Beginner's Luck

by Kate Clayborn

  “Oh, you mean George Billingsley?”

  “You know him?”

  “He was my fifth grade teacher,” Ben says, smiling. “I think my dad used to date his sister, way back before he married my mom.”

  “What? That’s so great! That’s—I love that,” I say, and Ben sends me a sidelong glance, curious, so I explain. “I love how you know so many people here, in all these different contexts, you know? From your neighborhood, or from going to school around here, or from people you meet at the yard. I always wanted that, but it was hard to get any traction with the way I grew up. You’re so lucky.”

  “I suppose I never thought of it that way.”

  “Do you know a lot of people in Houston?” I ask, tentative. I usually strike out on this, but I’m so curious—in Houston, is Ben more like that guy I met in the lab? Or is he this guy too, jeans and a t-shirt, tan, stubbled, his hair still wet from a shower?

  He takes a minute to answer, thinks about it. “I know a lot of people through work. Not just my company, but other professionals in the area. I suppose—no. I don’t know people the same way there as I do here. But that was a good thing for me, I guess.”

  I wait for him to say more, but he doesn’t, so I reach over and nudge his thigh with my hand. “Because why?”

  “Well, because around here, I knew so many people, but as the guy I was. The guy who set fire to a house, the guy who almost killed someone.”

  I shift in my seat, so I’m turned toward him more. “I’m sure no one thought of you only that way,” I say.

  He flips on his turn signal, lowers his speed as we head down a gravel path. “I was a pretty bad kid. Not only that time. I was always tearing shit up, getting into trouble. I’m sure it was exactly only that way.”

  His eyes are on the road. There’s a muscle in his jaw that ticks, and I figure he’s done with this topic. I try not to sulk about it—so what if Ben’s a bit slower to open up than me? Not everyone cracks themselves wide open the first chance they get. Still, though, he must see some change in me, because he sets a hand on my thigh, warm pressure that gives me that familiar, pleasant flutter in my stomach. I lean my head back, close my eyes, and feel the breeze that’s blowing in the window ruffle my hair, caress my face.

  I must doze, because when the truck rolls to a stop, we’ve pulled into a circular gravel driveway. To my right is a massive house, Tudor-style, a little worse for wear with a few windows boarded up, some half-timbers missing from the facade. “Is this a haunted house?” I ask. “Because I am not into that.”

  He chuckles. “It’s the dead of summer, Kit.”

  “So? A house can be haunted any time of year. Ghosts don’t take vacations.”

  “It’s not a haunted house,” he says, laughing, getting out of the truck and coming around for me. “It’s called the Ursinus Mansion. It’s getting restored—it used to be a pretty famous home in the area, way back before World War I, because the house itself was dismantled and brought over from England. Lots of the materials are actually seventeenth century.”

  “Wow,” I say, seeing it through new eyes. It makes me feel immensely better about my own house.

  A man comes out from the front door, wearing coveralls and a carrying a big toolbox in one big hand. When he sees us, he offers a casual nod in Ben’s direction. “Hey, Tucker.”

  “Good to see you, man,” Ben says, walking up to shake the man’s hand. “Kit, this is Rick Jarvis. He’s the lead contractor on this restoration.”

  “Hi,” I say, shaking Rick’s hand. It’s dry and scratchy enough that he could probably do sanding just with his skin, but his eyes are kind, his smile twitching beneath his full beard.

  * * * *

  I guess he’s a man of pretty few words though, because once he lets my hand go, he only looks over at Ben and says, “Out by dark.”

  “Sure thing. Thanks again.”

  Rick raises a hand in farewell as he walks over to his own truck, puts his toolbox in the bed. He pauses, looks back over his shoulder at us. “You don’t got any matches on you, do you?”

  I stiffen next to Ben. I’m ready to open my mouth and defend him, but Ben laughs. “You always were a dick, Jarvis.” There’s no heat in it, just that teasing familiarity Ben has with his dad too.

  “Let’s get that beer sometime,” Rick says, and then he’s in his truck, driving back down the gravel path, the tires popping as he goes.

