Chapter Seven #2
Flo scrambled up onto a box and rubbed the dusty windowpane with her hand, but I could tell by her crestfallen posture that there was no trace of the cat.
If it had been a cat. It could have been an opossum or a raccoon.
Oh God, what if I had raccoons? How on earth did you get rid of raccoons in your basement?
“It’s just a stray,” Jake assured me, reading my mind.
“A stray cat.” Flo shot me a sly look. “Maybe it’s good we don’t have a dog. It would only scare all the stray cats away.”
“There’s only one stray cat,” Jake said. “And see, it’s gone.” He made sure the window was latched, as if the cat would be able to open it. “Just keep this closed and you’ll be fine.”
“Or we could open it and keep the cat?” Flo suggested. “Since Mom won’t let me get a dog.”
“We’re not getting a stray cat. What if it has rabies?”
“I don’t think cats get rabies.”
“They do,” Jake told her. “So don’t go petting any stray cats.”
“We can get the cat checked by a vet before we keep it.” Flo gave me a pleading look.
“We’re not keeping it, Flo. Besides, you heard Jake, it’s gone.”
“Is that the furnace?” Flo quite cheerfully changed the topic, pointing to the squat black furnace in the corner.
“Yeah, although if you’re living here full time, you’ll want to change to a heat pump. They’re more efficient.”
My heart sank as Jake explained why I might want to spend a heap of money updating the heating and getting the plumbing checked out.
Not to mention the ancient electrical mains.
By the time we got out of the house, he’d told me another half dozen things that were going to drain my bank account.
I sure hoped one of the paintings in the dining room was a Picasso.
As Jake held back the red-berried bushes to escort us back to the street, an older man climbed out of a white Lexus that was parked in the driveway of the neat little house next door.
“Well, hey, Jake. What’s going on here? Don’t tell me you’ve found someone interested in the old place?” He was a lean old man with shining brown eyes and close-cropped silver hair. He wore a crisp checkered blue shirt and neatly pressed jeans.
“Heya, Elton. Ayuh, these ladies are taking a look.”
“How come everyone around here says ayuh all the time?” Flo asked. “And I’m not a lady. Ladies are fancy people who wear stupid shoes.” Flo tramped through the wild edge of the garden and out onto the sidewalk. She squinted at the man next door. “Are you our new neighbor? And what does ayuh mean?”
“Manners,” I warned her, but the old guy didn’t seem to be offended. He was already introducing himself.
“If this is your new house, then ayuh, I’m your neighbor. Elton Coutts at your service.” He held out a hand for Flo to shake. “And ayuh is Maine for yes.”
“Why don’t you just say yes?” Flo seemed put out.
I adjusted my clothes, which had snagged on the bushes as we’d fought our way down the side of the house. I retied my ponytail and tried to look like I hadn’t been in a fight with the garden. Some first impression I was making.
“Why should we?” Jake grumbled.
“I’m Florence Copeland.” Flo shook Elton’s hand, ignoring Jake.
“It should be Snee really, because my dad’s last name is Snee, but Mom wanted me to have her name, probably because she’s the one raising me.
And, also, why don’t babies take their mom’s names?
Seems to me moms do all the painful stuff to get the baby.
But also, Snee is a horrible name. Imagine being called Flo Snee. ”
Mr. Coutts nodded along. “Yes, well, I can imagine, given I got landed with Coutts. I didn’t have the option of taking my mother’s name, though—not back in my time—but I can’t say I would have wanted to, anyway.”
“Why not?”
“Her name was Sidebottom.”
Flo snort-laughed, which made Mr. Coutts grin, a big easy smile that made him seem like the world’s kindest grandpa. His gaze drifted to me.
“Hi,” I said, feeling absurdly shy. “I’m Zoe Copeland. Flo’s mom.”
“So, you’re moving in?”
“I think so.”
“Well, nothing’s been decided yet,” Jake broke in with his usual dourness.
“You must be close at least,” Elton told me.
“You’re the first person the family approved to even see the place.
” Elton looked up at the house. “Well, I can’t deny she’s a darling old girl and worth protecting from blood-sucking developers.
You should have seen her back in her day…
” He pointed to his own house, with its lemon-drop yellow door.
“She was as pretty as my place back then.”
“Who?” Flo demanded.
“Your house,” he told her affably. “She wasn’t always like this.”
“How do you know it’s a girl?”
“Houses are always girls. Houses and ships.”
“How come?” Flo considered the house.
