# “The Mom Next Door” by Tad Overdon
**CHAPTER FOUR**
“You feeling better now, honey?” Sharon asked.
Melissa sat hunched forward on the edge of a deck chair staring fixedly across the still surface of the Thompsons’ pool. She took a long, slow sip from the moisture-beaded glass cupped in her unsteady hands. She couldn’t bear to look either Sharon or C.J. Thompson in the eyes.
“I-I’m so sorry,” she stammered after a long while. “I didn’t mean to spy. I just…that is, I didn’t…” She gave up trying to find the words. Her head swam, and not from the rum.
Sharon gave a little laugh and tossed her head. “Hon, we saw you as soon as you came out through the glass doors. I kind of owe *you* an apology, for throwing you in at the deep end that way.”
“Throwing me—you *wanted* me to see you together?”
“Did you really think us Mayberry folk just leave our doors unlocked all the time?”
Melissa lifted her head to peer curiously at Sharon. The blonde sat cuddling with her son in a double chaise lounge, she wearing a short terry cloth robe and he with a beach towel wrapped and knotted loosely about his waist.