  “That wasn’t very nice,” I say.

  “Ah, Rick’s all right. He was there that night. He was a good friend.”

  “Still,” I mumble, pissed on Ben’s behalf.

  “Anyways, one good thing about knowing so many people around. You’re going to get to see this place now, before it opens this fall for tours and all that stuff. You thought your house was a handful, you know?”

  I grab his hand, linking my fingers through his. “I can’t wait.”

  We can’t go in all the rooms—some are taped off, or covered entirely with big swaths of plastic sheeting, particularly upstairs, where some of the bigger jobs are still underway. But downstairs is breathtaking—the floors wide-planked, textured with hundreds of years of nicks and slight depressions, the walls thick and roughened. The windows that are in are leaded glass. In the largest room, a banqueting hall, there’s a panel of stained glass that takes my breath away with its intricate leaf pattern, and I wish I could see it with the sun streaming through. Surrounded by the heavy, cherry paneling that lines the walls, some carved with rosettes, the window makes the room feel like a church, even though so far as I can tell, there’s nothing in here that suggests religion. We spend an hour wandering around, Ben telling me what he knows about the construction.

  When we’re back in the foyer, me looking up again at the huge, elaborate staircase, Ben wraps his arms around me from behind. “What do you think?”

  “I love it. Thanks for bringing me. I had no idea this was even here.”

  “Most people don’t, but it’ll be a big deal when it reopens. You’re getting the insider track here, honey.”

  I flush in pleasure, both at having this special local knowledge and at Ben’s endearment, which seems to slip out occasionally, though he betrays no embarrassment over using it.

  “Now come on. Let’s go have some champagne and toast your victory,” he says, pointing me toward the door. “It’s almost dark.”

  Ben spreads out a blanket on the bed of the truck, hoists me up so that my legs are swinging pleasantly in the warm night air. It smells faintly of sawdust from the house, but mostly out here it smells green, the air carrying with it the slight lemony smell from the magnolia trees that surround the house, their waxy leaves rustling in the breeze. It’s the best celebration I can think of.

  Ben pours me a glass he’s taken from the cab of the truck, giving himself about half as much, and he raises his to mine. “Next stop, Nature,” he says, leaning forward to give me a quick kiss before we drink.

  The champagne is sweet, bubbling deliciously in my mouth. I take another sip and laugh. “Not Nature. That’s not for me.”

  I lie back, my feet still swinging beneath me, the scratchy blanket against my skin and the hard steel of the truck bed pressing into my shoulder blades. It’s worth it to look up at the sky, orange and pink and purple with the setting sun. Ben steps between my legs, humming his pleasure at my new stretched-out posture, leaning down to kiss that spot on my collarbone that makes me shiver. “Could be for you,” he says, against my skin, and I go a little cold.

  I prop myself up on one elbow, place one hand on Ben’s chest. “I know it could be,” I say, ducking my head a little so I can look right into his eyes. “Ben—we’re not doing this again, are we?” I mean—we’re not doing the thing where we talk about my job, about how I should be doing more, about how Beaumont could help me get there.

  He takes a long look at me,
those eyes roaming back and forth between mine, over my cheeks, down to my mouth, back up to my eyes. “No. I know. I’m sorry.” He pushes away from me, shifts to sit next to me on the bed of the truck. “I think I’m—ah. I’m not being a recruiter here. I’m being this guy who…” He trails off, takes a deep breath. “Who lives in Houston. Who is going fucking crazy thinking about not being with you in a couple of weeks.”

  “Oh.” The way that oh sounds, it’s not what I mean. It sounds awkward, embarrassed, when really my heart is pounding, thinking about what Ben is trying to say here, whether he is trying to say it. But I don’t want to lie to him. Beaumont can’t be an option for me. It can’t. I belong here. Even considering something else is a betrayal. “Ben.” I take his hand, tugging a little, hoping he’ll look over at me. But he doesn’t, so I go on. “The night we bought the ticket, of the three of us, I was the only one who said she’d go back to work the next day, as if nothing ever happened. And that’s because I love my job, even though it’s not at the cutting edge of everything. I know it’s not top-of-the-line equipment or a lot of money or a bunch of chances for patents. But I want a full life, a life I chose for myself, a life I didn’t let happen to me. That’s really important to me, that I choose, that I’m not getting shuffled around by circumstance.”

