Chapter 20
I want to prosecute the menace to society who invented the leaf blower. Take him to court. Lock him away for life. After jolting awake to the sound of one Friday morning, I shove the book of sonnets under my pillow, throw on a robe, and storm out my French doors.
“Excuse me!” I shout.
Mike has enormous earmuffs on, and his back is turned to me. He’s making casual passes with the blower across my courtyard.
“Mike!”
No answer.
I tap him on the shoulder right before he quickly pivots and blasts me with the full force of the blower.
I cut his power, easy to do with the extension cord dangling behind him. “What are you doing?”
“I’m blowing your courtyard.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s Friday, Beatrice. This is the day I do the groundskeeping.”
“What?”
“Did you think the roses magically pruned themselves?”
“I hadn’t noticed.” Truthfully.
“Of course. Why would a fancy-pants lawyer and heiress stop to consider how the sand magically disappears from her daybed?”
“Bali bed,” I correct. It’s my latest splurge, and probably my last if I don’t figure out another hustle.
FroggoDoggo goes only so far in La Jolla.
Still, the bed was worth it. A bed outside is lots of fun.
It’d be more fun with an ocean view, but at least I can hear the surf when I nap outside in the afternoons.
“I thought you contracted the yard maintenance out.”
Mike inhales, slow and patient. “Of course you did.”
“I’ve never seen you out here.”
“You’ve never been home on a Friday morning before.”
It’s true. I’m usually out the door by eight on Fridays. “Yeah, well, it’s wedding season in La Jolla, and apparently dogs get invites to Mary Star of the Sea.”
“But not you.”
“I’m new.”
“Also incredibly obnoxious.”
“You traipse through my courtyard every Friday morning?”
“Regular, weekly groundskeeping—it’s in our contract. If I trusted you to keep after it, it’d all be dead and withered by now. Usually, I finish up a lot earlier. I’m sorry to disturb you.”
“What else have you been doing on the regular that I don’t know about?”
“Oh, well, I help myself to your abundance of ginger ales—weird beverage to be obsessed with, by the way. Nap in your bed. Stuff seaweed under your pillows.”
Note to self: Move sonnets to drawer of nightstand ASAP.
“And count the hours until you return, and maybe, just maybe, I might see you darting across my front lawn.”
“What the freak?”
“Before you threaten me with any of your legalese, let me remind you that I only have the one recycle bin. Excuse me for noticing the inordinate number of ginger ale bottles.” Mike sets down the leaf blower and grabs a tote filled with clippings. “Have you seen a book?”
“I have. I’ve seen several. If you’re curious, I can crack one open and read it to you. I know those long words and pages without pictures can be hard.”
“Cute.” He pulls a pair of clippers from his back pocket and adds a couple more spent roses to the tote. “I misplaced a book when I moved into the front house.” He waves a hand behind him, but all I see is the white privacy fence.
“What sort of book?” I follow Mike as he carries the tote over to the green waste bin. Not because he asked me to hold open the lid (which I do), but because I want to hear him say that he reads poetry and marks up the pages like a journal. “Dr. Seuss?”
“Sonnets. If you see it, let me know.”
“I’m sure it will turn up. It’s small, so it’s probably just tucked away in a box with your other books.”
“That’s what I thought.” Mike shakes the yard waste into the bin. “But I unpacked all my books last night and didn’t find it.”
“I’ll help you look.” And take the opportunity to snag his copy of Richard III. I should have ripped out act 1, scene 2 when I had the chance.
I skip down the steps through the open gate to Mike’s house. “Whoa,” I say as I stumble into his kitchen. “This place has completely changed.”
“Drywall will do that.”
I lift a corner of the Ram Board off the floor. “New hardwoods?”
Mike sighs. “Sadly, the old ones could not be salvaged.”
I poke around. The kitchen is surprisingly tidy. Supplies are organized neatly in a corner. “What happened to all the piles of junk?”
“Hauled it all to the dump last week after I finished texturing the drywall.”
I wander into the living room. “You put in a bigger window.” It takes up nearly the entire wall.
“Might as well. I was going to replace it anyway.”
“How? I never see subcontractors on the property.”
“I don’t use a lot of subs, but when I have to, I make a point of scheduling them well after nine a.m. You know, to minimize the noise complaints from the neighbors.”
I run my hand along the textured drywall. “Where did you learn how to do this?”
“My dad mostly. He’s in construction. I worked for him when we moved out to Texas.
Learned how to wire a house, put up drywall, install cabinets, lay tile.
” Mike pushes a box of tools flush against the wall.
“He said if I was going to waste my time memorizing lines for parts I might never get, then at least my hands could be busy.” He brushes some dust off the windowsill.
“Poor Dad. He realized too late that he was only enabling me. Construction is valuable experience when it comes to set design. And working for him gave me lots of time and lots of people to entertain. You learn to project pretty quickly when you want to be heard above power tools.”
