by Wendy Wax
“Do you have anything you can work in?” Avery asked with a glance at Nicole’s cream-colored capris and body-sculpted T. “Cleaning is a pretty dirty business.” Her look said she doubted Nicole had any experience with this. “And the grunt work is bound to be even filthier.”
“I have running clothes with me,” Nicole replied. “I’m sure I’ll be fine.”
Avery shrugged, but Madeline held up a pair of plaid seersucker shorts and a poorly cut sleeveless T-shirt with a striped umbrella on it. Nikki shuddered.
“Are you sure?” Avery asked with a smirk. “I think that would really round out your wardrobe.”
“It’s unlikely anything nice is going to survive the summer,” Madeline pointed out. “You really should have some things that don’t matter.”
“Don’t worry about me,” Nicole said, suppressing another shudder. She’d spent a lifetime making sure she’d never have to wear cheap ill-fitting clothing again. She was not about to start now.
Assorted paper goods were added to the tower of stuff. By the time they’d made it through the checkout line and anted up their thirds, Nicole was far too numb to object to the foot long hot dog and giant fountain drink that Madeline proposed for lunch. They ate them in a few hungry bites then carried their drinks with them to the van, which they loaded under Madeline’s expert supervision; it seemed efficient cargo area filling was yet another suburban skill at which Madeline Singer excelled.
In the parking lot, where cars seemed to move and zip around far faster and with even more deadly intent than they did on the street, Nicole contemplated her partners and reflected on just how far out of her comfort zone their little shopping venture had yanked her. Still, she joined in on the three-way high five at all they’d managed to purchase for just a hundred dollars apiece. When it was time to climb back into the minivan for the trip back to the beach, she only flinched slightly.
An eternity later, they hobbled out to the backyard just as the sky was beginning to pinken. Bedraggled, they dropped into the beach chairs with a scrape of aluminum against concrete.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been this dirty in my entire life.” Madeline plopped a family-sized container of hummus and triangles of pita bread on the upside down packing box that their Sam’s purchases had been carried in.
“Me, neither.” Avery dropped a bag of Cheez Doodles beside it and swiped the back of her forearm across her forehead, managing to add another streak of dirt to her face.
Nicole set an opened bottle of Chardonnay on the pool deck next to her bare feet and handed a plastic cup to each of them. “If there was an inch of water in this pool, I’d be in it.” Nicole slumped in her chair. “I think we should make it a top priority.”
“We barely have a working bathroom,” Avery pointed out. “It took me forever to clean the shower and the tub up in the hall. There’s pretty much no water pressure. I’d rather have a shower than a swim in a pool.”
“I want both,” Nicole said, lifting the cup to her lips. “It’s not an either/or sort of thing.”
“Well, it is here.” Avery took a long sip of her wine as the sun slipped farther toward the Gulf. “Everything’s not going to get done at once, but I will talk to Chase about the schedule and how things should be prioritized.”
Madeline looked ruefully down at herself. Together they could have posed for the illustration of “something the cat dragged in”—even Nicole in her high-end running clothes and her hair pulled back in a glittery clasp. This was only day one; she could hardly imagine what they’d look like after the long, hot summer that lay ahead.
Her arms were so tired that it took real effort to lift even the small plastic cup, but she nonetheless touched it to the others. “Cheers!” she said, and they nodded and repeated the toast. “Will you be able to run your business from here?” she asked Nicole as they contemplated the sinking sun.
Nicole’s cup stopped midway to her lips. In the pass, a boat planed off and gathered speed as it entered the Gulf. “Sure,” she finally said. “Have laptop and cell phone, will matchmake.” She turned her gaze from the boat that was now disappearing from view to focus on Madeline. “How about you?” Nicole asked. “Can you really leave home for the whole summer?”
Madeline finished the last drops of wine and set her glass on the makeshift cocktail table. “You make it sound like going to camp,” she said in what could only be described as a wistful tone. “I was hoping my husband, Steve, would come down and help for a while.”
