Her voice over the phone was calm and practical. Like it always was. "Are you sure you haven’t got writer’s block again?"

    I bit my tongue at the response I wanted to make. I knew she was only trying to help. "No. I’ve got the plot line in my head. I just can’t get it out on paper because of this stupid woman." I thumped the desk. The screen saver on my laptop immediately changed from a close up of an inquisitive Emu’s face, to page ten of my current ‘work in progress’. I glared at the stalled beginning of my new novel, ‘Immortal Hearts’. "I mean, who in the hell uses shears to cut their lawn in this day and age anyway?"

    "Maybe she can’t afford a lawn mower?"

    I snorted. "Humph. I may as well offer to mow her lawn for her in that case. At least I wouldn’t have that bloody ‘clicking’ going on all day."

    "What a great idea. She’s probably too old to be doing lawns herself anyway. It could be your good deed for the day."

    I thought about it. It wasn’t such a bad idea at all. "Hmm. It’s got possibilities"

    "I have to go, Hon. I’m late for a meeting."

    "Thanks for listening. I’ll see you when you get home tonight." I hung up the phone and stared at the half-written page in front of me. I had only progressed by about two hundred words since this morning. The ‘click-click’ of the old lady’s shears had started just after I logged on. From my study I could hear her snipping as if she was in the next room. It was worse than a dripping tap in the middle of the night. The methodical, repetitive noise ricocheted in my head.

    I stood and stretched, my wife’s suggestion taking shape. It may solve my problem. It only took twenty minutes for me to mow our lawn. The old lady’s did not seem very large. Maybe ten minutes work? She might even let me install a small gate in the back fence. That would save me pushing the mower around the block to her place.

    A picture formed in my head. I walked back and forth across her lawn, my mower spewing grass before me. The old lady stood nearby, a grateful smile on her face, a tray carrying a cold drink held firmly in her hands.

    The idea seemed appealing. I opened the glass sliding door to our rear pool area. Immediately, the noise intensified. Gingerly I walked across to our back fence and peered through the gaps between the palings. She squatted on the other side, her arms working the wooden handles of the shears rhythmically. "Click-click-click." Damn, it was irritating. She wore brown shorts, and a light blue shirt. I could see honey blonde hair with an old aged veil of silvering, tucked firmly in a bun. It was impossible to guess her age from my vantage point though. I could not see her face clearly enough.

    I thought about saying something, then decided against it. It would be a sensitive subject to broach. Not the sort of thing to bring up through a fence. I decided to ‘beard the lioness in her den’. It took several minutes to traverse the small block and arrive at the front of her house. I stood there momentarily; weighing non-existent options then took a deep breath and walked down her grassed driveway. I heard the shears before I saw her, and wondered how I would start the conversation.

    I rounded the corner of her small house, and noticed her still in the same position as I had observed before. I approached slowly, taking in her appearance. Her tanned arms and legs showed unusually well developed muscles. Maybe from all the squatting and clipping? She appeared to sense my presence before I managed to get any closer, and her head turned toward me, her piercing grey eyes peering at me inquisitively.

    Her voice was loud and scratchy, like shattered pottery. It was full of the age that appeared to be missing from her body. "Can I help you?"

    "Good morning, Ma-am. I’m your new neighbour from over the back fence. I thought I should pop over and introduce myself."

    She straightened, grimacing at the effort. Her voice was old, and the wrinkles around her face and neck suggested an age well on the wrong side of sixty. But her body confused me. She had the build and muscle tone of a thirty-year old. I moved closer, and held out a hand.

    "You have quite a job ahead of you," I commented, nodding towards the expanse of green grass before her.

    She shook my hand with a firm grip, and looked at me with a suspicious frown on her face. Her abrasive voice broke as the handshake did. "I get there eventually. Then it’s time to start over."

    I pointed to the shears. "You do it all with those things. It’s a long, slow job. I’ve heard you going at it for weeks now."

    She raised the shears and looked at them with what appeared to be pride. I noticed the long pointy blades were sharpened to razor blade keenness.

    "No choice. Teddy can’t stand loud machines."

    "I see," I said, wondering who the hell Teddy was. "It can get a little monotonous from my side of the fence unfortunately." I watched as her eyes narrowed and her pupils contracted to a piercing laser-like glare.

    "You’re not going to be a damn nuisance, are you?"

    I shook my head, cursing myself for not being subtler. "Uh-uh. I thought I might be able to mow your lawn when I do mine." I smiled, hoping the offer would placate the fire in her face.

    "I told you. Teddy don’t like machines. They make too much noise. He has shell shock from the War." She glared, hostility written into every crease lining her face.

    "I see," I mumbled again, frantically trying to think of a way to save the situation. I noticed a series of knolls along the back fence. They looked like five graves, lying side by side under the big orange tree, which shaded our boundary fence. I nodded my head toward them. "Pets?"

    Her reply was sharp, her tone still angry. "No. Pesky nuisances. Just like you are." Tiny red veins had appeared in her eyes, and white spittle showed at the corners of her mouth.

    I tried to be polite. "The noise is really intrusive. I thought I could negotiate some sort of compromise with you."

    A shadow fled across her face. When she spoke, her voice had a tone of resignation. "You’ll have to see Teddy."

    I looked at her, puzzled by the comment. She raised her shears and pointed toward her house. I turned my head, peering in the direction she indicated. In the small screened in veranda covering the rear, I made out the vague shape of someone wearing an orange Hawaiian shirt sitting in a wheel chair. I nodded. "I’ll talk to Teddy. Maybe we can come to some arrangement."

    She led the way across to the house. I followed, still surprised by the athletic look of her body. She opened the screen door, and stood to one side, indicating for me to enter by pointing with her shears.

    I entered the small room, my eyes slowly adjusting to the darker light. I could see ‘Teddy’, sitting in his wheel chair with his back to me. I moved closer, taking in the dark blue baseball cap sitting jauntily on his head. I stepped up beside his chair. "Teddy?"

    Teddy peered back at me through hollow, vacant sockets. His jaw hung slackly; the yellowed decayed teeth bared to the world. Horrified, I noticed the ageing skeletal bones extending from the sleeves of the shirt, just as I realised what was really buried under the orange tree.

    The old lady’s voice came from behind me. "Nuisances. Pesky nuisances, the lot of you."

    The image of the pointed shears arching high behind me came into my mind, just before they entered my back.