My neighbor Denise had borrowed at least ten things from me that year.
It started innocently enough.
First, my ladder.
Then the pressure washer.
After that, she gradually moved on to things from my kitchen.
My slow cooker.
My steamer.
A large cooler.
My favorite roasting pan.
Almost everything came back late, dirty, damaged, or missing some small piece.
And Denise never seemed particularly bothered by any of it.
The first few times, I convinced myself it wasn’t worth creating tension.
We had lived next door to each other for six years.
Our children had played together when they were younger.
We watered each other’s plants when one family went out of town.
And to be fair, Denise wasn’t a horrible neighbor.
She was simply careless in a very particular way.
The moment something crossed into her house, she seemed to forget that it still belonged to someone else.
My ladder came back with dried mud caked around the bottom.
The roasting pan returned with a dent in one corner.
The cooler smelled like fruit punch for days.
Whenever I mentioned anything, Denise always had an explanation.
“Oh, I was going to clean that.”
Or:
“Wasn’t that already scratched?”
And my personal favorite:
“You know how kids are.”
Apparently, her children were responsible for every broken lid, stain, dent, and late return within several miles of our neighborhood.
Looking back, I should have stopped lending her things long before she asked for the mixer.
I know that now.
The problem was simple.
I was terrible at saying no.
Last Tuesday around four in the afternoon, Denise appeared at my door.
“Please tell me you own a stand mixer.”
“I do.”
“I knew it!”
She clasped her hands dramatically.
“You are literally saving my life.”
I already knew what was coming.
“What happened?”
“I’m making a cake for Saturday, and my hand mixer is completely useless.”
Then she pointed past me toward the kitchen.
“The cream-colored one?”
My stomach immediately tightened.
It was an old KitchenAid.
Heavy.
Cream-colored.
There were scratches near the bottom and one tiny chip in the enamel from when my father accidentally hit it with a metal measuring cup years ago.
My mother had bought it in 1989.
She used it almost every Sunday until she became too weak to stand in the kitchen for long periods.
After she died, my sister and I divided most of her kitchen belongings.
I chose the mixer.
Not because it was worth the most money.
Because whenever I switched it on, the sound took me back to Sunday mornings in my parents’ house.
That might sound foolish to anyone who has never attached memories to an ordinary household object.
I looked at Denise.
“No.”
I actually managed to say it.
“Denise, I’d rather not lend that one out. It belonged to my mother.”
She laughed as if I were joking.
“I’ll be careful. I only need it for one cake.”
“I really don’t think—”
“Oh, come on.”
She remained standing there.
My daughter Sophie was sitting on the porch steps watching the entire exchange.
And somehow, I heard myself say:
“Fine.”
I regretted it instantly.
Denise smiled.
“I’ll bring it back Saturday.”
“Please clean it first.”
“Obviously.”
Saturday morning, I found the mixer sitting on my porch.
She hadn’t knocked.
She hadn’t handed it back to me.
She had simply abandoned it beside the welcome mat where anyone passing by could have taken it.
The second I picked it up, I knew something was wrong.
Dried cream had hardened inside the seam where the mixer head connected to the body.
Yellow.
Sticky.
Several days old.
Something sugary had dried along the power cord.
The whisk attachment was sitting inside the bowl covered with hardened frosting.
She hadn’t even rinsed it.
I carried everything into the kitchen.
Sophie followed me.
“She just left it outside?”
“Apparently.”
“That’s disgusting.”
“Yes.”
I washed the bowl first.
Then the attachment.