“Oh, is he retired?” Avery asked.
Madeline felt her cheeks flush. Nicole raised an eyebrow and poured them all another glassful.
“Not exactly,” Madeline admitted. “He was a financial planner who made the mistake of putting all his clients’ money in Malcolm Dyer’s fund. Along with his family’s.”
Her teeth worried at her bottom lip. She hadn’t meant to say so much. Or sound quite so pathetic.
“He stole my father’s entire estate,” Avery said. “Everything he’d built over a lifetime of hard work went into that thief’s pocket.” She grimaced and shoved her sunglasses back up on top of her head. “I still can’t believe it. Anything short of being drawn and quartered would be far too good for him.”
Madeline saw Nicole shiver slightly. “Are you cold?” The sun had not yet set, but its warmth had diminished.
“No.” Nicole turned her attention to the boat traffic in the pass. A Jet Ski swooped close to the seawall, its plume of seawater peacocking behind it. The rider was big shouldered and solid with jet black hair and heavily muscled arms. Nicole watched idly at first, presumably because he was male and attractive, but straightened in surprise as the rider locked gazes and offered a mock salute before revving his engine and zooming away.
“Do you know that guy?” Madeline asked Nicole, surprised. “He waved at you.”
“No,” Nicole said. “I don’t think he was actually waving at me. He . . .”
“Yes, he was,” Madeline insisted. “He acted like he knew you.”
“That guy was definitely hunky,” Avery said. “And he was definitely eyeing Nicole.”
“He must have thought I was someone else.” Nicole took a sliver of pita and chewed it intently before changing the topic. “So, how many kids do you have?” she asked Madeline.
“Two,” Madeline said, unsure how much information to share. “My son’s struggling a bit at school; he’s in his freshman year at Vanderbilt,” she said. “And my daughter, well, right before I left she lost her job—she’s a filmmaker—and she came home unexpectedly to live.” She cleared her throat as if that might somehow stop this bad news dump. “That was right after my mother-in-law moved in.”
“Good Lord,” Nicole said. She lifted the bottle, eyed the little that was left, and poured the remaining drops into Madeline’s glass. “No wonder you want to go away to camp.” She smiled with what looked like real sympathy. “Drink up, girl. I’d run away from home, too, if I had to deal with all of that.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes, sipping their wine, as the sun grew larger and brighter. A warm breeze blew gently off the Gulf, stirring the palms and riffling their hair.
“Maybe you should get your daughter to come down and shoot some ‘before’ video for us,” Avery suggested. “That’s actually what led to Hammer and Nail.” She furrowed her brow. “I had no idea what was coming down the pike when I shot that first ten minutes.”
Madeline considered the small blonde. “My mother-in-law seemed to think it was your husband’s show, that he got you on it.”
“A lot of people came to believe that,” Avery said, her tone wry. “Including my ex-husband. But the idea was mine. I’m the one who sold it, and us, to the network.”
They fell silent as the sun burned with a new intensity, shimmering almost white, then turning a golden red that tinged the Gulf as it sank smoothly beneath it.
“God, that was beautiful,” Madeline breathed as they all continued to stare out over the Gu
lf, unable to tear their gazes from the sky and the last painted remnants of daylight. “It makes me feel like anything is possible.”
No one responded, and she supposed she should be grateful that no one trampled on her flight of fancy. The show was over, but Madeline could still feel its power. It moved her in a way her fear and even her resolution and Little Red Henness had not. She raised her now-empty glass to Avery and Nicole. “I propose that we all make a sunset toast. That we each name one good thing that happened today.”
“Good grief,” Nicole said. “Look around you.” She motioned with her empty plastic glass at the neglected house that hunkered behind them, the cracked and empty pool, the detached garage with its broken windows and listing door. “Is your middle name Pollyanna?”
Madeline flushed at the comment, but she didn’t retract her suggestion. “I’m not saying we should pretend everything’s perfect,” she said. “I’m just saying that no matter how bad it is it would be better to dwell on the even slightly positive than the overwhelmingly negative.”
