Underestimated u-1

by Jettie Woodruff

  I went to Potter’s next, and spent more time than I should have in there. I was so thankful that Millie had told me about it. The prices there too, surprised me, and I bought everything that I needed, and then some. I found the cutest set of dishes and couldn’t help thinking about the exquisite china back in Indiana. Drew would have never eaten off of plates like that. They were white, and although I hated the bright yellow walls back at the house, the cute little yellow ducklings circling the plates and saucers were adorable. I wondered then if I had bought everything that Drew would hate on purpose.

  I was so excited. I could hardly contain myself. I had stolen, well not actually stolen, we were married. I had taken a microscopic amount of his money. Drew probably hadn’t even figured that part out yet. I honestly didn’t want anything of his. I would have walked away and slept on the floor for months had Ms. K not convinced me to take what was rightfully mine. Boy was I ever grateful that she did. Now that I think about it, she didn’t really give me a choice in the matter. I was taking the money.

  Buying the house was a little more difficult. It took me almost six months to embezzle the eighty six thousand dollars that Drew would never find. I had added between fifteen and eighteen thousand dollars to different overhead expenses for six straight months. The first couple of months I was paranoid, no I was terrified that he was going to catch it, but he never did. Stupid bastard shouldn’t have been so credulous. I knew exactly where the key to his office was. It was rather simple to add bits and pieces to his overhead, donate to a made-up worthy cause, and a delightful fat scholarship, sending me to the University of Misty Bay. I had actually found a couple of ways to change things a little to save him some money, without him knowing of course.

  I counted. It took me nine trips to unload my overstuffed Honda Civic. I stacked everything in the corner of the living room and would move it as needed. It took up half the room, and once again I forgot to eat. I wondered if there was a pizza delivery. Why would it even matter? I didn’t have a phonebook, and the pre-paid phone that Ms. K had given me only had seven minutes left on it. I wasn’t planning on using it, and Ms. K had already told me that we would end all contact once I had left Indiana. I was to pitch the phone out the window before I arrived.

  My heart all of a sudden dropped to my feet when there was a knock on the door. Nobody knows me here. Who would be looking for me here? What did they want? I was pulled from my frozen paranoia by the second knock.

  Stop it, Morg, I mean Riley. I said quietly but out loud as I made my way to the door.

  “Hi. I’m Lauren. I live in the uglier than your blue house, across the road,” my new neighbor said, introducing herself.

  I shook her hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m Riley, but everyone calls me Ry.” I was smiling to myself when I remembered that aspect of my new life. I had forgotten to mention that to Millie earlier.

  “Wow, it looks like you have your work cut out for you,” she observed peeking around me.

  I suddenly realized that I was being rude. “Come in,” I offered. “I really don’t have a seat to offer or anything to drink,” I teased.

  Lauren walked through the door. “Wow, the inside paint is worse than the outside,” she stated, and I laughed. “I forgot how bright it was in here.”

  She must have been in here before.

  “That will be altered tonight,” I assured her.

  “I have a friend that does construction if you want his number.”

  “Maybe for the outside, the inside has got to be done tonight. I have furniture coming by noon tomorrow,” All of a sudden I comprehended how much I had to do and what little time I had to do it. I was happy to have a neighbor, and I thought Lauren, and I would become friends. I just didn’t want to be her friend at that moment. I had too much to do.

  “Well I won’t keep you,” she said, and I was glad.

  The first thing I did was fill the mop bucket with hot sudsy lemon cleaner. I smiled. The yellow paint with the citrus, lemony smell made perfect companions.

  It was almost four o’clock in the evening, and I really, really wanted to get the yellow painted over before my furniture came the next day. I had planned on painting the living room as soon as the walls were washed down, but decided to go ahead and wash the kitchen down as well that way I could continue painting and get that done too.

  The living room took fifty seven minutes. Five o’clock. I was hungry. Why the hell was I forgetting about food so much? Oh, yeah because I am used to having meals prepared and waiting on me. That was another one that I would have to get used to.

