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Jude hadn't been asleep, which was the only reason she wasn't personally working on divorcing the s**t out of her husband. The garden had to be weeded out, mulched, God only knew what else before it would be ready to grow anything. This late in the season, it'd be mostly planting things other people had grown with all the risks implied there. Lord, she hoped none of them had parasites, that would be awkward.

At least she knew the soil was good. Next door's garden was quite pretty to look at. She'd have to ask for tips on caring for it.

"Hon, you okay," she called in her honey-slow Georgian drawl, abandoning her basket of weeds to go actually check on his dumb a**. "That didn't sound so good, you know?"

Jeremiah had only been up for a little while. Mostly because even with recovery days at home, drinking the previous night, he had a problem with staying in bed past daybreak unless he was feeling seriously under the weather.

His back was not hurting him enough to warrant it.

Which meant that he heard every little bit of the new neighbors and just ... let it go. The hammering was not loud and Algie stayed asleep through it (and that meant he did not care because as long as his spouse was asleep, then it was all good).

Right up until the clattering noise and the loud near-swear and then-

There it was; Algie's grumbling. He had just finished getting dressed, about to go downstairs and make breakfast, when it happened. "I'll go look, Alg. Stay in bed, breakfast isn't even started yet." Which meant he was leaning and pressing a kiss to silvering hair. Also making sure that both cats were on him. They were just another way to make him stay in bed.

Not that it necessarily worked.

A cardigan was pulled off of the sweater chair, another layer over another layer, and he was outside in a couple minutes. Making his way to the neighbors (it was good to know that whomever bought the house was going to fix it up; it was nice, the garden had a lot of potential), he was glancing towards the gardening that was clearly in process and then up towards the roof.

"Everything alright?" he called out. "No one fell?" ... because priorities to make sure people were okay and then there could be introductions.

"No sir, no harm," Jude returned, "Just my idiot ground-pounder of a husband provin' why Army men don't have wings." She dusted off her jeans and adjusted her sun-hat, loping across the overrun garden to introduce herself to the neighbor man. "I'm Jude, Judith McCool. And that's my husband, Carson. You're the detective, aren't ya?"

She smiled over at Carson, minty green eyes going all squinty around the edges. "I was going to bring you some muffins, but I guess this'll do as an introduction."

"No, it wasn't me that you woke up," Jeremiah's eyes glinted with amusement and flicked towards the shades that were being adjusted. "You did wake up my spouse however ..."

He was watching the man make his way down as his attention turned towards his wife. He could not help the snort about army men and wings. "Detective Lieutenant Jeremiah Mercer," he replied-

-and then Algie called down about the muffins. Jeremiah laughed, eyes crinkling at the edges. "... that would be Algie. Algernon Mixlin. Professor at Rider-Waite and bookstore owner." Also likes muffins that were not even available yet. "I'll have to get you a welcome basket." The welcome basket would be no joke. A hand was held out in greeting.

"I've been wondering who bought this place." Since he had heard it had been taken off the market. "Glad to see it's gone to someone who's going to bring it back to it's former glory."

Jude craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the fabled spouse. She couldn't see anything more than green eyes between the blinds. Well, they were a very nice shade, for sure. "I apologize for that," she said, "And I'll be sure to bring those muffins by when I've got 'em made. Wanted to get some work done on the garden before the sun's got up."

She waved Carson off. "Ya'll don't have to do that, though we'd appreciate it," she said. "We'll return the favor." Dinner parties? Oh man, did she have plans for dinner parties. Plans out the butt. "She's gonna be darlin' when we're done with her," Jude said of the house. "I'd like to find who let her get so run-down, that is a capital crime."

Jeremiah had an equally firm handshake, even if his hand was cooler than most would expect. "I'd think it was. It's been empty for years and the previous owner didn't exactly take care of it." They were a terrible neighbor too but he was not going to speak ill of them.

He watched Carson go to the tools with a glint of amusement in his eyes before turning back to Jude. "I can understand that. I usually do the same with my garden but we're taking a couple days off."

The detective was leaning with a hiss of breath to catch Hellbine by the scruff when he came barreling. The small cat was deposited onto his shoulders with a tap to his head to behave. Jeremiah was mrr'd at disapprovingly. There were new people!!

"Go ahead and start the tea, Alg!" he called back. Blue-green eyes went back to focus on Jude again. The accent made him think of America. "I could give you some spiel about it is traditional but a welcome basket is always a good thing and, of course, you've already offered those muffins and clearly Alg is very interested."

Even though they did not exist yet. The man thought with his stomach sometimes. "... the previous owner didn't know how to keep up with a house of this age. They were thinking of making it modern." If he was inclined to make a face, he would have done so.

"Well I sure understand that," said Jude, "I hear you've been having some troubles recently, what with the Blackfriars library attack and all. If you need a hand, please do say." She personally didn't see a problem with modernizing the inside. Wasn't that what they were doing as they removed chair rails and antiquated wallpaper? And she certainly wasn't going to go with Queen Anne style furniture, no matter what Carson said to her.

She smiled, regardless, bumping her shoulder against Carson's arm. "I did tell you that, hon. I thought you wanted to do it all by your lonesome."