  Ben looks straight ahead, off into the distance, where a line of trees is lit from behind by the setting sun. He’s so still, so quiet. I want him to say something else—I’m waiting for him to say something else. Tell me it’s not about the job, I’m thinking. Tell me that I’ve got nothing to do with the job.

  “Yeah,” he finally says. “That makes sense.”

  I’ve said what I meant, what I really think, and Ben squeezes my hand and smiles down at me, then leans in to press a kiss to my forehead. “We’ll figure it out,” is all he says, and even as I’m opening my mouth to talk that over, what figuring it out might mean for us—long-distance? Calling the whole thing off?—it’s as if he flips a switch, case closed. He’s pouring me more champagne and changing the subject, to some story about River setting up a new computer system at the yard, and even though it’s fun, and we’re laughing and talking—I don’t know why, but I get the feeling I’ve spoiled my own celebration.

  Chapter 16

  Ben

  I’m going to be late picking up Kit for my mother’s party, a fact that’s not helping with my nerves at all. Right up until I’d actually asked if she’d wanted to come with me, I wasn’t even sure I’d make it to the Crestwood. I’d still been manufacturing excuses in my mind for why I couldn’t go. But then Dad had told me he was taking Sharon as his plus-one, and since he’d factored into 100 percent of my made-up excuses, I figured I was stuck.

  And the thought of my whole Saturday night without Kit—it wasn’t an option. Since our trip out to the Ursinus earlier this week, I hadn’t brought up Houston again, but the fact that next week marked the end of my scheduled family leave was the ten-thousand-pound gorilla in every room we were in together. It’s not as if we didn’t acknowledge it. After all, with Dad doing better and my promises to Jasper, I’d been doing a lot more telecommuting work over the past two weeks, and more than once Kit had heard me on the phone, setting up future trips, talking to other clients, arguing with Jasper—who’d not, truth be told, given up on the idea that we could swing getting out of the non-compete if we just kept at Greg. When I’d suggested that we hang in, wait six months to do another review of the non-compete, he’d hung up on me in frustration.

  Unless I asked for an extension, I was expected back in the office in nine days, and I have no fucking idea what to do about that—every single thing in my life has been reorganized by this leave time, by Kit, and my one ham-handed volley about Houston on Monday night had gone over like a lead balloon. A full life, a life I chose for myself, she’d said, and I’ve thought of those words over and over. I suppose when I’d brought up Houston, I’d done it in the context of work, but I’d meant something else. I’d meant me, us—and Kit wasn’t going to choose that for herself, not if it meant leaving here, and not, especially, after knowing me so short a time.

  Truth be told, it fucking hurt, no matter how right she probably was. And though I know I need to try again, to sac up and actually tell her how I’m feeling, I don’t know the where or when of it, much less the how. All I know is that I’m going to be introducing her to my mother in the next hour, and for now, I have to put all my energy into not being the total dickwad I still sometimes turn into when Richard, my mother, and I find ourselves in the same room.

  “It’s the next house,” says River, from the seat next to me. I’m late because it’d started to cloud over as we’d finished up hauling in some reclaimed wood, and River riding his bike home sounded no good to me. He’d fought me, dramatically pulling up his hood and tightening it around his face, as if this would be enough to protect him from the elements, but had relented when I’d threatened to lock his bike up for the whole weekend in the back shed. He’d waited sulkily while I changed into my suit in the back office, then told me I looked like a politician when I came out. “The asshole kind,” he’d said.

  I’d laughed. I get a kick out of it whenever River and I tease each other. It reminds me of how far we’ve come since that first day he’d called me an asshole. And tried to break my foot.

