6. Chapter 6
Dean
The prince’s kingdom awaited his decision. The prince, meanwhile, had discovered spackle.
“Hello?” I ask, my voice groggy from sleep.
“Dean?” a voice I know well replies.
I let out a tired breath. Had I not been woken from a dead sleep and been completely disoriented, I might not have answered.
“Mom,” I say, wiping the sleep out of my eyes.
I don’t always avoid her calls, but I have a sinking suspicion I know why she’s calling today. In fact, I’d bet every bit of money I have in the bank on it.
“How’s my boy?” she asks in that silky-sweet tone she always uses when she wants something.
“I’m good,” I tell her.
It’s not an exaggeration. Once again, I slept better than I have in a long time, cocooned in the middle of this old mattress. Much better than the sleep I got at the last five-star resort I stayed at.
Which is . . . odd.
I’m also feeling good because I have a project: fixing the wall in my room. Which, I’ll admit, was incredibly frustrating at first—finding another shortcut by Rosie. At least this time I didn’t end up half naked and dripping wet in her entryway.
But also, I sort of enjoyed it? Not the naked part—the hole-fixing part.
I’ve been trying to find a hobby for a while now.
Golf was too slow—too much standing and waiting.
Spanish lasted four hundred days on the app, and I still can’t carry a conversation.
There’s an out-of-tune guitar in my storage unit.
Turns out what I like is patching drywall.
It didn’t end up being as cut-and-dried as I thought it would be.
After a quick Google search, I realized the holes where the anchors ripped out of the wall were too big for just spackle, and they would need mesh patches.
So, I went to Berk’s Hardware, conveniently one street over, grabbed what I needed, and spent the afternoon working on it. Now it should be dry enough to finish.
“That’s good to hear,” my mom replies.
“How are you?” I almost don’t want to ask, because it’s never a simple answer and especially won’t be right now with everything that went down regarding the will.
“Oh, you know,” she says.
Yep. Here we go.
“Have you seen the farm?” She jumps right in.
I rub my forehead. “I did. It’s in pretty bad shape.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah, the orchard is gone, and the front of the barn is burned down. There are raccoons living in the house.”
“Well, that’s not good,” she says.
Do I detect a slight bit of glee in the way she said that? Good. Maybe if the place sounds like a money pit, she can finally let it go.
“It’s going to be a pain to just get the raccoons out,” I keep going. “It’ll probably cost me quite a bit.”
I honestly hadn’t thought of the cost of animal removal. How much do companies charge to remove a family of raccoons? Maybe I should take Rosie up on asking those brothers to do it.
Right now, though, I need my mom to understand that the property is in bad shape and she’s better off not having to deal with it.
“I still don’t know why she changed the will like that,” my mom says.
Nope. My plan didn’t work at all.
I blow out a breath. “I don’t know either,” I tell her, like I have probably a hundred times already. “But they’re her wishes, and I want to honor them.”
I thought about just letting my mom have the farm. It would be easy to just turn it over to her. She had been expecting it and counting on it. She needs it more than I do.
But she didn’t grow up here. My grandparents bought the place right after she graduated. I spent ten summers on that farm. My mom has probably spent ten days.
I can’t say for sure what prompted my grandma to change her will, but I have a feeling it had to do with my mom’s current husband.
A man named Ed. He’s a piece of work. An alcoholic for sure, possibly a gambling addict.
They came to visit my grandma at the nursing home in Burlington a couple of years ago, not long after they eloped, and I think she took one look at him and knew what would happen to her farm if she kept the will the way it was.
My mom would have sold it immediately, and all the money would have gone to Ed.
Maybe that’s what she wanted me to do with the property? Sell it and give the money to my mom, but in a way that someone couldn’t take it from her, like in a trust or something.
It would have to be ironclad, so she couldn’t be manipulated into spending it. Because that’s happened before. My mom will do almost anything for what she thinks is love.
What I really wish I could give her is safety. I just don’t know what that looks like.
“Do you think maybe she was suffering from dementia? She could have been losing her mind,” my mom says.
I honestly don’t know how many times she’s asked this. My grandma could recall things most of us can’t, so I don’t think that was the issue.
“I don’t think so.”
“I could contest it, you know.”
“And I told you to do it,” I remind her.
I told her that after the will was read.
I think she was in shock after hearing the change, then that shock turned to confusion, which then turned to anger.
Lots of how could she do this to me? And she always hated me.
I think she even tried to say that this was my grandma punishing her from the grave.
I think it was my grandma saving my mom from Ed.
My mom won’t go through with it, though. At the end of the day, contesting a will costs money, and that’s something Tina Alden doesn’t have much of.
She sighs. “Well, that’s not the only reason I called,” she says.
“What else is going on?” I ask tentatively.
She hasn’t asked for money in a while, so at least Ed is making sure the bills are getting paid, which is somewhat reassuring.
“Ed and I are moving to Vegas,” she says.
I pull my chin in, even though she can’t see my expression. “What? You hate the desert.”
One time when I was around twelve, she followed a boyfriend to Arizona in the middle of summer. Our time there was short and so was the relationship. She said she never wanted to live in the desert again.
“I don’t hate it,” she says.
“I’m pretty sure you do,” I reply.
“Well, Ed wants to move there, so we’re moving. Next month. I’ll send you my address when we get there.”
I swipe a hand down my face. “Okay,” I say.
There’s nothing to argue here. I’ve watched my mom make decisions based on the men in her life enough to know that my words never work on her.
“Love you, Dean,” she says.
“Love you, too,” I tell her before hanging up.