  The kitchen had taken longer than I had anticipated because of having to clean all of the cabinets. It was now almost seven. I was still hungry. I sat on the floor leaned up against the glass door. I had already moved the ugly plastic tables and chairs out to the deck. I was eating crumbs from the bottom of a two day old Cheetos bag when someone was at the door again.

  Once again my heart sank. Why didn’t I lock the door? Lauren didn’t wait for me to answer that time and opened the door, causing me to freeze in a panic.

  “Relax,” she said, seeing my shocked paralyzed face and stiff posture.

  I smiled when I noticed her carrying a large pizza and a six pack of beer. She had changed clothes and was now wearing old jeans with a pink checkered flannel shirt. Her strawberry blonde hair was pulled back and hiding underneath a tied bandanna.

  My mouth was already salivating. Pizza, just what I needed. Not so much the beer. I had never liked beer. I was more of a wine kind of girl. No. Wait a minute. I drank wine because that was what Drew drank. Have I ever had beer? Yes. I did. I was thirteen, and some friends and I hid under a bridge, and I drank one. Did I like it? I didn’t remember.

  “You are my new best friend,” I told Lauren, patting the wood floor next to me. I didn’t mind wasting twenty minutes. I needed food, and pizza was just what the doctor ordered. That would definitely make me feel better, and I would probably work faster, having some nourishment and regenerated energy.

  We sat side by side, leaned against the glass doors and shared a pizza. Lauren probably thought I was a pig. I think I swallowed the first piece whole. I did drink a beer, and I didn’t mind it a bit. I wouldn’t say that I loved it, but it was okay.

  “Well, we better get busy,” Lauren stated, closing the pizza box.

  I looked at her with a little bit of confusion mixed with hope. “I am not going to let you help me paint,” I demanded with my head tilted.

  Please help me paint, please help me paint.

  “The way I see it, you don’t have a choice. I am doing nothing but sitting at my house watching reruns of Greys Anatomy. Now where are the paint pans?” she asked, and I smiled, happy that she wasn’t giving me a choice. There was one problem, however.

  “Paint pans?” I asked. I hadn’t bought paint pans. I just bought paint and brushes.

  “You don’t have any pans?” she asked. I shook my head.

  “What about rollers?”

  I shook my head again, and she laughed. “Come on. Let’s take a walk.”

  She took the unlocked lock from her shed door and took the two pans with four rollers and handed them to me. “Do you have any drop clothes?” she asked.

  Where was my mind? I had forgotten everything. I had never painted a day in my life. How was I supposed to know that you needed more than paint and brushes?

  “Nope.” I smiled.

  I was so grateful for Lauren’s help. I would have never gotten done with a paint brush. She trimmed while I rolled on the light gray paint. I liked it so much in my new room that I decided to use it in the living room, as well.

  “Do you have a radio?” Lauren asked.

  I ran over to my list and jotted it down along with other things that I had been remembering throughout the day. Like a microwave. How could I forget that?

  “I am going to run home and do number two and get us one,” she announced. I laughed out loud at the number two comment. I actua
lly laughed and if felt great. Could this truly be happening? Could I really pull this off and not be found? My thoughts were all over the place, and Lauren was back disrupting them ten minutes later.

  “Everything come out okay?” I teased.

  “Do you really want me to elaborate on that?” she provoked right back. I shook my head. Nope, didn’t need to hear that.

  Lauren turned the radio to a country station. I hated country music. Brakes. Wait a minute. Drew hated country music. I had never actually listened to it. How could I hate it if I had never even listened to it?

  “Where’re you from?” Lauren asked as we painted and listened to something about somebody digging their keys into the side of somebody’s souped-up four-wheel drive.

  “Indiana,” I remembered.

  “What part? I have a cousin in Indiana.”

  And the questions begin. “Carson,” I answered with only that.

