this size?” He hadn’t looked up yet. “That had to be seventy pounds!”

I couldn’t help it, I started laughing.

“Wha-who are you?” he asked blankly, looking from me to my mother.

“This is Anna, and her mother Pam Thomas. They’re our neighbors!” Emily smiled. “And ladies, this is my son, Austin.”

Being nearest, I promptly held out my hand and said, “Nice to meet you!”

“Uh, sure,” Austin shook my hand with a lopsided smirk.

“Now, off you go, dear!” Emily shooed her son away. “Go help your father and Mr. Thomas, would you?”

“Yeah, yeah. See ya,” he directed the last at me in an undertone, as if we’d been friends for a while, and I was kind of flustered.

“Alright, since you’re there Anna, would you mind opening those two and seeing what’s in them?”

“No problem,” I replied, and we all set to work.

That night, we were invited to the Preston’s house for supper, and Mom forced all of the food she’d prepared that morning before the Preston family arrived into my arms. These were the once mentioned pies, cake, and cookies. So, at seven-thirty on the dot, Mom rang their doorbell. Dad was sporting a freshly made salad and a Wal-Mart bag with various chips in it. She herself carried a hamburger tator-tot casserole, the one thing she’d managed to convince Emily to let her bring that had to do with the main meal.

The door opened at that moment, and Austin blinked. “Oh. Hi.”

“Hi.” Mom smiled.

“You’re here! Come in, come in!” Mr. Preston smiled warmly, and my Dad greeted him with a hearty, “Hullo there!”

This struck me as a little odd because Mr. Preston had seemed a bit cold when we first encountered him earlier, but I didn’t question it. I trusted Dad’s choices in his friends.
Dinner progressed like a normal dinner with long-time family friends would, and I took it as a sign that my parents were definitely going to get along with Emily and John, as I found was Mr. Preston’s name. I, for the most part, stayed silent until halfway through when Austin struck up a conversation. He didn’t seem too bad, just with the small talk we kept up. I got to examining him secretly, and noticed he was wearing a t-shirt that boldly proclaimed Avenged Sevenfold.

So we talked about music when I noticed his shirt, and we compared our favorites. From what I learned, Avenged Sevenfold wasn’t one of his absolute favorites, but he did like them. We were nearly opposites, though. He liked heavy metal, and rap, and everything on that side of the scale, where I stuck with country, soft rock, and a little pop. He admitted to liking some country, however, while I admitted to liking a few of his type of songs.
So, at that point in time, I saw us becoming friends.

After dinner, I went for a walk, politely excusing myself from the Preston home. About five minutes later, he caught up.

“Hey!” he said with a grin. “What’re you doing?”

“Taking a walk.” I replied simply.

“Do you always walk out after dinner?”

“Sometimes.”

“Why?”

“It’s refreshing.” he was getting kind of nosy, I thought here.

“Okay…so you guys are the local big-shots?” he asked.

I looked at him from the corner of my eye, my temper flaring. “What do you mean by that?” I asked forcefully.

“You guys are some of the higher-ups in town, right?” he seemed not to notice my newfound hostility towards him. “I mean, you live in the good district and everything.”

“We don’t flaunt our money, like someone I know.” I replied, hinting at him. “We got the smallest house for a reason.”

“Who flaunts?” he asked.

“Nevermind.” I rolled my eyes.

“Hey, wait! Are you saying that we flaunt? Because we got the big house?!”

“Finally, he catches on,” I mumbled under my breath so he wouldn’t hear. “It’s not just big.”

“What do you mean?” he grabbed my arm and I spun to face him.

“It’s not just big!” I cried. “It means exactly what I said! It’s not just big, it’s obnoxiously huge and way more space than three people really even need! And your parents are brilliant people, but you’re basing things on the monetary status of the people around you, and I hate it! So, so just stay away from me and keep your big-headed thoughts to yourself, you jerk!”

I shoved him aside and walked back towards our houses, but walked up my sidewalk instead of returning to the Preston’s home.

“Hey! Where do you think you’re going?” I heard Austin’s voice behind me.

“Where does it look like? I’m going home. I’m not feeling well right now.” I replied, with a sneer that I was sure he couldn’t see in the descending darkness. “Good night.”

I practically slammed the door in his face, as he had once more followed me. I locked it behind me, put my key on the hook by the door, and went up to my room. I took a hot shower and immediately threw myself on my bed afterwards in frustration.