Feeling unsettled from the conversation, I get up and change into basketball shorts and a T-shirt and put on my running shoes. I’m not sure a run is in the cards, but a jog to clear my head is just what I need.
I check my work from yesterday, and sure enough, the joint compound has cured. When I get back, I’ll sand it, paint it, and then once that’s dry, I can rehang the shelf.
If I were consulting this business, I’d tell Rosie that doing the job right the first time would cost her a lot less time and money in the long run. But I’m not consulting, and I’ve learned the hard way that unsolicited advice is rarely appreciated.
The jog feels good in the crisp morning air, the smell of damp leaves and woodsmoke, birds chirping around me, but it’s doing nothing for my mental state.
I’m not worried about my mom and her choices.
She’s an adult; she can make her own mistakes.
What’s bothering me is her unintentional reminder that I have no idea what I’m doing with this property.
If it were a client, I would tell them to liquidate it without further debate.
It’s a negative-yield deteriorating asset with no strategic fit.
Not worth the time or the effort. I know this.
Except that this is my family’s legacy, whatever is left of it.
It’s not just a piece of land. It’s my heritage.
And my heritage just happens to be a dilapidated farm that’s been taken over by raccoons.
He’ll know what to do.
I stop to catch my breath, hands on my hips, my chest feeling tight. It’s only been a week since I ran, but I feel more out of shape than if it had been a month.
I’m almost to the farm. My legs brought me here of their own accord. Or maybe it was my subconscious. Either way, I could go see it again. Maybe the answers are there in the early-morning sun, in the quiet, without neighbors around.
Or . . . I could go back and finish working on the wall.
Decision made, I start up my jog again and ten minutes later I walk through the door at the inn.
In the great debate between visiting my grandparents’ house or going back to sand down a wall and paint it, the wall won.
“Oh, hey,” Rosie says when she sees me. She’s got jeans and a pink T-shirt on, her hair down around her shoulders. No overalls today.
“Hey,” I say in return.
“Out for a run?” she asks, pointing to my clothing.
“Yep,” I tell her. I could have said something wittier, but right now I’m feeling all out of jokes.
“What’s your plan for the day?” she asks, a soft smile on her face.
“I’m going to finish patching the holes in my room, and then try to find a company to remove the raccoons from the house.”
“Oh, yes, the uninvited visitors,” she says.
I nod. “What are your plans?”
She blinks, looking surprised by the question. Like no one has asked her this in a while. It’s none of my business, really, but she asked first.
“I’m working on the inn and then going to a football game tonight.
It’s the first high school game of the season; pretty much everyone in town goes.
I really don’t have the time, since I have to have the inn ready by the festival, and I only have four weeks to do it, but I promised the Ednas I’d take them.
They’re two older women who’ve lived in town forever,” she says, answering the question before I could ask it.
“I’m never sure which one is Edna B. or Edna G.
and it feels weird to ask them now since I’ve known them basically my entire life.
But I have a fifty/fifty chance of getting it right tonight, since I’m picking them up at one of their houses.
If I get it wrong, they’ll probably tell anyone who’ll listen, since they’re the gossip queens of the town, and I’m sure they’ll say something like ‘that Rosie Harper can’t tell us apart,’ and I’ll spend the next decade being quizzed each time I see them as penance. ”
She covers her mouth. “Rambling, sorry.”
“You have to have the inn ready in a month?”
She eyes me. “That’s what you took from that? Yes. We have a fall festival in October. All my rooms are booked, and they have to be done by then.”
“So, then why would you say yes to taking the—what did you call them?”
“The Ednas,” she says.
“Right. Why would you agree to take them to the game if you don’t have time?”
She blinks again. That same look from before.
“Because they asked me,” she says.
Now it’s my turn to blink. Consultant Dean would tell her that’s not a good use of time. But guest-at-this-inn Dean doesn’t really have that right.
“Anyway,” she says in a moving-on tone. “Since I’ll be gone tonight, you’ll have the place to yourself. Please make yourself at home. Also”—she hands me a small folded piece of paper—“that’s my phone number. If you need anything, just text or call.”
“Thanks,” I say, tucking the paper into the pocket of my shorts.
“Well, those rooms aren’t going to finish themselves,” she says, pointing toward the stairs.
“Right,” I tell her. “Good . . . uh . . . luck.”
I’m not sure why I say that, but it’s what comes out of my mouth. I’m guessing she does need some luck if she wants to get this place ready. From what I’ve seen of the other rooms, it would probably take a team to get it done.
A team she doesn’t have.
“Hey, Rosie,” I say, stopping her on the stairs. She turns around and faces me.
“Yeah?”
“I know this is a strange request, but do you think I could use the kitchen?”
She looks at me, confused and surprised.
“I thought maybe I could keep a few things in the fridge? And maybe make myself some meals. I’m not sure I can keep eating at the grill or the café,” I explain.
Both are decent places, and within walking distance from here, but not something I want to keep doing day in and day out.
I came up with the plan last night after I saw the unused kitchen. It’s unprecedented, but this entire stay has been outside the norm. I’m fixing a wall in my room for crap’s sake.
“Yes,” she says. “Of course. I should have thought to offer.”
I shake my head, not following her logic. “It’s not a normal thing to offer.”
“I know, but this isn’t a normal inn,” she says, adding a shrug of her shoulders for emphasis.
I give her a small smile. “That’s . . . very true. You don’t have to say yes, though. You can tell me if you’d rather I not use it.”
She looks at me again with that blank sort of stare.
Then she smiles. “Why not? It’s barely getting used by me anyway.”
“Okay, well, thanks,” I say.
“Make yourself at home,” she says before turning and going up the stairs.