Chapter 6 #2
Charlie loved fishing, and I would love to get him on a boat. “I’m not sure we can go for the whole day. My sister…”
He was nodding. “Totally understand. We can come back in whenever you want. Whatever you’re comfortable with. What day would work for you?”
Neil was a nice guy. “Well, thank you for inviting us. Sundays are usually good. Let me see if I can find someone to hang out with Cassie, and then, yes, we would be happy to go.”
“How about a week from this weekend?” he asked me. “This Sunday is the Feeding Frenzy.”
I looked at him blankly. “Oh, right the team dinner.” With the super cute name.
We sat together, talking about swimming and the kids. Neil’s ex had moved to Virginia to get re-married. Ellis spent the summers with her, but it didn’t sound like a great situation. “She moved on,” Neil explained. “Has two more kids with her new husband. Ellis feels like he gets in the way.”
Now I felt pretty bad that I had threatened him. Poor kid.
Tara rushed in. “What a day! Neil, scoot over. We have lady business.”
“Tara, nice to see you, as always,” Neil said, not moving an inch. I liked this guy more and more.
She laughed as my phone dinged with a text. Eagerly I grabbed it and read the message. Oh. “Why do you look so pissed, Em?” Tara asked me.
“What? Oh, no, this is good news. Jason Irving is coming to look at our hot water heater after work on Wednesday. Only one more day without hot water.” If he could fix it. I didn’t want to consider the possibility that the water heater would need to be replaced.
She tilted her head at me. “That is good news. So why are you still looking disappointed?”
“I’m not.” Totally not disappointed.
“Sure,” she said. “Sure. Why don’t I pick up the kiddos after school that day and you can have your rendezvous with Jason?”
“Tara!” I poked her.
Neil stood up. “I’ll leave you ladies to it. Emily, I won’t be back at practice this week, but I’ll see you at the dinner this weekend. We’ll work things out for next Sunday.” I nodded and smiled at him.
“What’s going on?” Tara demanded. “What are you doing on Sunday?”
“Neil wants to take me and Charlie fishing so the boys can hang out.”
“Oh, Neil wants Ellis to hang out with Charlie? That’s so convenient, since you’re Charlie’s aunt and Neil wants to get in your pants,” she said.
“Tara!” The woman did not have a filter. “Neil wants them to be better friends, and so do I. This has nothing to do with my pants.” I got busy checking my emails and ignored her.
“Look,” Tara said, elbowing me. “There’s old Georgie.”
I looked up to see that Annie had come back in with her dad, George Whitaker.
He must have been driven over to the pool.
She was helping him over toward the bleachers.
It was slippery on the pool deck, and I saw his foot slide out from under him a little, pulling him down on Annie (who was all of 5’2”).
I felt bad about my earlier interaction with her.
She was totally clueless, but in a good-hearted way.
Anyway, I couldn’t watch an old man slip and break his hip.
“Hi,” I called as I approached. “Can I give you a hand?”
They stopped. Annie looked up and smiled gratefully. George Whitaker just looked.
“I’m Emily,” I said, uncomfortable under his gaze. “We met outside the pool the other day.”
“Yes, I remember.” His voice was deep, and sounded vaguely like Luke’s. Thirty or forty years ago, George Whitaker had probably been as handsome as his son. Now he just looked mean.
It was like we were in a staring contest. No one made a move.
“Um, well, ok, if you don’t need any help, I’ll head back to the bleachers,” I told them.
Annie opened her mouth to speak but Mr. Whitaker shook his head. “No, we don’t need your help.”
It was so awkward. I nodded stupidly, then turned and found my seat back on the bleachers.
“What’s up with him?” I whispered to Tara.
“The Whitakers are all assholes.” She looked at me sideways. “Most of them.”
∞
I got home from the NGS on Wednesday afternoon in a pouring rainstorm.
Tara had taken Darby and Charlie to the movies.
“I need a nap,” she had told me. “This movie should do it.” I got Cassie some tea, and twisted the wire hanger antenna on the TV until I had a channel kind of coming in.
Unfortunately, it was a curling match, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.
I had her settled on the couch with a blanket tucked around her when the doorbell rang.
“Emily!” she said, sitting up straight. “Don’t let anyone see me like this!”
“I’ll take him through the kitchen,” I soothed her.
I opened the back door and beckoned Jason through the rain. He ran up on the porch, shaking like a dog. “Thanks for coming!” I told him. “Come on downstairs and check out the beast.”
We came down the basement steps and I flipped on the light.
“This is just like my grandma’s house,” he said, staring around in the half-darkness.
“It’s exactly like my grandma’s house,” I joked.
“Isn’t this her house?” He stared at me.
