by Mae Respicio
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2018 by Mae Respicio
Cover art copyright © 2018 by Luisa Uribe
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Wendy Lamb Books, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
Wendy Lamb Books and the colophon are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Name: Respicio, Mae, author.
Title: The house that Lou built / Mae Respicio.
Description: First edition. | New York : Wendy Lamb Books, [2018] | Summary: Longing for an escape from her extended Filipino family, Lou plans to build a tiny house on land she inherited from her father, but difficulties quickly arise.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017022047 (print) | LCCN 2017037604 (ebook) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1796-4 (eBook) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1794-0 (trade) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1795-7 (lib. bdg.) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1797-1 (pbk.)
Subjects: | CYAC: Coming of age—Fiction. | Home—Fiction. | Family life—California—Fiction. | Filipino Americans—Fiction. | Building—Fiction. | Moving, Household—Fiction. | California—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.R465 (ebook) | LCC PZ7.1.R465 Hou 2018 (print) | DDC [Fic]—dc23
Ebook ISBN 9781524717964
Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter 1: If People Were Houses
Chapter 2: The House I’m Going to Build
Chapter 3: Perfect Home
Chapter 4: On a Mission
Chapter 5: In on a Secret
Chapter 6: Proving Myself Wrong
Chapter 7: A Tiny House in the Woods
Chapter 8: No One Else Knows
Chapter 9: Seeing My Dream
Chapter 10: Original Plan
Chapter 11: Operation Tiny House
Chapter 12: It’s Official
Chapter 13: This Is the Best Day
Chapter 14: Just Keep Building
Chapter 15: Not Like the Others
Chapter 16: We Barely Started
Chapter 17: Something to Know You By
Chapter 18: Next-Best Thing
Chapter 19: Say Something More
Chapter 20: The Way We Always Do
Chapter 21: Move Away
Chapter 22: Never Had a Chance
Chapter 23: How It Works
Chapter 24: See It Clearly Now
Chapter 25: Something New
Chapter 26: Wherever I Am, I’ve Got Some Ideas
Acknowledgments
About the Author
To my mom,
Tina Respicio
If people were houses, Lola Celina, my grandmother, would be a hot-pink Painted Lady—one of those fancy San Francisco Victorians tourists love, with intricate stained glass that casts rainbows onto the sidewalks. She’s colorful. Right now, we’re strutting around the living room in summery folk-dance dresses. Mine’s bright yellow. It feels light and airy, and when I’m jumping around in it I wish I could fly.
I spin as fast as I can. The skirt flounces up and Lola joins me, twirling and twirling, while Mom takes our picture from the couch. We finish and stand shoulder to shoulder, trying not to wobble. Laughter pours out of us.
“Ay nako!” Lola says. “I haven’t danced around this much since I was—”
“—crowned Miss Sampaguita in your village for three years in a row, we all know,” Mom says, and Lola cracks up. My cousins and I have heard this story a million times; it’s one of my favorites.
Lola and I put our arms around each other. I’m taller than she is now. I’m only half Filipina, so we don’t look exactly alike, but our family says we have the same smile. Definitely the same crazy laugh.
I plop down next to Mom, out of breath.
“Lou, we should get you a pretty dress to wear on your birthday,” Mom says.
“Actually, what I think every new thirteen-year-old needs is a circular saw,” I say, even though she’d never go for that. Too dangerous.
“Nice try, kiddo.”
“Don’t you want to wear something beautiful on your special day, anak ko?” Lola says. Anak ko. My child. Even though she calls all the grandkids that, it still makes me feel special.
My birthday’s coming up, but I don’t care about wearing some silly dress or having a huge Sweet Thirteen like some of the kids at school. There’s only one thing I want—my own house.
I just have to build it first.
The idea started off as a daydream, a dare to myself: What if I made something no other girl has? Because here’s the neat part: I own some land. Trees and shrubs and everything. I inherited it from my dad’s family after he died, and that’s where my house will go.
I’ve been planning this for a while, and I’m ready to do something about it. If I keep thinking and brainstorming and watching how-to videos—instead of doing—it’s never going to happen. Lolo, my grandfather, used to say, “That’s how dreams work. You just have to do them.”
“Okay, scooch over,” Lola says, sitting next to us. She starts folding and piling up costumes she sewed for Barrio Fiesta.
Barrio Fiesta is a neighborhood celebration. Villages in the Philippines throw them every year. It’s our big fund-raiser for the Filipino American Community Senior Center, with dizzying rides, tasty food, and all my friends hanging out. The festival ends in a show, and my whole family pitches in. This time Lola’s sewing, I’m making sets, and Mom’s organizing the rummage sale. I’m dancing, too. We only practice a couple days a week, so that leaves me plenty of building time.
Mom tilts her head against mine. She’s quiet.
“What’s wrong, my dear Minda? Is this about your job search?” Lola asks.
“I haven’t gotten any offers yet. I applied all over the area,” Mom says.
“It’s okay, anak. Try to be patient. And you should feel proud, too. It’s not easy to put yourself through school. It’s all right to take things slow.”
My mom’s a medical technician, but she just got her nursing degree by going to school at night. Now she’s looking for a new job as a nurse, and works a lot of overtime to pay off student loans—and because we’re saving up to move out of Lola’s house.
Mom’s face brightens a little. “The good news is the hospital I interviewed with in Washington State scheduled a follow-up call. Cross your fingers.”
Is she serious? I sit up. “Are you talking about moving?”
Mom smooths my hair. “I’ve been thinking a lot about it, honey, and it’s the perfect time for a change.”
“Not that kind of change.” I can’t imagine anything worse.
“San Francisco’s so expensive. If we lived in Washington, we could find our own place and save up for your college fund.” She smiles at me like she hasn’t just said
the wrong thing.
I give her a big smile back. “We’re. Not. Moving.”
Lola rubs small circles onto Mom’s shoulders, the way she and Mom do with me whenever I’m feeling bad. “You’ll find a job soon, anak ko. Though I cannot imagine you and Lou moving so far from home.”
“Well, something good will come our way, I know it,” Mom says. She turns to me. “Okay, young lady, if you’re done parading around like Miss Preteen Sampaguita, then it’s bedtime. Last day of seventh grade tomorrow!”
* * *
—
I lie in bed, staring at glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling. I wish I was looking at real stars on my land, where at night they fill the sky. The thought of moving has me wide-awake. I can’t believe Mom would want a job in another state.
Most people count sheep to fall asleep. Me? I like to think about houses. It cheers me up. And it’s easy, because there are hundreds of types of houses in the world.
Some I like just for their names: the barndominium, the geodesic dome, and the Queenslander; a saltbox, a snout house, or a Yaodong.
Others have fascinating details, like:
The yurt—a round, portable tent pulled in carts by yaks.
The houseboat—part house and part boat.
The mansion—everybody knows this one. It’s what I used to want to live in, but now I think they’re obnoxious, too big and glossy. Not my style.
Then there’s the opposite: a tiny house.
These houses are garage-sized small, but they can still have a kitchen and a bathroom and a secret cranny for brainstorming ideas.
People all around the world build and live in them. They don’t cost as much as a normal house and certainly not as much as a mansion. But the best part? A tiny house fits everything anyone could ever need—a bed, a table and chairs, a toilet, a sink with running water (which a lot of people in the world don’t even have). If you think of it that way, a tiny house isn’t tiny at all. It’s just right.
* * *
—
Mom snores loudly from her side of our room while cars zoom down the street. We live in a busy part of the neighborhood where shops and restaurants and gas stations stay open way late. Sometimes I can trick myself into thinking traffic sounds like the ocean.
Mom and I share a bedroom, with twin beds shoved up against opposite walls. It’s the same room she shared with her sister, my auntie Gemma, growing up.
Lolo, my grandfather Ernesto, died a few years ago, but I still see him in every part of this place: On the patio where he and I would watch sunsets like movies, a wad of tobacco in Lolo’s cheek. In the kitchen where he fed me rice and fish, kamayan style—with his hands, no utensils. He said it made the food taste better. It did. And in this very room, at night, tucking me in.
He’d pull the blanket to my chin, and I’d run my fingers down his gnarled knuckles and listen to stories about his job when he first came to America. He picked crops in fields, his back aching, a straw hat full of holes the only thing shielding him from the sun. After stories he’d close my door, but I could still hear Lola in the kitchen washing dishes, even though there’s a dishwasher. She’d say, “I never needed a dishwasher in the Philippines, did I?”
Now it’s just me, Mom, and Lola. Lolo died three years ago, but we first moved in when I was a little kid. Mom had me when she was only nineteen, a kid herself. At least, that’s how our family gossips about it. And now here we are, Mom snoring like a chain saw.
Having my own room would be awesome-sauce.
“Mom?” I whisper. No answer. She’s out.
From under the bed I slip out a flashlight and a long, fat cylinder of paper. My blueprint.
It crinkles as I pull off the rubber band and roll the paper open like a giant map. It’s soft and thin under my fingers, full of notes and numbers. I shine the light.
The land I own belonged to Dad’s family, the Nelsons—my dad, Michael Nelson; Grandpa Ted; and Grandma Beverly. Dad died in a car accident a month before I was born, so we never met. But I have his land, so at least I know some part of him.
I wasn’t going to start construction until I had all the materials, but if Mom wants to move us away, I might never have the chance to build. Once she has an idea, that’s all she can focus on. Me too. Stubbornness is one of the traits Lola says Mom and I share.
My shop teacher, Mr. Keller, has a quote up in his classroom that I like: Seize the day. That’s what I’ll do.
“Lucinda, go to sleep.” Mom glances my way before turning over, her back to me like a wall.
I shut off the flashlight and bury myself under the covers. When it seems like she’s asleep, I aim a bright circle onto my plans.
My new house will have a composting toilet and, right above the kitchen, a cozy sleeping loft. Giant picture windows will frame redwoods. Anytime I need to get away for peace and quiet, I’ll go there.
Time to make it real. Seize the day!
Whenever Mr. Keller sees people goofing off during shop, he points at them with his nub and says, “Careful or you’ll lose a digit.” His finger ends at the joint. He lost the tip in high school while not paying attention during shop. Everyone gets freaked when they see the stub up close—including me. Right now it’s hovering a few inches from my face, pale and smooth around the bone. I try not to look.
“Miss Bulosan-Nelson?” he shouts.
“Sorry,” I say.
“No staring off into space, please.”
Jack Allen glances over and I’m sure he’s smirking, but whatever. It’s the last day of school and I can finally start building something big.
Mr. Keller looks about a thousand years old. Mom says when she had him in high school, he already looked ancient.
He’s mainly bald, with a half circle of gray hair rimming his head and long white whiskers that poke out from different parts of his cheeks. He likes to pluck them while reminding us of how we’re the only public middle school in San Francisco that offers woodworking (aka Industrial Arts and Technology) and how that’s good since electronic doo-zads have made the human race manually incompetent. Kids take his class because they think they can breeze through, until they find out just how hard it is to make a wooden banana hanger.
“Power off any tools, folks. It’s your last Keller’s Critique!” he shouts.
The buzzing in the room dies down as everyone waits for the machinery to come to a complete stop. If there’s anything Mr. K has taught us, it’s the importance of safety.
I slide off my goggles as he circles the tables.
Someone’s working on an “electronics holder”—basically a hunk of wood to stick a phone on top of (genius). Some other guy’s making what he calls “Mystery in a Cube”—yet another shapeless block. Then there’s my piece.
Mr. Keller puts his hands on his knees to get eye level with it. He pushes his glasses up and stares into the model of a teeny-tiny house.
“May I?” he asks, and I nod.
He picks it up carefully. It’s small enough to fit into his cupped palms, with four walls, an A-frame roof, card-sized cutouts for windows, and a door. I didn’t have time for the deck.
“Is this for birds? Some kind of wonderful, magical birdhouse?” he asks, perking up. He always seems genuinely curious about what I make.
“No.”
“Then what is it?” He knocks on the roof like some mini-creature might pop out to say hi.
The room’s quiet, everyone’s listening, waiting for a new Tissue Rejuvenator moment. That was my fifth-grade Innovation Project, a toilet-paper-dispenser hat so that whenever I had a cold I could reach up, yank down the paper, and presto! Instant relief! I was so nervous during the presentation, but everyone cheered and they all wanted to try it on. I love it when people get excited about things I make.
But as I sat down again, Jack Allen lau
ghed, leaned over, and whispered, “Nice work, TP Girl….” Meathead Carver Jamison heard and shouted, “Lou the Toilet Paper Girl for president! She gives free wipes!” Everyone busted up. They still call me President TP.
I haven’t told many kids at school about my house, but this is the most excited I’ve felt about any of my ideas—and I’ve had a lot.
Mr. Keller hands my project back.
“It’s a model for the house I’m going to build.” I sound confident. I say it louder so everyone can hear: “I’m building my own house.”
“Your own birdhouse?” Mr. Keller asks.
Maybe I should talk them through my vision, like the floorboards I’ll fit together from reclaimed hardwood, or the twinkle lights I’ll drape over the deck in a sparkly canopy. All this in one hundred square feet, the size of some people’s luxury bathrooms.
I look around, but no one’s paying attention. “Yeah. A birdhouse.” It’s easier than explaining.
Mystery in a Cube Guy snickers. “Who makes birdhouses?”
“Who makes a square?” I shoot back.
“Enough,” Mr. Keller snaps.
Jack peers my way again and, when I catch him, he looks down at the thing he built—bookends, I think? Simple blocks, barely sanded. I bet they’re not even level.
Mr. Keller runs his good hand along the seams of my model like he’s checking for gaps. “Excellent detailing, Lucinda.” He says this quietly so that no one else can hear. He’s a nice teacher like that.
The bell rings for lunch period. Mr. Keller gives a few parting words and the class transforms into a flurry of cleanup.
* * *
—