“You’re serious, aren’t you?” Avery asked. They all still held their empty glasses aloft. “How good a thing does it have to be?”
“That’s up to you,” Madeline said. “I’m not interested in judging; there will be no ‘good enough’ police.”
“Well, that’s a good thing,” Nicole snorted.
“All right, hold on a sec,” Madeline said. She went into the kitchen and retrieved a second bottle of wine from the fridge, grateful that John Franklin had had the power turned on. As she refilled their glasses, she searched for a positive. Nicole was right, it wasn’t an easy task.
“Okay.” She raised her now-full glass and waited for the others to do the same. “I think it’s good that three complete strangers were able to reach an agreement and commit to a course of action.”
They touched glasses and took a sip. Madeline nodded at Avery. “Your turn.”
“Hmmmm, let me think.” She looked out over the seawall at the gathering darkness as the three of them sat in a spill of light from the loggia. A few moments later she raised her glass. “I think it’s good that this house is not going to be torn down. It deserves a facelift and a new life.”
They clinked and drank and turned their gazes to Nicole. Madeline could hardly wait to hear what she would say.
Nicole looked back at the house, then at them. A small smile played around her lips, and Madeline wondered if she was going to tell them to stuff the happy crap or simply refuse to participate. But she raised her glass in their directions and with only a small sigh of resignation said, “It’s a good thing no one saw me in that minivan. I can’t imagine how I’d ever live it down.”
Eleven
They checked out of the Cottage Inn and moved their things to Bella Flora first thing the next morning. There wasn’t much to move, since no one except Nicole had come prepared for more than a couple of days’ stay. They stood around in the kitchen waiting for the pot of coffee Maddie put on to brew and eyeing the open box of doughnuts she’d set out on the speckled counter.
Avery had a steaming cup of coffee, heavily creamed and sugared just like she liked it, ready to lift to her lips when Chase Hardin strode into the kitchen without so much as a knock or a shouted hello.
“Good morning, ladies,” he boomed.
“Coffee?” Madeline offered, in full mother-hen mode.
“No, thanks. We don’t have time.” He grinned as he reached over to remove the mug from Avery’s hands. She’d barely had one sip.
“Hey!” She reached for the cup of caffeine she so desperately needed, but he just put it down on the opposite side of the counter.
“Come on. I want to have the furniture off the truck before the roofer and the plumber get here. They’re stopping by to take a look before they head to other jobs.”
He herded them outside without waiting for a response. Avery normally drew energy from her morning caffeine, but it appeared anger was an equally strong stimulant. “I assumed we’d go over the plans together and come up with a workable schedule before we solicited quotes.”
He stopped short at the lowered tailgate, and they all plowed into each other at the abrupt halt. Avery felt like one of the Three Stooges.
“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, squirt,” he said as they untangled themselves.
“I know you didn’t actually say that.” Avery fisted her hands on her hips.
He stared down at her, his blue eyes bright with amusement. “’Fraid so.”
“I assumed we’d be collaborating on this project,” she said. “Especially in the start-up phase. You can’t just go off half-cocked. I expect to see the list of what you intend to do to the house so we can agree on how to prioritize it.”
Chase folded his arms across his considerable chest and looked down at her. Way down. Avery had never hated being so short quite so much.
“My list,” he said carefully, “is right here.” He tapped his forehead. “Where it’s supposed to be. And I don’t really need help prioritizing it.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” she sputtered.
“And I never go off half . . . cocked,” he said, somehow managing to turn his retort into an insult and a double entendre at the same time. “There’s only one boss on any job and at any site. The minute you let someone else audition for top dog the time schedule and the quality level go all to hell. I’m the contractor on this job, and a co-owner. We don’t have time for design by committee.” He shrugged his broad shoulders. “Besides, you have no real-world experience that I’m aware of, and I don’t have the time or the inclination to educate you.”
