Chapter 6
Opinion: Reality falls somewhere between the best- and worst-case scenarios.
—Delilah Dune, opinion writer
T he puddle she’d left in the kitchen was a small lake by the time she arrived home. Grabbing the bucket she’d purchased from Mr. Tibbs, she placed it under the leak and glanced up just in time to get a second raindrop to the eye today. “Ugh!”
The doorbell rang.
Even though she could only see out of one eye, she headed in that direction and opened the door, apologizing before she’d even set eyes on the person waiting on the porch. “Sorry for the goth clown look,” she said, covering a hand over one eye.
“Goth clown?” the man asked.
“Water from the leak got in my eye. Runny mascara and blush equals goth clown,” she explained. “Never mind. Come on in. Thank you for getting here so quickly.”
“Anytime.” The man’s voice was deep and gravelly. And familiar.
Narrowing her one good eye, she lowered her hand, blinking the other eye until the blur was gone. “Travis? What are you doing here?”
“You invited me.”
“I’m pretty sure I didn’t.” She looked past him to the open front door. “Listen, I’m expecting someone right now, so your apology will have to wait.”
“Apology? I’m not the one who did anything wrong.”
After her breakup with Joe, Lyla had surpassed her limit for conflict and confrontation for at least the next year. “The past is the past. We can move on from it or stay stuck in it. It’s your call. Either way, we’ll have to do it another time. I’m kind of busy right now.”
“Is that the reason you never opened my emails?” he asked. “Too busy?”
She tried to roll her eyes, but her left eye still stung. Where was this handyman? He said he’d be here in fifteen minutes. “Look, it’s been years. You and I don’t really know one another anymore. We’re practically strangers.”
“Whose fault is that?” He placed his hands on his hips, which she realized were strapped with a tool belt. “I disagree, though. We’re far from strangers.” He seemed to scrutinize her as he gave her a slow once-over. “Same eyes. Same crease between your brows when you’re too serious. Or when I used to do something you knew would get us in trouble.” He pointed at her face. “Same Ursa Major constellation on your cheek right there.”
Lyla had forgotten that he’d always pointed out how the freckles made a perfect Ursa Major pattern.
“Maybe it’s been years, but I still know you, Ly. And I know why you didn’t stay in touch.”
She didn’t have the bandwidth for a trip down Memory Lane. “Travis, it’s not a good time.”
“Fear,” he said. “When something scared you, you used to shut down or run away. You never just faced it head-on. I’m just not sure what it is you were afraid of with me.”
Her throat constricted, swollen with emotion. Shutting down or running away felt like good options right now. Her gaze flicked over her shoulder at the leak, which seemed to be getting worse. She imagined the ceiling caving in at any point. One a sigh, she faced Travis again. “Travis, I’m waiting on someone. Two somebodies, actually, because a guy is also scheduled to pick up these donation boxes today.”
“That’s fine, because I’m not here for socializing,” he said in a curt tone that she’d never heard from him. “I’m here for a job.” He looked past her toward the kitchen, suddenly all business. “Where’s the leak? In there?” Instead of waiting for her to respond, he started walking toward her kitchen.
“What are you doing?” She pushed the front door closed before following behind him.
He stopped in front of the bucket that she’d purchased from Mr. Tibbs’s hardware store and looked up. “Yeah, I see. Is this the only one?”
Lyla’s brain connected the dots. Travis had told her he supported his nomad lifestyle by doing odd jobs for a living. “ You’re The Handyman?”
He glanced over his shoulder. “I guess you have changed a little bit. You’ve gotten a bit slower without me to keep you on your toes.”
Without thinking, Lyla swatted at his shoulder. “I am not slower.” The touch zinged like static electricity.
“I’ll take care of this leak. It’s supposed to rain all night, so I better get started. If you need me, I’ll be on the roof.” He turned his back to her and started walking toward the front of the house.
“You’re going on the roof now?” Panic shot through her. “That’s dangerous. What if you fall?”
Travis glanced over his shoulder, pausing at the door. “Then I hope you’ll be there to catch me. Oh, that’s right. Out of sight, out of mind. In that case, I hope your neighbor Ms. Hadley is still heading the neighborhood watch.” With a wink, he opened and closed the door behind him.
After a few minutes of trying not to worry, Lyla stepped outside with her umbrella and looked up at Travis, who was already walking around on the rooftop. There was a ladder propped against the house. It was slick with rainwater now, just like the roof itself.
“Be careful!” she called up to him.
By the looks of it, Travis was hammering new shingles to the spot where the leak was originating. He had on a yellow rain jacket with a hood, which was good. Although his jeans were probably getting soaked through.
She watched as he shifted, placed his hammer back on his belt, and stood. Her pulse stopped. If it was her, she would have fallen by now. She’d be in the hospital or the morgue. One or the other.
He took a step in her direction. Then, in slow motion, he seemed to skid on the shingles, his arms flying out to the sides.
Lyla screamed and threw up her own arms as if she could catch him as his body lunged forward and he skidded down the roof. He came to a stop after a couple feet. He was nowhere near falling off, but her imagination had already gone there, and according to her blood pressure, Travis had hit the ground and broken every bone in his body.
“Are you okay?” she shrieked.
“No!” he called back. “I think I wet my pants.”
Lyla stiffened, unsure of how to respond.
“I’m fairly sure it’s only rainwater, but you never know.”
She didn’t mean to laugh, but she couldn’t help herself. “Physically okay,” she clarified, shouting loud over the sound of rain. “Are you physically okay?”