Never mind. I pointed him to the back corner. “Here’s the water heater.”
“I don’t know if I’ve ever seen one so old,” Jason whistled, and studied the dusty appliance.
My heart sank. “Do you think you can fix it?”
“Won’t know until I take a look.” He plunked down his tool bag and pulled out a flashlight.
“Emmy!” I heard from upstairs.
“That’s my sister,” I explained. “Holler if you need me.”
Cassie needed help to the bathroom, then decided that we should paint our toenails, which meant that I would paint our toenails.
“You’re so sloppy!” she chastised.
“Stop wiggling your dumb foot!” I retorted.
We looked at each other and laughed. “We never did stuff like this when we were kids,” she said suddenly. “Like sisters on TV, you know?”
“Nothing is like TV. If it were, we’d have hot water and a laugh track. I moved in when you were a junior in high school—you had other stuff going on.” Like, apparently, a lot of boys. A lot.
“You didn’t like me back then,” she commented.
I stared at her. “Are you joking? I worshipped you!”
She shook her head. “You and my mom got along. You were so quiet, studying all the time, she was always praying or going to church. I never had anything in common with either of you.”
“Your mom was just being nice to me because she felt so sorry for me. You were her daughter. Loretta loved you so much. She used to tell me stories about you as a little girl.”
“Really?” She sat up straighter. “She did?”
I nodded. “Hold your foot still! I just painted your arch. She talked about you all the time to me.”
Cassie laid back against the cushion. “You and Nana took care of her when she was sick. I guess it was good practice, huh?”
I stared at her. Tears pooled in my eyes. “Cassie, I’m glad to take care of you. You’re my sister, and I love you.”
Clumsily, she patted my hand. I grabbed her fingers before she could pull them away.
“Hello?” called a disembodied voice from the basement stairs.
“Don’t let him come up here!”
“Coming!” I called, and hopped off the couch.
Jason was standing in the kitchen. “So, that isn’t something that I can fix. There’s no way to get parts for it, and based on its age, it just isn’t worth it.”
That was becoming a repeating refrain in my life.
I put my face in my hands. “Ok. Ok. Let me think.”
“Luckily I have one in my truck.”
“Huh?”
“I have a replacement unit in my truck. It’ll work perfect here.”
I stared at him. “I can’t afford it. No, thank you.”
“Thirty bucks.”
“Huh?” I repeated inanely.
“Thirty bucks for the heater and the install. I better get going putting it in, I have to get home.”
He disappeared out into the rain. “Is he going to fix the water?” Cassie called.
“Hang on.”
I ran out into the driveway. “Jason, there’s no way this could only cost thirty dollars. There’s no way.”
“Did you want to pay me more?”
“No, but I don’t want to cheat you, either.”
“You’re not cheating me. Let me get to work, don’t worry about it.”
I slowly walked back inside, the rain soaking through my sweatshirt.
“Well?” Cassie asked. “Is he going to fix the water?”
“Looks like it,” I said.
A few hours later we had hot water. “Thank you,” I said to Jason as I turned on the tap and felt the heat on my fingers.
“It’s wonderful!” A few tears squiggled out of my eyes.
Hot water! Praise be. I paid him the thirty dollars, and he hauled away the old machine, saying that if he would scrap it for us.
I wanted to hug him but he was already looking at me like I was nuts.
My phone was buzzing when I came inside. “Hello?”
“Hi,” a deep voice answered me.
I sat down at the kitchen table with a plunk. “Hi, Luke.”
“I’m just calling to let you know that Danny Bob decided to ditch Michigan and is headed for Nashville to become a country music star. I think he has what it takes.”
“Well, we’ll miss him, and I hope when he makes it big he’ll remember the woman who went back to find him when Charlie left him in McDonalds.”
Luke laughed. “How could he forget you?”
Seriously, I glowed. “How is New York?”
“Grey,” he sighed. “Dirty.”
“That fun?”
“That fun. What’s new with you?” he asked.
“Well, I have good news. Guess what? We have hot water!” I told him.
“That is good news.”
“Jason, the dad from the swim meet, just installed a new water heater. For thirty dollars!”
“That’s awesome.”
“It’s more than awesome. There is hot water literally pouring out of the faucets. This is honestly one of the best days of my life,” I told him.
“It doesn’t take much to make you happy.”
“Try showering for a few days with blue lips and see how happy hot water makes you!”
“I’ll pass on that.”
Luke told me more about what he was doing in New York, and I told him about nosy Mrs. Ferber. He agreed that she should MYOB, then asked, “And what does that mean?”
“Um, duh, Mind Your Own Beeswax. Were you not in second grade? Do I need to teach you how to make a cootie catcher too?”