Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
I caught Sayer rubbing the back of his head as we worked to remove the shelf in the bathroom. If I mentioned him falling into the wall, would he remember? What if he didn’t?
He hadn’t mentioned it. Neither had Emma.
I chewed the inside of my cheek. “You okay?” I asked.
He sighed. “Just a headache. I’ll take something for it after lunch.”
My eyes darted to the crown of his head. I tracked his swallow, the way he squinted against the low light. How his jaw worked left and right.
Now was my chance. I needed to bring it up in a way that didn’t sound accusatory—in case he didn’t remember. But if he did, I didn’t want to look stupid.
I shuffled a bit. “It looks like you have a knot on the back of your head.”
He scoffed, then looked at me. “What do you mean?” His left hand searched. “I don’t feel anyth—oh. I must have bumped my head.”
I tried to suppress any recognition—or sudden flush of anticipation—that crept up my neck in pink splotches. If he didn’t remember, why did I? The thought boxed me in, pressed close, causing a shred of worry to claw its way into my neck. “Are you all right?”
He sighed, then wiped the back of his hand over his forehead.
“It doesn’t help that it’s hotter than the Devil’s basement in this place.
” He wedged the flathead farther between the shelf and the wall, used both hands to push in, then angle it away.
Like a lever, it separated the two. Finishing nails released, one by one.
I stole a glance over my shoulder. An inkling started in my fingers—a tingle, as if they wanted to touch the wall, to run down the section that had been missing yesterday.
“Should I go turn the AC on? Close a few of the windows?” My eyes flitted over Sayer’s shoulder where he stood in the doorway. “I’m a little warm, I think.” I fanned my shirt open to be rid of the imaginary sweat.
“I’ll be … fine?” He said it like a question.
“Good, that’s good.” I rubbed the side of my neck, then pivoted to the steps. “I’ll get you a water and Advil, just in case.”
And so it went—Sayer and Emma and I chipping away at my task lists. Emma would work remotely early in the morning, log off at two, and start helping with odds and ends. Sometimes she would get coffee or lunch from town or run to the hardware store for something I’d forgotten to pick up myself.
Every night, I checked the hallway. The wall didn’t change, and neither Sayer or Emma mentioned it.
One late afternoon, in a desperate attempt to feel like I hadn’t imagined the whole ordeal, I snuck into the sunroom while Sayer and Emma set up our takeout in the dining area.
The air still pressed on my lungs when I stepped in. The wicker furniture sat in the same place it had for the last decade or two. Nothing had changed—not even the bench I’d dreamed about.
I took a seat, strangling the bench lip, trying to steady my breathing. My heart skittered as I lifted my attention from the floor to a potted fern across the room, then to my right—to the door I’d seen that thing in.
But nothing was there.
That night, at exactly 12:15 AM, the cries started again like clockwork.
They lasted for days.
Momma, no.
Momma, please don’t let him.
Momma, take me with you. Please don’t leave.
I tossed every night. The pleas, so similar to mine when I asked Aunt Cadence to let me stay, ripped layers from my lungs like a peeling onion, until one night I stumbled out of the bedroom, grabbed my keys, and locked myself in my car.
I slept in the reclined passenger seat until sunrise kissed the trees, and got rewarded with a stiff neck.
To compound my rigidity, text messages filtered through sporadically from my mother. It only exacerbated the fact that I left that little boy on the other side of that door, alone. How many times had I cried like he had, wishing my own mother to come back in the middle of the night?
MOM: You need to send me pictures of things before you take them to donation.
MOM: Some of those items are mine.
MOM: I will drive down there and get them myself if you don’t mail them.
MOM: Speaking of mailing. Why haven’t the ashes shown up yet?
A poorly veiled threat.
I’d just finished removing the painter’s tape from the kitchen baseboards one Thursday when my phone vibrated on the island.
I didn’t need to check to know it was Mom.
I balled the tape up with more force than necessary, stood, ripped the retractable trash can out of its hiding place, and chucked the tape ball inside.
I could block her. Act like I broke my phone and didn’t remember her number. But if I did, what would I do if she actually drove down? At least when I’d invited her to the funeral, I hadn’t expected her to actually show up. At a funeral, with witnesses, there was nothing she could ask me for.
I should have known that would change as soon as I was alone.
Ping.
I stared, blank, out the breakfast nook window. I could go outside. Take a break. Plant those seedlings before they died.
