9 Ethan
A utumn turned into winter. I had been living with Ellie for over a month, and I concluded that Nat was a bloody idiot to kick Ellie out. Ellie was the perfect housemate.
We worked out a cooking schedule between us, with flexibility built in to have dinner out or grab takeout whenever we wanted, and we always ended up going out to eat together anyway. Whenever Ellie went out, it was always with Joyce and Hannah, which meant that Callum always tagged along, which meant I was always included. We even had everyone over for dinner once or twice on the weekends.
“Too bad it’s too cold for a barbeque,” Callum looked outside wistfully one of those evenings.
“The backyard’s in no shape for a barbeque even when it’s warm,” Joyce gestured to the mass of dead weeds and shrubs out back. “You’re more likely to start a bushfire with the amount of dry kindling outside.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I have a plan. If I can pull it off, we’ll be eating in and from the backyard by spring.” Ellie’s eyes gleamed as she told us what she had in mind for the backyard. It would be a lot of work, but she had drawn up actual plans to clear it out and put in a kitchen garden. She had told me the back was north facing, and it was important somehow due to the amount of sunlight fruit and veggies required.
I just nodded and let her lead. She was improving my property value so much, and she didn’t even know it. I had checked my budget, and I could afford to keep her rent steady for the foreseeable future. She brought so much more to my place than she knew.
She had already started work on clearing out the back garden. Every weekend, more and more of the back garden emerged as Ellie got rid of all the weeds. More of Ellie’s grand plan for the backyard was taking shape. The wicking beds Ellie ordered arrived, and we spent a whole Saturday assembling them and putting them into place. These were raised garden beds with a water reservoir underneath them, a local invention that Ellie spent days waxing lyrical about. They were supposed to reduce the amount of watering the beds needed—important in our hot and dry climate, and plants in them were supposed to grow better because their roots chased the water downwards. These set Ellie back three thousand dollars, and she wasn’t going to let the landlord pay for it until I pointed out that raised garden beds were permanent structures that she wouldn’t be taking with her the next time she moved. In the end, Ellie was convinced to let her faceless landlord pay for the beds while she covered the cost of soil and plants. I wasn’t fussed at how much she was spending on the garden. If she hadn’t moved in, I would have eventually ended up paying a landscaper more to do the work and not given the gardens a second thought. But the more I worked on them with Ellie, the more I started to care about how they fit with the house. All of Ellie’s additions fit.
Throwing herself into getting the house in order seemed to be Ellie’s way of coping with the breakdown of her friendship with Nat. Even the inside of the house was cosier. There were more rugs around the house, including a brand-new runner in the hallway. The house had lovely hardwood floors, and I never thought they needed anything else, but somehow, the rugs made sense. Now I couldn’t imagine the spaces without them.
There were cushions too. A lot more cushions all over the living room sofas. And even they made sense, especially on nights where we ended up sinking into the sofa or onto the floor while we watched TV.
If Nat realised what she had lost, she didn’t show it. Ellie told me she hadn’t heard from her since she told Nat that her new maid of honour was Andy’s side piece. That worked out perfectly fine for me. Ellie was a damn good housemate and tenant, and I wasn’t going to take her for granted like Nat had.
~
M y home life was going swimmingly, and my work life was going just as well. Today was going to be the day I asked the woman of my dreams out.
Renae was the hot executive assistant for one of the directors on my floor. She was competent, professional and always friendly to everyone she came across. My few encounters with Renae had been during the floor’s quarterly interdepartmental morning teas, and Renae always had a friendly smile for me. If all signs weren’t a go just yet, at least they weren’t a no.
Strategic conversation with staff in her department informed me that Renae had just broken up with her boyfriend, meaning that she was now very single and available to mingle. Given how many other single guys on the floor looked at her the same way I did every time she walked the length of the floor that stretched between her boss’s office and the lifts, I needed to make my move before they beat me to it.
There were two places I could casually run into Renae without needing a damn good reason to—the lifts or the kitchen. I had tried the kitchen before, darting there for a tea top-up just as I saw Renae slip in, but there were always too many people there to get her to myself. The last time I tried, I was thwarted by—of all things—Renae’s boss waving me down to talk about one of my latest reports. I had slyly tried to slip in that I could send her an update via Renae, just so I’d have an excuse to talk to her, but the director told me I’d earned enough trust to email her directly.
On one hand, yay for visibility with upper management. On the other…
Today would be a lift day. I had noticed that Renae occasionally made coffee runs in the middle of the morning, and I had been keeping my eye out for her next one for ages. I hadn’t had much luck over the last few weeks, with a large audit keeping me busy and stuck in meetings during the times Renae went for coffee. Now the audit was over. All I needed was for lady luck to smile my way.
Callum and I had cubicles next to each other at work, which was why he was my backup Renae lookout, and thank goodness he was on the job because I was head down in work when Callum wheeled his chair over to my side and whispered, “Oi, Renae alert.”
I had stopped paying attention to the lifts when I got stuck in. Now, I looked up to see Renae heading towards the lift lobby.
“Thank you,” I nodded gratefully to Callum, locked my computer and darted to the lift lobby while trying to look as casual as possible.
Fortune favoured the bold. I entered the lift with Renae right before the doors closed, turned to her and gave her my most winning smile. “Hey, Renae. Are you heading for coffee too?”
She smiled back at me. “Oh yes. Sally and I need one after the morning we’ve had.”
Sally was the director Renae worked for, a very stern, scary lady in her fifties. Even though I had gotten permission to email Sally directly, I still quaked like a school kid every time I hit send.
Be confident… Be confident…
“Mind if I join you?” I casually invited myself.
“Go ahead.” The smile she returned was blinding. This was a good sign.
“Where’s your usual coffee haunt?” I ventured.
“I always go to the Dome just across the road from here.”
That explained why I never saw Renae when I went downstairs for coffee. I frequented a smaller hole in the wall on the other side of the building. Dome was a national chain. Their coffee was okay, but the indies made better brews.
A flash of inspiration hit me. “I usually go to Brew Brothers round the corner. They make amazing coffee there. Want to try it instead today? Or is Sally a Dome only coffee person?”
Renae laughed. “She’s not really fussed. I just picked Dome because it’s the closest to us, but I’m open to trying new things.”
Fantastic woman. I patted myself on the back for that flash of inspiration.
Then Renae added, “It’ll probably be our last chance to try it before our transfer. I really should have hunted down better coffee around here before this, but better late than never.”
Her words startled me. “Oh? What transfer?”
Renae’s face lit up. “Sally’s transferring to the Melbourne office. Her kids and grandkids live there, and she wants to spend more time with them. I’m going with her.”
“That’s awesome.” I did not feel awesome. “Are you looking forward to it?” Maybe she wouldn’t be keen on the move and would opt to stay at the Perth office.
Her enthusiastic reply crushed all my hopes and dreams. “Hell yeah. It’s a bigger city with so much more to see and do, and the company is paying for the whole relocation. I can’t wait.”
Awesome. Just great. Fantastic.
“When’s the move?”
“In two weeks.”
“Congratulations!” I tried to sound happy for Renae. Deep down, I was devastated. I finally got my chance to talk to her, and she was moving away.