Rhymes with Cupid

by Anna Humphrey

  How could I have been so stupid back then? I wondered. When Matt started flirting with me in chemistry and following me around the school asking me out, I thought he’d singled me out because I was special, because he’d cared about me. When really, all along, I’d been replaceable: just a girl who fit into his arms as well as any other girl would fit. But that was most high school guys for you. Pretty much anyone who was female, decent looking, and willing would do.

  The scared sparrow had stepped aside now, and a new model with shockingly red hair had taken her place. She peeked out from behind a tree with sultry eyes as the cameras flashed, then held one hand up over her mouth in a strange way. “Gorgeous,” the host was saying. “She’s got it. She has so much confidence. She makes peacock look sexy.” Seriously? Except for the hair, I couldn’t tell the difference between her and the last girl, but then, what did I know about modeling, or anything, really? Maybe there was something I was missing; some crucial difference between the sexy peacock and the scared sparrow—between Tabby and me—some very obvious (to everyone else) reason why Matt Love loved her, but didn’t love me. She just had it. I just didn’t.

  Well, big deal! I clicked the TV off and carried the popcorn bowl to the kitchen. So what if I didn’t have it? If being a sexy peacock was what attracted guys like Matt Love, maybe I was better off being a scared sparrow, anyway. I had other things to focus on, I decided, as I came back to the living room and gathered up my school books.

  And, as for Patrick, and his inexplicable crush on me, he’d survive. Give him a week, or a couple of days, even. He’d see that there was nothing special about me. And then he’d be willing to take the next decent-looking girl who came along. . . . And so much the better if that decent-looking girl just happened to be Dina.

  In fact, it seemed like he was already getting over it. All things considered, he’d been remarkably chill during our driving lesson. He’d even had me pull into a drive-through where he’d ordered fries. While we’d waited our turn in the line of cars, he’d gathered up the dead roses and casually climbed out to toss them into a nearby trash can. “I don’t get why girls like flowers so much, anyway,” he’d said when he returned. “They kind of stink.” And, because I was still feeling bad about rejecting him, I didn’t say a word about the fact that they only stank because they were dead, or about the greasy fries smell that soon filled the car, mixing with the lingering dead roses stench to form a supersmell that was easily ten times worse.

  When we got home, he’d even offered to help me shovel the walkway, which was gallant of him and everything, but totally unnecessary. He had his own to do, after all. “What? You think I can’t lift a little snow?” I’d said. Then I’d done it myself, working extra-fast so I’d finish ahead of him. “Night,” I’d said casually, tossing the shovel into a snowbank, my muscles already burning.

  It was 9:30 now, and what had started out as a vague muscle pain had turned into a full-fledged throbbing. I tried to stretch out my shoulders, but it didn’t do much good, so I decided to take a hot shower instead before heading to bed. But, first, true to my word, I did the rounds of the house, checking that all the doors and windows were locked. I started in the basement with the small sliding windows—stepping around the giant wardrobe, which was still lying facedown on the floor. It was creepy being down there alone at night, so I worked quickly, switching on all the lights first to reassure myself that there weren’t any monsters or bad guys hiding in the corners behind the cardboard boxes and bags of lawn fertilizer. Then I switched them all off again, feeling like a baby for being freaked out enough to check in the first place. I worked my way upstairs from there, checking the ground-floor windows and doors and even making sure that all the burners on the stove—which I hadn’t even used—were shut off. Then, reassured that the house was safe and secure and that my paranoid mother would be proud, I went upstairs, showered, and went to bed.

  It wasn’t until I woke up at three thirty A.M. that I knew something was wrong. My first clue was the fact that I was awake at all. I’m usually a really sound sleeper. My second clue was my nose: It was numb.

  I pulled an arm out from underneath my duvet, then quickly pulled it back in again. The air was the temperature of a chilly fall day. My first instinct was to curl up in a ball for warmth, and try to go back to sleep. But, then, that wasn’t an option. The house was my responsibility. Forcing myself out of bed, I stumbled over to the radiator and lay my hand on it. That’s when I knew for sure that I was screwed. It was three thirty in the morning, in February. I was completely alone, and the furnace was broken.

