Chapter 13
Fredrik
“Ready to do some tiling?” Jackson called from the front door.
His voice had a careful edge to it, like he was approaching an unpredictable wild animal. Was that me?
“Sure! Come on in,” I called back, meeting him in the dark, cold foyer. “It’d be good to get that bathroom finished.”
He gave me a hug, then a measured look. “You look better.”
“I’m okay.”
“No, you look alive.”
“Thanks.”
“Did you say you wanted to finish the bathroom? We’re not going to order original tiles handmade by monks on the foothills of Tuscany?”
“No. The one you showed me last time is fine. The zigzag.”
“The chevron?”
“Whatever. It’s fine.”
Jackson looked at me for a moment longer, then broke into a smile. “Hallelujah! I’ll go get my stuff before you change your mind.”
He ran back to his truck. I put on my slippers and followed, feeling guilty.
Was he saying I didn’t want to finish the house?
Maybe I’d been stalling a little, worried that I wasn’t going to do justice to the historical features.
It had always been Uncle Glenn’s dream to restore the house to its original glory, and I wanted to respect that.
However, after decades of renovations and alterations, it was hard to know what that even meant.
He’d bought the place on a whim, like he’d done most things, and bequeathed it to me, possibly also on a whim.
He had seen potential in everything. Buildings. Businesses. People.
He’d seen something in me.
It was dark outside, and so cold that every hair on my body instantly stood up.
Maine winters were something else. I should have worn my boots and zipped up my jacket, but it seemed pointless to do so for a few minutes outside.
Besides, it was probably good for me to get my nuts whipped by the icy wind.
It’d wake me up for an all-nighter and get rid of the persistent hard-on I’d been sporting all day since that kiss. I had to stop thinking about it.
“Take that,” Jackson said, hoisting a cardboard box into my arms.
It must have been the tiles since the weight of it nearly buckled my knees.
I adjusted to it and carried it inside. I wasn’t weak.
Chopping firewood for myself, my parents, and my grandfather kept me from turning into a wet noodle, as did my occasional visits to Lobstah Lifts—whenever Jackson decided he needed a workout buddy.
But I was getting lazy and sluggish, like my mind was stuck in some sort of tar.
Not moving. Not feeling. Avoiding anything that might cause more pain.
And then she’d kissed me. Just like that, with no preamble. Or maybe she considered mentioning her curiosity a drumroll of some kind. It fucking wasn’t. She’d blindsided me, slipping through a crack and tilting everything until I lost sight of the horizon.
But I wasn’t feeling sluggish anymore. I wanted to move. To do something.
Jackson organized his tools outside the gutted bathroom and started measuring the walls. For a while, we worked in silence, laying tiles until the floor was ready for grouting.
“So…” Jackson said as he grabbed a bucket to mix the grout. “A little birdie told me you have a new tenant.”
“Tenant?” I asked, buying time.
“The cute girl living at your store?”
I sighed. “How do you know about that? She moved in like two hours ago.”
“Your sister came to clean a site we were working at.”
I shook my head in disbelief. Kailee must have texted her mom immediately.
The gossip gene ran in the family. Why didn’t I have it?
I’d never felt the slightest need to discuss other people’s business.
I barely wanted to discuss mine, especially with my friend observing me like that, his eyes filled with glee.
“Yeah, she’s staying for a bit. Her boss came for a visit and told her she wasn’t allowed to sleep at the back of her store.”
“No shit! How was there even room for a bed in there? If they split the real estate office in three…”
“There’s no room! It was a child’s bed. Ridiculous.”
“Did she turn up at your door with a sleeping bag or something?”
“No. I happened to be there and heard their conversation, so I told her boss she was staying with me to get him off her back.”
“And then you had to find her a place? Because you can’t help but get involved.”
“What’s this about? You wanna take her?”
“I would, but I have a feeling you’d bite my head off.
” He winked, slapping a load of grout on the floor, then handing me the float.
“Can you carry on? I’ll start from the other end, and we can meet in the middle, then we wash and let it dry for thirty minutes while we grab beers, then the final clean, and it’s done. ”
I took the float and did my best to mimic Jackson’s movements, happy to see a glimpse of what the finished floor would look like.
No more picking my way across the ugly, gutted floor when I needed to use the bathroom.
No more ruining socks walking on rough concrete. Why had I lived like that for so long?
Jackson grabbed a sponge and showed me how to wipe the tiles without pulling out too much of the grout. “Keep it light,” he said. “Like you’re stroking her hair, postcoital.”
“Whose hair?” I grumbled.
He ignored me. “I, for one, think it’s healthy that you’re noticing someone.
But remember what I’ve told you about local girls?
This is someone who works next door and you’ll see regularly.
And now she’s living in your store…” He paused for effect, giving me a careful look.
“I told you, I’ll take you out. A weekend in Bangor.
We’ll blow off some steam and find you a hot date. ”
“I don’t need a—”
“I mean a nice bookish lady who’s turned on by that whole mental patient slash professor vibe,” he corrected, gesturing at my outfit.
I glanced at my fluffy slippers, corduroy pants, and bathrobe. “I was going for The Big Lebowski.”
“See! Even your movie references are dated. At this rate, you’ll end up with a menopausal woman.”
“Noelle thinks elbow patches are sexy,” I countered, then immediately froze, wishing I could reel the words back in.
Jackson halted, too, holding a measuring tape between his hands, like he was using it to assess the credibility of my words. Twenty inches of bullshit.
