“I already spoil her. I know it’s too early, but Alice said she’d knit a stocking for her at Christmas.”

He tied his robe closed, stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray on his stoop. Then he grabbed his coffee and made his way over with a lawn chair to sit on the street facing Mom and Alice. On the hottest nights, the four of them filled a kiddie pool with water and sat with their feet in it, drinking beer.

I glanced at my watch while Eddie got settled. “I’m headin’ out to the job now. You need anything before I go?”

Midge gave me a playful smile. “Just for you to stay for breakfast. We never see you enough.”

“I’m here every day and also live on the same street as you.”

“It’s never enough,” she said, throwing up her hands. Potting soil went flying. “But say hello to Edna from all of us. If this weather holds, it’s gonna be a kiddie pool night.”

“Damn straight,” Eddie said, lighting another cigarette.

I went to leave but got distracted by the metaphorical mosquito buzz in my ear. I glanced uneasily at the lot. My neighbor Linda was down the shore this whole month, and her house was the one that butted right up to it. A month from now, when she returned, would it only be harder to live next to?

“So I uh…” I cleared my throat, rubbed the back of my neck. “I finally got through to someone at the city two nights ago. The guy told me they don’t have any plans to fix it up. He said it was our problem to deal with.”

Eddie growled into his coffee. Midge muttered something in Italian that I didn’t hear.

“It’s always going to be there,” Mom said softly. “I can’t believe they’re abandoning it.”

“I can believe it,” Eddie said.

“Me too,” Midge added.

I went to tell them what else the guy said—that we should fix it ourselves—but held back. “I’m going to keep trying. Someone uptown will know who we need to put pressure on to take care of it.”

“Are you going to keep doing that thing where you glare at the trash while standing in front of it?” Midge asked.

I looked at her over my shoulder. “I don’t do that.”

“Every night you try to glare that lot to death,” she said. “The whole neighborhood sees you do it. We’ve been talking all about it around the kiddie pool.”

I swallowed a frustrated sound. “I know it’s pointless to ask you not to gossip about me.”

“It’s not gossip. It’s sharing. We’ve been sharing about you, is all.”

Sighing, I shifted on my feet. “I’ll remind all of you that, back in the day, I was kinda known for scaring people with my facial expressions.”