Or, I could break down the wall. See if the door was there. Prove I wasn’t crazy.
Ping.
Slowly, I turned to where my phone lay face up on the island.
Eleanora Peluska blinked over the screen, the realtor. A second later, it lit up again, but with a different name. Carla Matterson.
I shouldn’t have been surprised Eleanora was reaching back out. I’d kept my interactions at arm’s length, because that uncertain part of myself couldn’t fully commit to giving her the listing. Not yet. Tack on Mom’s incessant calling, and my blood pressure was ready to bubble through the roof.
I couldn’t do this. I turned the phone off, stalked to the garage and grabbed a pair of gloves, and headed around the back of the house toward the shed. The seedlings stood tall against the shed side, a few leaves slightly curled. They were probably rootbound at this point.
I carried them down to the edge of the lawn, where I remembered Aunt Cadence’s garden used to be. I kept my head down and trudged back to the shed to dig around for a two-pronged hoe. Ten minutes later, I had a rectangular outline in the dirt, and I started to swing.
I didn’t look back at Harthwait once.
My body was on fire.
I slithered from my bed late the next morning.
A cold sweat clammed my skin, plastering the thin sheet beneath the quilt to my legs and arms. I never understood how that happened: I could go to sleep, semi-comfortable in a huddle of blankets after a shower, then wake up sticky as a marathon runner by daylight.
I shut my windows, one by one. I thought I’d closed them before I fell asleep to an infomercial. Eyed the dolls on the shelf by my old desk, as if they had anything to do with it.
I retrieved a (maybe) clean shirt from a pile I’d let collect in the rocking chair.
Laundry was a priority like hot tea ran in my bloodstream: seldom.
Then again, the thought of doing anything that didn’t revolve around renovations made me nauseous.
I averted my gaze; if I didn’t look at it, maybe the mound would disappear.
I forewent the jeans I’d left in the hamper and opted for shorts. Instead of brushing my hair, I finger-combed it, then tied it a knot at my crown. I didn’t make it far down the hall before Emma’s voice echoed up the steps.
“Of course! Let me go and see if she’s up yet and we can give you the full tour.”
“A bit late to be sleeping in, yeah?” This voice was deeper, familiar.
I rounded the corner, met by three sets of eyes. Two I knew, one I didn’t. Ringing started in my right ear.
Emma spotted me first.
“The woman I was going to get! Look who stopped by.” Emma’s expression brightened. I could have counted every single one of her teeth, top and bottom row, she smiled so wide.
Ivan stood in the doorway in casual clothes, Wranglers and a pair of boots. Not a lick of dirt coated the hems. A man I didn’t recognize, similar in age to the three of us, with long braids that fell past his shoulders, lingered just behind Ivan.
I floated, disconnected, until I reached the first floor. I wanted to curl into myself, so small I could disappear, from the way they watched me.
“Is something wrong?” I didn’t like how breathy my words sounded.
Emma leaned against the doorframe. “I asked Ivan and Trevor to come by and take a look at the house. You know, for a second opinion.”
Fire ate through the pit of my stomach, working upward out of my esophagus. Why would anyone else need to look at the house? It’d been inspected—twice—which I’d made a priority. “I didn’t know,” I said, pointed.
“We haven’t decided if we’re letting Eleanora have the listing,” she told both of them, as if I already knew this. “You know, it’s an old house. I’m sure you guys have seen plenty of relevant comps to tell us if the suggested renos are worth the hassle.”
Ivan’s smile was slick when he leaned in, his shoulder pressing against the doorframe. “Of course. I’m glad I ran into you. Landry hadn’t mentioned doing the renos here.”
Emma shot me a look that said, Why not?
My cheeks heated with embarrassment. Of course I hadn’t told him. I didn’t want him to know anything about my work or why I was here. But Emma had opened the front door wide for them.
I took a step back, closer to the stairs. “I’m sorry—but it seems I’ve been left out of this conversation,” I said. I didn’t look at Emma. “Why exactly are you here at my house?”
If only Sayer was here today instead of taking time to be with Wade.
Don’t get me wrong, I was all for quality time with a significant other.
But I now drifted in the middle of the Pacific with no life raft, and I needed a buoy.
Sayer was that buoy. My self-control was slipping like granules through dry fingers.
“I have my real estate license,” Ivan said. “Trevor’s a trusted contractor.”