  I’m a little surprised, honestly, to see that he lives in a small but meticulously maintained house, the yard featuring carefully dug flower beds, the front porch lined with brightly painted clay pots, overfull with geraniums. I don’t know what I expected, but I guess it was easier for me to think that a kid getting in the kind of trouble River had been getting into would have been living in a place that bore more obvious signs of distress, though I of all people should know better.

  “Nice place,” I say, pulling into the driveway, but River is already reaching with one hand to retrieve his backpack, the other clasping the door handle. This is straight out of my own teenage playbook, the same move I’d pull pretty much every time my dad took me to school in the Volvo wagon he used to have, the one that had an exhaust pipe held up by a pair of pantyhose.

  “Wait. We’ve gotta unload your bike.” River sighs, a heavy, frustrated exhale, and I laugh. “You embarrassed of me, man?”

  “No,” he grumbles, but he’s answered me so quick that I know he’s embarrassed of something.

  I’m pretty sure I know what that something is when I hear the sound of a screen door bang shut, followed quickly by a woman’s loud, almost honking laugh—I’m guessing I’m about to meet River’s mom, who I only know as the “strange sorta woman” my dad mentioned speaking to on the phone after River was first caught at the yard. There are other voices too, light, lilting voices also full of laughter, and when I see three women emerge from around the back of the house, I figure I’ve dropped River off during some kind of party his mom his having.

  I give him a sympathetic glance and get out of the truck. The woman who I think is River’s mom—the resemblance is clear—is wearing a long, floral skirt paired with a men’s dress shirt, tied at her waist. She’s got brown hair, same as River’s is at the roots, but it’s shot through with gray, and it brushes her elbows as she walks toward me. “You must be Ben,” she exclaims, her arms already coming around me. I catch River’s wince. The poor kid.

  “I’m Frances, River’s mom.” She pulls back from me, keeping a grip on my arm, gently pushing me toward her companions. “This is River’s Aunt Vera,” she says, and I shake the hand of a short, red-haired woman who has River’s same hazel eyes. “And this is River’s grandmother, Sue.” Sue’s about the same height as Vera, but with white hair almost as long as Frances’s, and she’s got clear blue eyes and a big smile that she’s aimed right at River, who’s got his head ducked in obvious discomfort.

  “It’s nice to meet you all. River’s been doing a great job for us.” This probably doesn’t help the embarrassment fac
tor, but it seems like the right thing to say to the kid’s mom, maybe grease the wheels for him to get back into her good graces if he’s been in trouble.

  “That’s wonderful, absolutely wonderful!” She lets go of me and heads over to River, wrapping him up and kissing his head. I hear him groan. “He’s such a talented boy. Do you know, I think it’s a gift from the universe that he got in trouble that day. A gift!” She raises one hand to the sky, and Vera and Sue nod.

  This all seems a bit crazy-town to me, but it sure doesn’t look as if River’s neglected, and that’s something. I clear my throat, trying to diffuse some of the awkwardness, and nod toward him. “You’re back Monday after class, yeah?”

  “Yeah,” he says.

  “Well, I’ll let you all get back to…ah…” I trail off, because I’m not sure what they were doing. Maybe a drum circle or something, because I definitely smell incense.

  “You should come join us!” Vera exclaims, clasping her hands together. “We’re having a bean sprout casserole. Tofu for extra protein!”

  I try not to let my expression reveal anything. I’ve got nothing against bean sprouts, but tofu is how I imagine eating a sponge feels. Plus, I’ve seen what River packs when he comes to the yard, and there’s not a bean sprout in sight, so I’m wondering if he’s resigned himself to packing his own lunches in protest. “Oh, that’s very nice of you, ma’am, but I don’t want to be intruding on your family party.”

  “Family party?” laughs Sue. “This is a regular Friday night!”

  “We all live here,” says Frances, in explanation. “And River, of course! I’m afraid he’s a bit outnumbered, aren’t you, honey? It’s a lot of estrogen, I’m sure.”

  “Not from me,” Sue quips. “I’m all dried up!”

  River looks like he wants to die, and I bite the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing.