If You Were Here: A Novel

by Jen Lancaster

  So, through the house we went, and now we’re at the turn in the stairwell and we’re thoroughly and profoundly stuck.

  “Guys, we need to angle it up and to the left to get it over the newel,” I instruct.

  “No, I think we have to wedge it more this way,” Luke disagrees, turning and shoving the lip of the tub until it’s firmly lodged between two wide wood balusters.

  “Wrong!” Mac chimes in. “We’ve got to go even more to the right.” And then Mac bashes the corner into the riser.

  “You guys, please! I’ve got the better vantage point. Up and to the left!” I plead.

  “How about if I try this?” Mac asks, shoving his section of the tub into the stringer, which leaves an enormous gash and makes me wince. The stairs, up until five minutes ago, were the one undamaged portion of this whole house.

  “Or what about this?” Luke throws his weight into the side of the tub and hits something, causing it to splinter.

  “That didn’t sound right,” Mac says, and Luke agrees.

  The fiberglass begins to get slippery. “I’m starting to lose my hold on this thing. Can you just do what I ask and go up and to the left?”

  “That’s why you need to wear gloves for this kind of project. See here, Mac? I’ve got the rubber dots on these and they grip like crazy. It’s like the tub would stick to my hands even if I let go.”

  “Please do not let go!” I call from my perch on the landing.

  “I go more for the high-tech gloves,” Mac says. He rests his shoulder against the tub and shows Luke his hands. “For me, I’m all about the gel inserts. They aren’t quite as grippy as what you’ve got, but I find they go a long way in shock absorption. Hey, when we’re done, I should show you my new shooting gloves. The Palm Swell protects all the nerves in the center of your hand so you don’t get so tired when you’re on the range. Fatigue is the number one cause of misfired—”

  “I’m about to drop the tub!” I shout, as the fiberglass slips out of my non-rubber-tipped, non-gel-coated, non-shock-absorbed hands. My end flips forward while the portion the boys are carrying wedges tightly in the stairwell.

  The tub is lodged almost completely upright. I can’t see around it, but from the sounds of it, the guys are fine.

  “Hey, what happened?” Mac asks.

  “I guess I couldn’t hold on to a hundred-pound tub myself,” I acidly reply.

  “You should probably get some gloves,” Luke adds helpfully.

  Argh.

  I grab the tub on either side and shake it in hopes of dislodging it. No such luck. “You guys, try it from your end!”

  I hear huffing and shoving, and if I position myself right, I can see the guys through the tub’s drain hole. Luke’s hurling himself into the tub while Mac tries to lift.

  “Yeah, it’s stuck, all right,” Luke confirms.

  “Well, unstick it, please; I’ve got plans later.” In a little while I’m supposed to meet Kara at her parents’ house for her big outing. Poor thing was so nervous that she made herself sick and had to take the day off work. I’ve been trying to talk her off the ledge all day.

  Mac takes charge. “Let me see what I can do. Luke, what we need here are tools. Let’s go.”

  “Wait. Don’t go. Maybe we—” But by then it’s too late. They head directly out the front door toward Mac’s workbench in the detached garage, leaving me alone at the top of the stairs with my thoughts.

  I have two thoughts right now. One, that I should have never offered to emcee the goat rodeo that is carrying a tub up the stairs, and two, that I deeply, desperately, urgently need to pee.

  I wait for at least twenty minutes before they return, crossing my legs the entire time. We don’t have any functional bathrooms yet and we’re still going in the Porta Potti. As soon as we got the tub upstairs, the guys were going to work on the toilet. I suggested they do the toilet first, what with my deep and abiding love of using the restroom indoors, but they insisted it would be easier to get the tub out of the way.

  Yeah. Easy.

  “What the hell, you guys?” I ask when they finally return.

  “Oh, sorry,” Mac replies. “Luke wanted to see my new impact driver, so we were looking at that.”

  “Can we please get me out of here? I’m about to wet my pants!”

  “Then use the bathroom,” Luke suggests.

  “I would, but you guys haven’t installed it yet! Hurry, please; I’m dying!”

  “Whatever you do, don’t think of waterfalls or swimming or anything,” Luke instructs.

  “That was very helpful, thank you,” I seethe.

  “Hey,” Mac says, “we can probably fit a coffee can or something over the top of the tub and you can go in that.”

  “What are you talking about?” Luke argues. “When’s the last time you saw anyone buy a can of coffee? What are you, eighty years old? Gonna use your S&H Green Stamps to buy something nice before you listen to your Pat Boone album? Coffee can, ha! She could probably go in a Starbucks bag, but I’m not sure they’re watertight. Oh, hey, have you tried those VIA packets? Not bad. I keep them in my desk at work—”

  Through clenched teeth, I say, “A can isn’t going to fit. Can we please stop talking about coffee now and start moving the tub?”

  “Okay,” says Mac, finally taking charge. “Here’s how we’re going to do this. Mia, you’re going to stand at the top and push, and Luke and I are going to come underneath and pull.”