  I grabbed my robe from the hook on the door, stuffed my feet into a pair of slippers, and went downstairs. “Furnace, furnace, furnace,” I muttered, scanning the three-page note my mother had left on the kitchen table. It listed numbers to call and procedures to follow in the event of any and all emergencies. If the key got stuck in the lock, I was supposed to call Jay at LockWorks. If a light burned out, I’d find bulbs under the sink. If my toast was too dark, I should turn the setting to “light.” My mother had thought of everything, really. Everything except what to do if the furnace died.

  I sighed as I switched on the light at the top of the basement stairs. If I was lucky, the furnace would turn out to be one of the many appliances my mother had attached a sticky note to, like the one on the fridge: “If freezer leaks, defrost,” or the one on the blender: “Close lid firmly before blending.” I wasn’t lucky. The furnace had no such helpful sticky note.

  My next stop was the computer where I Googled “Furnace Repair, Middleford.” Five company sites came up. Only one of them—Hot Stuff Furnace Repair—offered twenty-four-hour service. I dialed the number. The phone rang five times before someone picked up.

  “Yeah, what?” a woman’s voice answered groggily. I guess you couldn’t really expect stellar customer service at that hour of the morning.

  “Um. Hi,” I said, suddenly feeling like I was ten years old. “Sorry if I woke you up. My name is Elyse. And my furnace is broken. Is this the right number?”

  I could hear bed springs creaking. “Dan,” the woman shouted, obviously trying to wake her husband. “Danny. A broken furnace.”

  “You can come?” I said, relief washing over me.

  “Sure we can. Where you located?” I gave the woman my address. “You understand,” she went on, seeming more awake now that it was time to talk cash, “we charge an up-front service fee of one hundred and seventy-nine dollars for an after-hours emergency call. And the rate is seventy-five dollars an hour after that, plus whatever’s needed in parts.” I gulped.

  “A hundred and seventy-nine dollars? Just to show up?”

  “Cash is best. Check is fine, too.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, my voice going small. “My mom’s out of town. I can’t write a check. I don’t even know if we can afford that.”

  The woman sighed, like my existence was annoying her. “Well, if you can hold on till morning, the daytime price drops. Seventy-nine for the service call and sixty an hour after that.”

  “All right,” I said. “Sure.” I could pay the $79 with my last paycheck, and if I was lucky, it would be a small repair that I could cover with the emergency money my mom had left. She wouldn’t even have to know about it until she got home.

  The furnace woman told me a few things I should do in the meantime, like turning on a tap and letting it drip so the pipes wouldn’t freeze. Then she said they’d be by in the morning. I hung up and hugged my bathrobe tightly around me. The house seemed to be getting colder by the second. I thought about calling my aunt Sarah, to see if I could stay there, but she was all the way across town, and I didn’t want to wake her up. Plus, if I called her, she’d make me call my mom, and that was the last thing I wanted. I’d told my mom I could handle taking care of the house on my own, and I intended to do it.

  I glanced out the side window—toward Patrick’s house—on my way back up the stairs. He’d probably let me in if I knocke
d on the door, get me some blankets, and let me sleep on the couch, but how weird would that be? I liked him. We were friends. But I’d only known him a week. Plus, I’d just rejected him that afternoon.

  So, instead, I went to my mom’s room, pulled her bathrobe on, on top of mine, then scrounged around in the linen closet looking for the electric heating pad I used for period cramps. I plugged it into the power outlet in my room, arranged it near my feet, pulled the blankets over my head, and went back to sleep.

  And when the sun came up the next morning, things looked better. Sure, the house felt like the inside of a refrigerator, but I was handling it. I had my mom’s biggest, warmest coat on and a fleece-lined hat. The repair guys would be there soon. All I had to do was make myself a mug of hot chocolate, curl up with the heating pad, and wait. So I waited. And waited. And waited. When nine o’clock came around, I called school to explain why I wouldn’t be in. At ten, I called Hot Stuff Furnace Repair to see how soon they’d be there. The same woman answered.

  “Sometime between ten thirty and four,” she said.

  At first I thought she was kidding. “But I can’t wait here all day. You’ve got to understand. My house is really cold right now.”

  “That happens when the furnace breaks,” she answered drily. “Have you got a space heater?” No, I did not have a space heater. Also, I hated her. I hated her with every icy bone in my body. “The guys’ll be there as soon as they can. Maybe before noon.” But “as soon as they can” didn’t end up being before noon at all. At three, I called Mr. Goodman to tell him I’d probably be late for my shift at the store. At four I realized I wouldn’t be making it in at all. I called Dina to give her an update and to ask her to tell Patrick I might have to cancel our driving lesson. Then I called Hot Stuff again. Apparently, it was a big day for furnace failure. They’d probably be by between six and nine P.M.

  After I hung up, I sighed and turned off the TV. I couldn’t stand watching another game show, or drinking another mug of hot chocolate, anyway. I figured I might as well go next door to wait for Patrick so I could officially cancel our driving lesson in person. I’d leave a note on the door for the repair guys, telling them where I was. Plus, while I waited, I might actually get warm.

  When I got to Patrick’s I knocked firmly on the door and waited a minute, then two. I knocked again. Finally, I heard the shuffling of feet. “Hello?” An old man opened the door and stared out at me with big, round eyes. “I thought I heard someone knocking.” He smiled. “Are you here to collect for the food bank? I think we’ve got some tinned pears, but you’ll just have to let me see.”

  “No,” I said. “I’m Elyse. From next door.”

  “What’s that?” He leaned forward. “You want more?” He scratched at his head. “Well, I suppose I might have a jar of unopened peanut butter, too. And I’ve got pickles. Could you use pickles? A big jar of dills, but they’re in the cold cellar behind some boxes. If you don’t mind coming in and waiting for my grandson to get home, he can carry them up for you.”

  “Oh, no,” I said very loudly. “No pickles. I’m from next door.” I pointed toward my house. Then I pointed at myself. “Elyse. Elyse Ulrich. You’ve met my mom.”

  “Oh. The Ulrich girl,” he said, figuring it out. “You’ll have to forgive me. I haven’t got my hearing aid in. Come. Come inside. What can I do for you?”

  I explained then, in my loudest voice, about the furnace. He nodded. “Now, you’ve got a gas-burning furnace over there, if I recall,” he said. “Have you checked your pilot light?”

  I shook my head. I didn’t even know what a pilot light was, let alone if our furnace had one. “Well, that’d be your first step. Let me see. . . .” He looked down at his watch. “Patrick won’t be home for another few minutes. Have a seat.” He motioned toward the living room. “I’ll just get my hearing aid in, then I’ll be right down. Go over and see if I can have a look for you.”

  I didn’t know if it was the fact that my tear ducts were thawing out after a long, frozen day, the exhaustion from sleeping so badly the night before, or the fact that when he didn’t even know who I was, Patrick’s grandfather was willing to give me a jar of pickles, but his kindness suddenly overwhelmed me. “Thank you,” I said, tears springing to my eyes. I blinked them back. “That would be great.” He shuffled up the stairs. While I waited, I took off my boots, wandered into the living room, and sat down, pulling off my mittens and looking around.

  The sofa I was sitting on was formal and uncomfortable. Its floral pattern competed with another on the heavy curtains and a third on the wallpaper. Two ceramic lamps flanked it on either side, sitting primly on side tables that hadn’t been dusted in months. A collection of Royal Doulton figurines of ladies in ball gowns danced, each frozen mid-step, in a dark wood display case. Everything about the place made it obvious that a woman had once loved this room.

  I stood up and walked over to the fireplace mantel, which was filled with framed photos that seemed to go in chronological order from left to right. A young bride and her husband standing by a tree, grinning at each other. A shot of the same couple in a park in sepia tones: This time the woman hugged a young child from behind; the man held a baby in his arms. I moved down the line until I got to the ones that showed the couple with silver hair, cuddling two little boys—one with Patrick’s curly hair—sitting on the front steps of the same house I was in now.

  Patrick’s grandmother wore the same smile in each of the photos. Her head tilted slightly to one side, her eyes gleaming with laughter. I walked back down the line of photos, looking at her more carefully as she got younger and younger. She was beautiful, actually, and not just because her hair fell in perfect ringlets and her cheekbones were high. There was an unmistakable warmth and playfulness about her. Plus, it was obvious to me now where Patrick got his twinkly green eyes and curly hair.

  I had just reached the last photo again—the wedding photo—when I heard the front door open. “Hi, Grandpa,” Patrick said loudly. “I’m home.” I was about to call out to let him know I was there, but something caught my eye. I stepped closer to the picture. There, around Patrick’s grandmother’s neck was a small, heart-shaped pendant. The picture was in black-and-white, so it was hard to tell for sure, but it looked familiar: a lot like the opal pendant my mother had found between the floorboards in our attic the week before. Could it be?

  “Well now.” I heard Patrick’s grandfather’s feet on the stairs again. “There he is. Patrick, the Ulrich girl is here, waiting in the living room. Having some trouble with the furnace. I was just about to head over to check on the pilot light.”

  “I’ll do it, Grandpa,” Patrick answered. I sighed silently. It was one thing having Patrick’s grandfather help with the furnace, but the last thing I wanted was to accept Patrick’s help. Even though we’d agreed to be friends, things were bound to still be a bit awkward between us. But also, if he could fix it at all—which was unlikely—the fact that he’d rescued me was bound to go straight to his head. And, if he couldn’t—and if he was anything like any other guy I’d ever met—the second blow to his pride would be too much to take.

  “There’s a good boy,” his grandpa said. “Save me going out in the snow. I’ll get you my tool belt.” A minute later, Patrick’s head poked into the living room.

  “Patrick-the-furnace-repair-guy, at your service,” he said. I gave him a tight smile. “Well, sort of at your service,” he continued. “On one condition.”

  “What’s that?” I asked, turning away from the photo and putting my mittens back on.

  “As soon as I fix it, we go driving. Dina told me you wanted to cancel, but we’ve only got seven days left. You’re not failing that test on my watch.”

  “You seem pretty confident there,” I countered.

  “About the driving test or the furnace?”

  “Both.”

  “Yeah. Well, I’m just that good,” he said. I rolled my eyes.

  But as it turned out, he’d taken a
n elective in appliance repair back at his school in Toronto, and he was that good.

  Five minutes later, he was stepping around the giant wardrobe that lay facedown in the middle of our basement floor. “Do you guys always keep that there?” he asked, giving it an odd look.

  “Not really.” I explained about it falling on my mom. Patrick offered to help me push it upright, but I just shivered and suggested we had bigger, colder problems to focus on at the moment.

  He nodded and shone a flashlight into the dark, cobwebby recesses of our basement. “Well, it’s not your pilot light,” he said, crouching down near the furnace.

  “I knew it,” I answered. “There’s something seriously wrong with this thing. It just completely died. You’re not going to be able to fix it. Don’t worry. I already called the repair people. They’ll be here between six and nine. We’ll drive tomorrow. No big deal.”

  “Hey, not so fast.” He held up a hand. “I’m not done.” He walked around to the other side of the furnace, resting his hand against this pipe, then that one, hemming and hawing. “Huh,” he said finally, a smile breaking across his face. “I think I see your problem.”

  “You do?”

  I watched as he reached up to the ceiling and flicked on a switch—one of the same ones, I realized, I’d flicked off the night before, when I’d been turning off lights after checking that the windows were locked. The furnace hummed to life. Even in the freezing cold basement, I felt the warm flush going to my cheeks.

  “You know,” he said, “if you really wanted to see me, you could have just come over. You didn’t have to shut your furnace off and pretend it was broken. I mean, fake Lyme disease is one thing, but this . . .”

  “Look. I didn’t. I just—I didn’t know what that switch was for. I honestly thought it was broken. And I made it pretty clear yesterday. I don’t feel that way about you—I—”