  “What brought you to Misty Bay? I know you didn’t come all the way here just to work with Starlight Scarlett in her weird little coffee shop.”

  “Now you’re scaring me,” I stated, hoping to get off topic.

  She laughed. “You will absolutely love Starlight. She is as Bohemian as they come. I just know that you didn’t move to this sectarian town for that purpose,” she assumed.

  “Are you calling this town a cult?”

  “Are you going to avoid my question all night?” she retorted with her own question.

  I smiled down at her from my step stool, which thank God she owned too. “I lost my job when they downsized, and my grandmother left me this house. I just decided it was time for a change.” I lied, hitting it right on the money. I smiled inside, proud that I remembered until I saw the look on her face. She knew I was lying. She knew my grandmother didn’t leave me this house.

  “If we’re going to be friends, you can’t lie to me,” she said being exceedingly blunt. “My aunt owned this house up until last month. She owns mine too. That’s why they are both ugly blue.”

  I walked down the step stool to face her. “Lauren, please don’t ask me too many questions about my past. I am not running from the law or anything like that. I just need to keep a low profile,” I tried to reassure her.

  “Well, you need a better story,” she said, turned and started painting again. “People around here know that my aunt has owned these two houses for years.”

  Thanks a lot, Ms. K. Nice investigating skills.

  “I’ve got it,” she stated matter-of-fact. I looked down at her with a peculiar stare. Why would she be so zealous about helping me? I didn’t get it.

  “How old are you?” she asked, again bluntly.

  “I will be twenty five next month. Why?”

  “Perfect,” she alleged while I continued to look at her like she had two heads. “We went to college together, and when you lost your job, I told you about my aunt’s house, and you bought it,” Lauren exclaimed excited. “You didn’t tell anyone else the grandma story, did you?”

  I shook my head.

  I was happy that Lauren stopped asking questions, and we talked and talked while the room was being transformed into a whole new domicile. We painted the living room and kitchen with the light gray almost silver tone paint. The wall around the French doors and the front door were painted in a darker shade of gray, and I, without question, loved it. I tried to get Lauren to quit and go home just before midnight, but she wouldn’t. I was glad that she didn’t.

  She washed all of the new dishes and put them away while I hung curtains. The only thing left to do was clean the hardwood floors and wash down the two bedroom walls. I could do that the following morning. The furniture wouldn’t arrive until around noon.

  “I’m done.” I stated. I couldn’t go anymore. My energy was gone, and my body was telling me that it had enough. “I can’t thank you enough, Lauren,” I told her, and I couldn’t. I would have never gotten that much done without her, let alone trying to do it with limited tools.

  “Yes, you can. You can thank me by going in there and getting some clean clothes and coming home with me. I have an extra bed.”

  “I’m fine here, but thank you just the same.”

  “I insist. If I leave, you are going to continue to work, and I can tell that you are exhausted. Now move it.”

  I smiled at her. We just met, and she already knew my intentions. I was already thinking that I could get the walls washed before I went to bed. “I’m going to grab a shower, and I’ll be over.”

  “Promise me.”

  “I promise.”

  I didn’t wonder anymore why Lauren had picked the house on the other side of the road, rather than the one by the ocean. Her house was quite a bit bigger. She had it decorated with modern décor. The walls were like mine and painted two-toned but with beige and chocolate brown. There was a black and white, female country music singer hanging behind the couch. I knew I had seen the woman before, but couldn’t tell you her name.

  “You play?” I asked, eyeing the guitar on the couch.

  “Yeah, I mess around a little,” she said, modestly.

  She was dressed in flannel pants and a t-shirt just like me. She yawned and showed me to her spare bedroom. It was a queen sized bed with a fluffy green comforter. I couldn’t wait to crawl into it.

  I lay in bed and stared out at a branch blowing back and forth in the window. I had a million and one thoughts going through my mind, and they wouldn’t seem to settle. I thought about decorating my new house and making it my own. That thought led to the mansion that I had just fled from. My whole house was the size of my suite there, but already it was more inviting than the ice cold castle. That thought led me to thoughts of Drew, and I betted that he had at least five P.I.’s looking for me.

  Would he find me? Was there any way that he could trace my whereabouts? I wondered what my friend Jena had told him. She knew nothing. I made sure of it. She had no idea where I was either. I talked to her the night before I had disappeared, and we even talked about the weekend charity event that we would attend, tomorrow. I wondered if Drew was sly enough to report me missing. I had made my intentions perfectly clear with my short, to the point, note, informing him that I hoped he rotted in hell. It was a good possibility that he never even found the note. I had typed in my e-reader. I told him not to try to find me, but I knew that was like pissing in the wind. He had everyone he knew on it, and then some.

  I thought I had covered my tracks well enough though. I didn’t once talk to Ms. K on my cell or the house phone. The only telephone that I had ever used to call her was the pre-paid one that she had given me, and once from Drew’s desk phone, but that was months ago. He made so many calls from that phone he would never put it together, not to mention I didn’t even know Ms. K’s name. All she would ever give me was Ms. K.

  Chapter 2

  I woke later than I had wanted to. I had so much to get done yet, and here I was still in bed at almost nine. I wasn’t sure what time the exhaustion had finally won, and I fell asleep, but I did feel rested. I walked out to Lauren’s living room, and it was empty. Her bedroom door was opened, so I peeked in, it was empty too. Maybe she had to work.

  I walked down the hall and took in the portraits down the left side of the wall. I knew that Lauren had a much better childhood than I had. There were several pictures of her and her sister, I assumed. They both had the strawberry blonde hair and were built with the same short but not too short build. There were two other pictures of the two girls and their parents. I presumed that Lauren was the older of the two by the graduation picture.

  I slipped on my flip-flops and walked across the road to my own house. My own house, I said, smiling to myself again. Panic struck once more when I noticed my front door open. I relaxed almost immediately the closer I got. I could hear the country music playing.

  I looked in the smaller bedroom, and it was empty, but the walls had been washed, curtains hung, and the wood floor shined. I laughed when I heard Lauren singing somethin
g about having friends in low places. She was singing in a deep voice, not her own I was sure. I opened the door with a grin.

  “What on earth are you doing?” I asked, seeing her on the floor with a bottle of Murphy’s oil soap and a rag. The curtains were hung there too, and I loved them. The white curtains with the black, willow tree pattern accented the gray walls perfectly.

  “Sorry, I hope you don’t mind. I am used to getting up at four in the morning for work. I was up by five and didn’t want to wake you.”

  “You should have woken me,” I claimed. “What on earth do you do that you have to get up at four in the morning?”

  “Lauren and Levi,” she said. Like I knew what that meant.

  “Uh?”

  “Oh, sorry I forgot. You’re not from around here, Lauren and Levi in the morning. I’m a radio host.”

  “Really? You talk on the radio?” I asked, intrigued. “Now I know I have to go buy a radio.”

  “Yup, I work from five am to one pm.”

  “I bet it’s country too, right?” I smiled.

  She didn’t answer and only looked up with a smile. “I brought coffee over if you want a cup.”

  “I do, but I want you to stop this, and come and drink one with me.”

  We sat on the deck overlooking the ocean and drank our coffee. I was so glad that Lauren was my neighbor. I loved her already. I wondered why there was no man, or was there? I should probably wait until I know her a little better before I ask.

  “Are you divorced yet?” Lauren asked, breaking my thoughts about her love life.

  I looked at her with a pensive expression, holding my cup to my lips.

  “Relax, will you already?” she requested. “You have a tan line around your finger.”

  I looked at my finger. Sure enough, she was right. I wondered if makeup would cover that for a few days or weeks. How long does it take to get rid of wedding ring evidence?

  “I have never been married,” I said with a warning look. She laughed.