I hurried to interrupt, knowing from experience that Flo’s curious questions could spiral into chaos very quickly. “Have you lived here on Tinker Street a long time, Mr. Coutts?”
“Oh, well, that depends on what you mean by lived. This place was our summer house, the wife and I, for close on thirty years—but I would consider that vacationing, rather than living. Most of the year we lived in Boston.”
“Don’t you live while you’re on vacation?” Flo asked. “And you had a whole house just for summers?” She let out a low whistle, something she’d recently learned how to do. “You must be rich. This is our first and only house, and we can only afford it because it looks like a trash heap.”
“Flo!”
“What? It’s true.”
“Two houses is more than is strictly necessary, I agree,” Mr. Coutts—Elton—said genially.
“But this is my only house now. When my wife passed away, I moved here full time. What did I need with a big house in Boston, when there was just me? And it’s nice to be here, where we made all our best memories.
” His gaze drifted back to our witchy house in its tangle of green.
“There’s lots of memories in old houses, good and bad, but your new home holds some golden ones. ”
I followed his gaze to where the shingled treasure house sat buried in overgrowth.
“Well, the day’s getting on,” Jake said abruptly. “We don’t want to hold Ms. Copeland up much longer; she’s got a long drive home.”
I bristled. I had no plans to drive home yet. “It’s Zoe,” I reminded him sourly.
“You seem pretty set on getting rid of us,” Flo told Jake as he propelled us to our car. She turned to wave to Mr. Coutts. “Is it because you want to buy the house yourself? Is this a plot? Are you trying to steal our house off us?”
Jake looked genuinely horrified. “I can’t think of anything worse than owning that place.”
“Good. Because it’s ours. Right, Mom?”
“Yes,” I said, stopping when we reached the hardware store. “I’m going to call the agent now.” My heart was pounding. Oh my God, I was about to buy a house. A junk house. At least I was if the family would sell it to me. It sounded like they were pretty picky.
“This is really what you want?” Jake looked concerned, like I’d told him I was about to jump in the bay and swim across the Atlantic.
“It’s what we came for,” I reminded him, feeling snappy over his relentless interfering.
Jake shook his head in disbelief, his tousled hair falling across his sunglasses. “You must be half crazy.”
I remembered the other houses I’d sifted through online. “This house is a find,” I told him fervently. “You should see some of the others out there.”
“Yeah, well don’t tell Gail that or she’ll ratchet the price up.
” He smiled but still didn’t look happy.
“You might want to start a tab at my store,” he suggested dryly.
“I can order in the things you need as you need them. You’re going to be renovating for a long time.
” He gave Flo a rueful look. “And you better get used to Moxie, kid, if you’re going to be a Mainer. ” Mainah.
“You better keep stocking lemonade,” Flo scoffed.
He shook his head, as though disappointed, but there was a glimmer of humor in his expression. “You got any idea when you’ll be moving?” he asked me. “And are you sure you don’t want another look at the place before you make your mind up?”
“We’ll be here before school starts in the fall.” I ignored his suggestion about seeing the house again. Maybe I was worried it would look worse on a second viewing. Right now I was clinging to memories of that long attic bedroom and its sea views—it was proof of what the house could be.
“Okay.” He sighed. “Well, welcome to the neighborhood, I guess.”
Jake watched us as we climbed back into the car.
“He didn’t sound too pleased about us moving in,” Flo said.
“I think that’s just how he sounds.”
Flo waved at him as we pulled out. Jake was standing by the front door of the hardware store, hands in the pockets of his cut-offs, looking like someone had just run over his dog.
But dejection looked good on him. He was the kind of handsome that could carry anything off, even cheap plastic sunglasses and a hangdog expression.
After we left the house on Tinker Street, we drove up the coast, passing through Rockport to Camden.
I felt euphoric as we cruised the coastal road, each little town so charming it hurt.
Camden itself was stupidly pretty, a fairytale town with thickly wooded hills and a fishhook harbor where yachts bobbed like champagne corks.
By comparison, Oxeye looked like a ramshackle afterthought.
The only thing Oxeye and Camden had in common was the cobalt bay.
Flo and I found a quaint red shingled diner by the water, and I quieted her with a burger and fries and told her to amuse herself watching the tourists while I called the agent and then the bank.
It turned out buying a house could be shockingly easy and shockingly fast.
When the calls had been made, I dropped my phone on the table, feeling weak. “Flo? I think we just bought a house.”
“Good.” Flo jabbed a salty fry in my direction. “I was worried Jake was going to put in a bid while you were blathering away. Didn’t you notice how he kept trying to talk you out of buying it? It was sus.”