“Hello.”

“Hey.”

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Nothing, I just had to call with a story.”

“Got it.  What’s up?”

“So, do y’all ever sell stuff on Craigslist?”

“Huh.  No.  Can’t say that’s a regular thing for us.  Why?  Is that a hobby of yours?”

“A hobby? No. But, we’ve found it’s a good way to get rid of shit.  We’ve found that it’s much easier than disposing of things ourself.”

“Dispose of it? Like, you’re selling things you’re throwing away?”

“Basically.  When we clean out, we naturally end up with a bunch of crap to get rid of.  We may take some to Goodwill, but we’ll list a lot of it on Craigslist.”

“Isn’t that a pain in the ass?  Like how much can you possibly be making?”

“Very little, but it’s got nothing to do with the money.  Half the time we’ll list the stuff as free.  It’s literally a way to have someone else take it away and save us the trouble of taking it to a dumpster.”

“And people want your old crap that you list for free?”

“Oh yes.  You’d be amazed how many people are interested in free stuff.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

“So, we were getting rid of something the other day.  It was a stroller that we never really used.  My wife will usually put it on the front porch and just text with them so there is no face to face exchange.  And, since it’s free, there’s nothing to discuss.”

“Solid plan.”

“Thanks.  Anyway, so they come and text that they’re there.  My wife tells them to grab it off the porch.  Well, like 10 minutes later, my wife sees that their car is still in the driveway.  Obviously, this raises a red flag.  Like, why are these people still here?”

“A little creepy.”

“Exactly.  She can tell the lady is on her phone so she figures she’s getting directions or answering a text or something.  Within a few minutes they leave and it all seems over.  Then, after they’ve already left, my wife gets a text from her saying, ‘Hey, I think your kid’s bike got caught under our tire.  We checked it out and it looked ok though.  But, just wanted to give you a heads up’.”

“What?”

“Yeah.”

“So, they ran over a bike?”

“Oh, yes.  Or, as she put it, ‘a bike got caught under their tire’.”

“That’s certainly one way to put it.”

“Yeah.  It’s a really creative way of saying we ran over your bike.”

“What do you do from there?”

“There wasn’t much we could do.  My wife checked out the bike and it was still functional, but it was clearly scratched up and a small piece was bent.”

“So, it didn’t really hurt it?”

“Depends how you look at it.  It wasn’t destroyed or unusable, but the bike was definitely in better condition before they came to our home and ran over it.”

“Did you ask them to fix it?”

“Who?  The people who drove 30 minutes for a free $20 stroller?  Kidding aside, I thought about it. But, all we had was a phone number.  We didn’t know their names.  There hadn’t been any venmo payment.  Plus, what do I do to fix it?  Take it to some bike shop and have it buffed and have that minor piece replaced?  Ultimately, that’s all work on my end.”

“I’m impressed they told you about it.  Seems like they could have gotten away without saying anything.”

“Same.  I think they assumed we saw it happen.  But, still.  Who sends that text after you leave?  Like, you are right there and can tell the person face-to-face.  Instead, you just float a text over explaining that you ran over a bike.”

“Even better, they made it sound like it was the bike’s fault.”

“Exactly.  That pesky bike got itself caught under their tire while they were backing out.  Who’s to say whose fault it was.  Best we just go our separate ways. Thanks for the free stuff though.”

“I’d love to know the conversation they were having when they were in the driveway.  You know they debated how to handle the situation.”

“Of course.  I’m sure the husband was like, ‘If we tell ‘em, they’ll want us to fix it or replace the bike or something.  It’s fine.  Let’s just go.  It shouldn’t been there anyway’.”

“Oh, I’m thinking they waited to see if anyone came out of the house and when you didn’t, they were like, ‘let’s get the hell out of here.  We’ll text from the road’.”

“You’re probably right.  This wasn’t their first rodeo.”

“You think they’ve done this before.  Going around running over bikes?”

“Seems like they knew how to pull it off.”

“Guess that’s just the cost of doing business.”

“Apparently.”