I bet.
“His subs are now some of Texas’ best critics when it comes to live Shakespeare.”
I can’t breathe I’m so jealous. If I’d known that a job in construction in some corner of Texas would have given me that level of access to Mike’s talent, I’d be hanging drywall right now. “And your dad?”
“He finds it very entertaining that I’m still in construction. He says anytime I want to move back to Texas, he’s got a job waiting for me.”
“Dads can be insufferable. Especially when it comes to family businesses. Ask me how I know.” I’m still not speaking to my dad, but rather than feeling angry about how everything happened, now I just feel…sad. “So what’s next? All these tools can’t be for staging.”
Mike blows out a breath and runs a hand through his hair. The blond has grown out past his temples, and what looked like black roots have softened into a dark brown. “Finishing the floor, painting, baseboards, kitchen cabinets, a backsplash, appliances, countertops. The list goes on.”
“Where are the books?” I wander down the hallway to the bedrooms and open the closed door. Is it rude? Yes. Does this stop me? No. The guy let himself into my bedroom at my parents’ house, after all.
I’m not sure what I’m expecting to find.
I take it back—I expect to find a dirty mattress on the floor, piles of overripe laundry, an old grease-stained pizza box, all the trappings of student life.
I’m shocked to see a tidy, even chic bedroom.
The leather chair, I recognize. A spindle midcentury bed with creamy duvet, I do not.
But it’s the stuffed bookshelves I’m interested in. I cannot keep my hands off the books. My fingers brush against their spines. Unlike most everything else in modern life that has become set dressing for content creation, these bookshelves are for function. The collection is worn and delicious.
“So many books.”
Mike stands in the doorway. “I can’t move them into the front until I’ve painted, and I was getting tired of unpacking boxes every time I needed to find one.”
His room smells like eucalyptus, and I want to take a stack of books to his bed and start reading.
Mike edges closer until he’s standing next to me. “Are you doing anything tonight?”
My breath becomes shallow. “Excuse me?”
He pushes the copy of Northanger Abbey that I’ve been fiddling with in line with the other books. “Adam asked me to mention that he could use some more help at the escape room, if you wanted to pick up some shifts.”
He’s herding me toward his door. Before I can figure out how he’s organized the titles. Before I can grab the copy of Richard III.
I snort. “Pass.” Could I use the money? Absolutely. Am I willing to orbit Mike while he’s in cosplay with my brother and all his cast there to see the messy push-pull I feel for this man? Heck no.
Mike closes his bedroom door firmly. “Well, if you change your mind, let me know. Always happy to carpool.”
I follow Mike back out to the kitchen, not that it looks like a kitchen. Just a wall with random hookups jutting out. “You don’t even have a sink yet.” He does have a wooden table with a toaster oven on it and wire shelves with kitchen gadgetry behind plastic tarping. “How do you eat?”
“I manage,” Mike says, sliding a box of tiles away from the wall.
I spy a jar of cookies on the wire shelf and dive behind the tarp. “So you were here every day after school and every summer until your move?”
Mike measures the wall behind me. “Yup.”
“What did you do? Apart from eating garbage.”
Mike takes more measurements and makes some notes on his phone.
“Did you learn to surf?” I bite into the cookie and quickly grab two more from the container. They’re delicious. Taste like they came from one of those fancy bakeries I walk by with my four-legged clients.
“Of course.”
“Do you still surf?” I survey the wire shelves serving as Mike’s makeshift pantry for licorice but find none.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Bea, I’m not sure you know this. Seeing as how you are retired or whatever, but some of us have to work for a living.”
“I thought you were a student.”
“Some of us have to work for a living even while going to school.”
“Hey! I worked my butt off. Worked so hard I burned out. Don’t talk to me about work ethic.” This is the first time in my life I have space enough to breathe and have conversations that aren’t about law.
“Must be hard walking the occasional pooch and still being able to afford everything you want.”
“What is your problem? I asked if you still surf, and all of a sudden, you’re biting my head off.”
“My problem, Princess, is that you are in my way, and I have to order these cabinets by tonight if I want to get the sale price.”
“You could have just said that.” I smooth the plastic back in place. “If you need a kitchen sink or more fridge space”—I spy the mini fridge in the corner—“you know where to find me.”
Mike sighs. He straightens and looks me up and down. “And this generosity would come with what sort of strings attached?”
Why can’t it be easy? Why is everything impossible?
He could have just said, Thanks. And I could have said, Anytime, and that would have been that.
But no. He wants to talk terms and negotiate, and that’s something Lawyer Beatrice is always willing to do, but I don’t like that side of me.
I don’t like weighing being a decent human being or good neighbor against quid pro quo, not anymore.
I shrug. “You’d owe me one, I suppose.”
“Pass.”
“Fine. Enjoy washing dishes in your bathroom sink.” I bite into my third cookie before I show myself out.