He snagged her gaze with his. “By the end of the summer you’ll be back smiling and nodding into a television camera. Maybe you should stick to what you do best and let me do the same.”
Avery could barely respond; she wasn’t going to until she saw the satisfied glint steal into Chase Hardin’s eyes. As if he’d nipped some little problem—namely her—in the bud and could now get on with more important matters.
“Good grief,” she said. “You look like a normal person, but inside you’re a complete Neanderthal.” She pressed a finger up against his broad Cro-Magnon chest and the faded T-shirt that strained across it. “How many Mediterranean Revivals have you renovated or restored?” she asked. “Did you write your thesis on Addison Mizner and his transformation of Palm Beach?”
He dropped his gaze to her finger, then raised it to her eyes. “No, I didn’t get to write a thesis on Mizner or anyone else. I’ve learned construction the good old-fashioned way, with my hands and my heart. I’ve learned how to listen to what the house wants and figure out what it needs. And that’s not something they teach at college or put in books.”
Avery dropped her finger as he turned to pull the first mattress off the truck. Motioning Avery and Madeline closer, he positioned the double mattress so they could get ahold of it. “Here, why don’t you be in charge of this?”
Her stab of regret at taunting him fled, replaced with a flash of indignation, but she couldn’t let go of her end of the mattress without dropping it on the asphalt. “Of all the nerve,” she began, but he was already sliding the end of the other mattress toward Nicole and then walking backward balancing most of it so Nicole just had to hold on and follow his lead.
Avery and Madeline didn’t fare anywhere near as well or move anywhere near as fast as the “boss” and his helper. The discrepancy in their sizes, which left the mattress tilted at a precarious angle, didn’t help, and of course finding a good way to hold on to and support a mattress was like trying to hold on to Jell-O. Avery landed on top of it twice, almost fell down the stairs while bumping it up them, and was finally forced to push-pull it through the upstairs hallway in order to get it to her room.
“Thank God you insisted on mopping the floors up here so many times,” she said to Madeline as they both collapsed on the mattress to catch their breaths. Chase walked by whistling as he carried the t
hird mattress up on his own and deposited it in the next room before poking his head into her open doorway. “I hope you’re not planning to slack off so soon,” he said. “Dad sent a nightstand and lamp for each of you. And there’s a table and chairs for the kitchen.” He walked in and offered Madeline a hand up then turned to Avery. “Come on, Vanna. Up and at ’em.”
She ignored the proffered hand and clambered up on her own. With his laughter ringing in her ears, she huffed down the back stairs and into the kitchen, where she drank her nowtepid coffee down in one angry gulp.
“We need a microwave,” she said to Madeline, who’d followed her down. “To warm up coffee.” She poured herself a second cup and took a long, soothing sip. “And a gun would be good,” Avery said. “In case I need to blow his brains out.”
Madeline laughed. “I think we’ve got enough on our hands without having to defend you against a charge of manslaughter.”
“Vanna?” Chase’s voice floated down the center hallway. “Where do you want these chairs?”
Avery closed her eyes and tried to think soothing thoughts, but really, what was the use? “If he calls me Vanna one more time, I’ll be able to plead insanity.” Avery turned a grim smile on Madeline. “What do you think about the chairs? Do we want them here in the kitchen? Or shall I just tell him to shove them up his ass?”
Robby the plumber arrived after Avery’s second cup of coffee. He was somewhere in his midtwenties with a chunky build, a moon face full of freckles, and the carrot red hair that went with them. His big brown eyes were friendly and calflike.
“Hello, ma’am,” he said when she stepped around Chase to introduce herself and shake his warm, doughy hand. “You’ve got a great house here. I look forward to working on it.” He smiled shyly.
He was sweet and his glance was admiring, but he was awfully young. “Have you ever . . .” she began.
“Robby’s family has been working for Hardin-Morgan Construction since before Robby was born,” Chase said. “He worked with his father on a number of renovations in northeast St. Pete so he has some experience with cast-iron pipes and older plumbing systems.”
