Chapter 9 #2
The bathroom was very…pink. Pink tile, pink bathtub, pink sink, pink flowered wallpaper, pink curtain. It was a lot of pink. Maybe he wouldn’t notice.
“This is very… pink.”
“Oliver and I call it the pink palace. It even has a throne.” I pointed at the toilet and snickered.
Unamused, Gil stood in the middle of the bathroom and turned in a slow circle.
“It used to have pink carpet. That was one of the first things I removed when I could.”
He stared at the tub. “Where’s the handle for the faucet?”
I picked up a pair of pliers I kept on the lip of the bathtub. “It broke off, but this works well enough.”
I hedged around him, brushing his shoulder, and showed him how easy it was. Except it took me four tries and one hard yank before the water sputtered out. Gil’s look said he wasn’t impressed.
“Is there something wrong with the floor?” He pressed the tip of his shoe into the cheap linoleum that had been under the carpet. I was sure there was a lot of water damage under that. Probably mold. Maybe a large family of armadillos.
“That’s nothing. You should see the living room floor.” Whoops.
“What?”
“These old houses. So many quirks. That’s what makes them special.”
His hands went to his hips and his frown deepened. “Right.”
“Lots of potential, don’t you think?” I led him out of the bathroom as Oliver barreled out of his room, waving a plastic figure in his hand. “Mr. Dalton, this is my favorite dinosaur.”
“Velociraptor, right?” Gil said.
“If you want, you could come play with me later. I’m doing Dinosaur Extincting.”
“No,” I said firmly to Oliver. “Mr. Dalton isn’t here to play. He lives outside. We live inside. We can be polite, but we aren’t…friends.”
Oliver’s forehead wrinkled. “But why not?”
How to answer that one? I pulled out the trusted answer parents had used for generations. “Because I said so. Go on back to your room.” I patted him on the head. “I’ll come play with you in a few minutes, okay?”
His shoulders drooped. “Yes, ma’am.” He walked, albeit slowly, down the hall and disappeared into his room.
Gil stopped in front of the only door I hadn’t addressed, his hand going to the doorknob. “What’s in here?”
Without thinking, I threw myself in between him and the door and wrapped my fingers around his wrist. He froze. We stared at each other for a long beat.
He smelled good, like the expensive laundry detergent I only splurged on when the budget allowed, and I had a fleeting thought of leaning in and taking a bigger whiff.
The urge was so strong, I pressed my back against the door to put more space between us.
No smelling the enemy. I needed to remember he wanted to sell my house.
“This is nothing. Just a little closet. Let’s go see the living room.”
“But I want to see what’s in this closet.”
“No, you don’t. It’s just…stuff.”
“What kind of stuff?”
My secret shame. Every single craft project I’d ever started…and never finished. So many skeins of yarn. So many. An embroidery machine. Two dozen plates I had been excited to hand-paint…for about a week. That was just the beginning. “Stuff?”
“Are you asking me?”
“No. It’s just some stuff I collect.” With a wobbly smile, I put a hand on his chest and patted reassuringly.
The corner of his mouth twitched and if I didn’t know better, I would say he was almost amused. “You aren’t collecting human skulls, right? Roadkill? The skin of your former roommates.”
I scowled. “If I were going to collect anything like that, it would be jewelry made from human hair. I saw this video about it. It used to be popular in the eighteen hundreds. After someone died, they’d collect some hair and make brooches and necklaces and rings.
You would never guess it was made of hair.
Pretty amazing stuff. I’ll send you a link to the video. ”
He didn’t make a sound, just stared at me like I’d grown a third eye. Just as well. He should probably know now I could be…eccentric at times. His chest expanded with a breath, and I realized my hand still rested there, against the warm, solid wall of his chest.
Objectively , he was handsome if you liked uptight, principal types with hints of gray in their hair and dark-rimmed glasses and nice hands.
Some people might even say he was a ten.
But he was also here to take my dream away from me.
Minus eight points. Plus, he ate plain oatmeal on purpose .
Take away another three points. Which makes him a negative one. So there.
I snatched my hand back like I’d touched a hot oven.
“Let’s finish this up, okay? I have things to do.
” I slid out from between him and the door and hustled down the hallway and back to the kitchen.
“Oliver and I moved in about three years ago. Honestly, I think Ollie might have been a bit of a hoarder, but we’d been making real progress getting everything sorted.
Still have more work ahead of us, but that’s okay.
I don’t mind the hard work. This house is worth it. ”
“Is it?” He leaned back against a kitchen counter. “This place is a dump. Everything needs to be updated. It would be better to sell it as-is and move on.”
My hands balled into fists. I forced myself to take a deep breath. “This house is over a hundred years old. Generations of your family have lived here.”
“My family?” he scoffed. “You need to get something straight right now. I’m not going to agree to keep this house or the café or anything else.”
“You aren’t the only one who gets to make the decision,” I said, trying to keep the outrage out of my voice. “I own half of it.”
And I can’t afford to buy him out for the other half.
A mulish expression settled on his face, the one that reminded me of Ollie, and I had a flash of a dark-haired little boy who’d been told his favorite sweater vest was dirty and he couldn’t wear it to school. “So do I.”
“I know that.” I took a step forward, poking him in the chest. “And you know what, it’s not fair.
You didn’t even know Ollie. You are—were—his grandson.
How can you just take one look at this house, this legacy he left to you, and decide you don’t want it?
This is part of your heritage. Aren’t you even a little curious? ”
“I’m curious about the money I’ll make when we sell it.”
“I am not selli?—”
“And I sure as hell don’t want to keep a house I can’t even sleep in.”
I let out a frustrated growl. He was right. It was unfair of me. He wouldn’t get anything out of keeping the house. I hated that he was right.
“Fine. I know you probably think I’m some selfish brat and you know, maybe I am right now. But I loved Ollie.” My voice caught when I said his name. “You didn’t even know him, and he still wanted to give you this. Give it a chance, at least.”
“A chance to what? Get to know a man who abandoned my grandmother and my mom? Doesn’t sound like the kind of guy I want to know.”
“Ollie didn’t abandon them,” I said fiercely. But truly, I had no idea what Ollie’s story had been. No one did, but the Ollie I knew wouldn’t have done that.
“You don’t know that.” He took a step back, his dark-blue eyes like lasers burning into my skull. “And you don’t know me.”
With a jerk, he opened the door. I jumped when it slammed shut.