“I’m fine. There’s just a little blood.”
“Blood?” At the mention, Lyla went weak. This was why nursing school was never an option for her.
“Yeah. I scraped my arm up pretty good. Do you have Band-Aids?”
Her parents had boxed up the entire house. There wasn’t anything inside, but maybe there was a first aid kit in her car. “Yes, I think I have something. Come on down. But don’t fall.”
“Like I said, just make sure you catch me if I do.”
“Ow!”
Lyla ran an alcohol wipe over Travis’s abrasions as he laid his arm out on the kitchen counter. “I don’t remember you being such a wimp.” She paused. “Actually, I’m getting déjà vu right now. I do recall you being a big baby over a scrape you got that last summer together.”
“Trying to climb in through your bedroom window. Totally worth it.”
“We weren’t dating, Trav. You could have rung the doorbell and come in the normal way.”
“I didn’t want to let my youth pass me over without climbing in through a girl’s window. Even if she wasn’t into me as more than a friend.” He flinched slightly as she cleaned his wound. “You nursed my injury that day too.”
“Yes, I did . . . I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I truly am.”
“I scared you half to death out there, so I’d say we’re even now.”
She swiped the alcohol wipe over his wound again, pressing harder this time.
“Ow!”
His groan made her grin.
“You’re tough, you know that?”
Yeah, she knew. One had to be tough to go through what she had these past couple of months. Or years, with Joe. Leaning forward, without thinking, she blew the alcohol on his skin dry. It was something her mom used to do when Lyla skinned her knee.
Her brain quickly caught up to her actions, and she felt the thick tension between them. This was a different kind of tension than the kind they’d shared in Travis’s truck, when he’d been mad at her. This tension was the very kind that had frightened her at eighteen. The brewing kind from an attraction hard to ignore.
Peeling the backing off the Band-Aid, she stretched it over the long scrape along Travis’s forearm.
“Thank you, Nurse Lyla.”
“You’re welcome.” She pulled her hands back in front of her.
“If the whole writing thing doesn’t work out, you’d make a good nurse.”
“How did you know that the writing thing did work out?” she asked.
“I read your column. ‘Delilah’s Delusions.’ ”
Now she looked at him, her lips parting. “I didn’t think anyone knew that was me.” Her mom was proud of her, yeah, but Lyla knew her parents weren’t fans of the opinions Lyla wrote. She doubted they bragged to the folks in Echo Cove about her accomplishments.
“You know there’s no such thing as a secret staying a secret for long. Not here, at least. I enjoy reading the column.”
“You do?” she asked.
“Mostly. I can tell you’re trying to get a rise out of your readers. But I’m impressed with your success.”
She looked down and away, some part of her wishing he was impressed by some other aspect of her current life. She hadn’t done anything important since moving away. She hadn’t changed or saved lives. “It’s not that impressive.”
“It is to me. But what do I know? I’m just a nomad with a hammer.”
“Without you and your hammer, my parents’ house would be underwater by now.”
Travis noticed the 7-Up bottle nearby and reached for it. “So this is it, huh?”
Lyla grabbed the folded paper that she’d already pulled out. “Yup. And here’s the bucket list we almost finished.”
Travis inspected the crossed-out items, reading them off. “Spend a whole day at the lake without sunblock. Were we really this stupid?”
“My unpopular opinion is that we were geniuses. Albeit sunburned ones by the end of summer.”
He chuckled as he kept reading. “Roast s’mores over a bonfire. Watch the same movie four times.” He pointed at her. “I think that was your idea.”
“I was trying to prove the theory that a good movie only gets better each time you watch it. We watched Sleepless in Seattle ,” she remembered.
“And what do you know? It’s playing again now right here in Echo Cove.”
Lyla wasn’t sure why she was so nervous. She and Travis had been best friends once, and they’d shared everything with one another. Almost everything, at least. She’d never shared how her feelings had evolved, when they were eighteen, shifting from friendship to something more. Something scarier.
Travis tapped his finger on the list. “The list says four times. We only watched the movie three times, if I remember correctly.” His voice dropped a note, delving deeper and reverberating through her. “Then I think we should see it again. Together.”
Lyla had a big imagination. Maybe she’d just fantasized him saying that. “What?”
“Let’s go to the movies tomorrow night.” He held up the list. “It’s bad luck not to finish. Fourth time’s the charm?”
Say no, Lyla. Just say no. She didn’t have a good reason to turn down the invitation though, and part of her didn’t want to.
“Come on, Ly. You owe me. We’ve missed out on a full decade of each other’s lives.”
She rolled her lips together as she looked at Travis, debating her decision. Who was she kidding? It’d always been impossible to say no to Travis Painter. That’s why she’d cut him off completely when she went to college. He could talk her into just about anything. “Sure. Seeing a movie sounds great.”
June 30
Dear Diary,
Travis came to my window last night. It was like a scene out of a movie. I heard a tap, tap, tap and then I pulled back my curtain and there he was, holding a single flower. He’d picked it from my mom’s garden, which she wouldn’t be thrilled about if she knew. It was the most romantic thing that has ever happened to me. Romance and Travis do not go together, though. He wasn’t being romantic. He was just being funny. My mind knows that, but my heart doesn’t.
I have to listen to my mind. Otherwise, I’ll end up like my mother. No offense, Mom, but I can’t get stuck in Echo Cove my entire life.
Later, Diary.
Lyla