“She said that?”
I nodded.
“In actual words?”
I nodded again.
“To you?”
I groaned in frustration. “She says a lot of things. Blurts them out like a broken radio. It’s not that deep.”
“But she said it to you.” He narrowed his eyes. “She’s into you!”
“She’s curious. She’ll be into someone else tomorrow.”
He shook his head. “No. She’s into you. I’m sure there’s a sexy dude wearing elbow patches in a catalog somewhere, but the way you do it? Nobody finds that sexy. Trust me.”
He had a point.
“I guess there’s just not that much to do in Hideaway Harbor.”
“She wants to do you to alleviate her boredom?” Jackson gave me a look.
“Either way, she’s only in town for the holidays.”
Jackson’s eyes widened as the realization took hold. “That’s right! Because she sells tinsel and shit!”
I nodded because a lot of what that store contained was indeed shit.
“Stay away from her. I mean it.” I couldn’t help the words from flying out of my mouth.
Jackson laughed. “I’m not going after her! But you should. Have a holiday fling. Distract yourself from… you know. It’s perfect.”
“I’m…” I shook my head, looking for the right words. “I’m not like you.”
I’ll fall for her. She’ll shred my heart, and I’ll never recover.
“You mean you get way too serious way too fast?” He raised his brow. “I know. Life’s not all or nothing, Teddy. There’s a lot that falls in between. Fun weekends. Dates, you know? The girl who’s fun-crazy when she’s drunk and then the following morning—”
“She’s just crazy,” I finished for him. I’d heard this story. “Sounds delightful.”
Jackson slapped more grout on the tiles, looking a little hurt. “Sorry I can’t sell it to you with big words. I’m not a novelist like your other friends. I’m alive, though.”
I had to laugh. “I love that about you.”
We worked in silence for a while, dodging each other in the small space. Before long, we’d filled all the gaps and the floor looked a lot more finished, apart from the layer of grout sitting on the tiles. It was also sitting across the hem of my bathrobe.
“It’s beer o’clock,” Jackson announced, straightening his back with a groan. “And please don’t throw that awful garment in the wash. Throw it out.”
I discarded the bathrobe and fetched two cold ones from the fridge as Jackson plopped himself on the couch. He’d somehow finished the floor without getting anything on his expensive jeans. The man lived in a different reality.
I restarted the fire that had died and joined him.
“So… Bangor next weekend?” Jackson went for casual, but I heard the serious undertones.
We hadn’t done anything he considered fun in two years. He’d been supportive and patient with me, but I had to pull myself out of this funk or I’d lose the last person not related to me by blood who still cared enough to turn up.
“I thought you’d be signed up for Santa Speed Dating this Friday. Eileen will be devastated if you skip town.”
Jackson sat up. “Santa what? How do I not know about this?”
“Because you don’t pay attention to her flyers?” I guessed. “They’re all over the place.”
“Okay. New plan! We both go Santa Speed Dating.”
“Over my dead body.”
“Would you prefer to be freshly killed or with some impressive rigor mortis? I’ll try to time it right.”
I could see it in his eyes. He’d never let this go. He’d drag me there by the fake beard he’d glue on my face in my sleep, thinking he was both hilarious and helpful. I needed to distract him with something. Anything.
“She kissed me.”
The silence that followed made my ears ring, like I’d just heard an explosion.
“Noelle? The candy cane girl?”
“Don’t call her that!” I tried to shake the mental image of Jackson licking Noelle.
“She kissed you, and…” He stared at me expectantly.
“Nothing. I told her it was a bad idea. She agreed.”
“You didn’t kiss her back?” Jackson yelled.
I wiped the spit spray off my cheek, huffing indignantly. “I… We made out. But I couldn’t go on, could I? We were upstairs in my store. Kailee was there. I mean, not in the room, but…”
“But you told her you’d like to go on, right? You told her that she’s hot and amazing and you’d like to take her out? Eat her out? Meet her later? Give me something!”
“We agreed to be friends. It’s fine.”
Jackson slammed his beer bottle against my coffee table. “It’s not fine, you idiot! She kissed you, and you pulled some standoffish move. You humiliated her, and now she’s never going to try again, and you’ll die a miserable, lonely bastard.”
“That’s a little dramatic. We both agreed it’s not a good idea. She’s staying in my store. There’s a power imbalance. It’s awkward.”
“Of course there’s a power imbalance. She needs your help, and you made it clear you want nothing from her.”
“Are you saying I should ask her to pay rent by sucking my dick?”
Jackson got up and walked over to my fridge, helping himself to another beer. “You owe me this,” he said, opening it with the edge of the table. “For being that dense.”
I was getting irritated now, but also worried. Was it possible I’d offended Noelle? She’d seemed fine afterward, joking with me and teaming up with my niece. “I don’t care about any power imbalance. She needed help, and I’m helping her. I don’t need anything in return.”
Jackson rolled his head to loosen his shoulders and crossed the floor to join me on the couch again. “You think you’re being a gentleman or something, but she’s not going to see it that way. She’s now thinking you don’t like her, and desperately looking for somewhere else to stay.”
The realization fell on me like a blanket of snow, spreading a chill down my spine.
I’d rejected her. I’d probably made her feel like a nuisance.
She’d only stayed because she didn’t have anywhere else to go.
She’d buried her feelings and joked around to make herself feel better. That was what people did.
If I wanted to really help her, I had to do better than that.
But what could I possibly do?