  We try this for a few minutes and manage only to jam the tub in more. Then the guys lift the bottom as I pull up and back. We make a tiny bit of progress, but it’s a hollow victory, due to how much this gouges the balusters. We’re just starting to get somewhere when Luke stops us. “Listen, guys, I’m having a low-blood-sugar crash. I think I had too many VIAs today. They’re just so easy to make! You just rip ’em open and add hot water! Bam, that’s it! Anyway, I can’t do this until I eat. Do you have something with protein in it?”

  “We’re not doing a lot of cooking here, but we may have some hot dogs in the back of the minifridge,” Mac tells him. “You can heat it up in the microwave in the corner.” The microwave Vlad ordered has arrived, and not a moment too soon. I was getting really tired of eating my SpaghettiOs hobo-style.

  Luke starts to trot off, but then stops himself. “Wait. Where are my manners—Mia, would you like a hot dog?”

  I would like to scream, I would like to cry, and I would like to hit something or someone. Yet in this moment, I’m probably best off following the path of least resistance. “Sure.”

  Luke’s back in a minute.139 “Here ya go, Mia!” I don’t understand how he’s going to give the hot dog to me until I see the end of it poking out of the drain.140

  For lack of a better idea, I eat my hot dog. It’s not bad.

  The protein seems to refresh Luke, who comes up with the idea of removing the banister and spindles. Ultimately this will cause more work on the back end, but will likely save hundreds in repair costs. “Let’s do it.”

  I could wait in any of the bedrooms or up in the loft, but I feel like if I’m not within earshot managing this process, the boys will get distracted. I have to pee so badly my entire body is humming. I’d hoped the salt and nitrates in the hot dog would somehow make me want to go less, but now I’m about to bust and I’m thirsty.

  “How’s it coming?” I ask.

  “Almost there!” Mac assures me.

  “Can I be doing anything?”

  “Well ...” Luke considers. “You might want to, um, you know ...” But before he can articulate “Hold on to your end,” he pulls the final balustrade, and the tub releases, sails down the length of stairs, banks off the wall, and careens into the foyer, where the force of a hundred pounds of sweat-slicked fiberglass flies across the tiles and knocks the front door wide-open.

  I’m off like a shot behind it, making a mad dash to the Porta Potti. As I sprint out the door and over the tub, I slam directly into two Abington Cambs police officers.<
br />
  “Where’s the fire, ma’am?” says the taller, older one.

  “I’m sorry. I was just trapped and—” And that’s when it occurs to me that I have two Abington Cambs police officers in my driveway. “Wait. I’m sorry. Can I help you officers with something?”

  The younger, shorter one addresses me. “Ma’am, does a Mr. Bauer live here?”

  “Come again?”

  The older one takes over. “Mr. Bauer, does he or does he not reside at this residence?”

  I am beyond confused. “Agent Jack Bauer?”

  “Yes, ma’am, Mr. Bauer.”

  “You know Mr. Bauer is a cat, right? Not a person?” Then I’m suddenly consumed with dread. “Is he okay?”

  “So you confirm he does live here?” demands Officer Younger.

  “Yes. Do you have him? Has anything happened to him?” I worry that not only might Agent Jack Bauer be hurt, but that someone could have had an accident avoiding him. We live up on a bluff and the roads back here are winding. One wrong turn and someone could find himself down a ravine or in the lake.141

  The younger one flips open a notepad before he continues. “We’ve had a complaint about your cat. He was seen at eighteen hundred hours urinating on a neighborhood lawn.”

  “He got out a couple of hours ago and I was tied up and couldn’t chase after him. But how would you know that? Wait. Someone called you guys? Because a cat peed outside? Are you kidding me? Is this a joke?”

  “Vandalism is no joking matter, ma’am,” says the older cop.

  And that’s when I snap.

  Or go all Swayze.142

  I can’t stop what comes out of me next. “Do I seriously pay thousands of dollars in property taxes so you two can harass me about my cat getting outside? Is that where my money is going? I’m sorry; is it illegal for creatures to relieve themselves in this town? Are you going to buy all the squirrels tiny little diapers? Gonna give the chipmunks catheters? Hey, wait. A bird crapped on my windshield! Better call nine-one-one! I think that’s a hate crime! I’m not kidding ; this is singularly the dumbest goddamned—”

  “Language, ma’am,” says Officer Older.

  Rage bubbles up inside me. “Forgive me. What I meant to say is that this is singularly the dumbest gosh-darned thing I’ve ever heard. You tell Lululemon and Citizen Cane and Elbow Patches or anyone else in this neighborhood who has you two rent-a-cops in their pocket that I will not be harassed any longer! I live here! I’m not leaving! But you? You are wasting my time, you’re wasting taxpayers’ time, and I’m about to commit my own hate crime if you don’t get out of my way so I can use the bathroom.”

  I stare them down so hard that Officer Younger finally says, “We’ll get Mr. Bauer for you.” Then he goes to the backseat and plucks one seriously confused kitten out of it before handing him to me.

  “What, no shackles?” I demand.

  As they begin to back away, the older one says, “One more thing, ma’am?”

  “What?!”

  “You really can’t keep your bathtub on the front porch.”

  After Mac and Luke convince the police not to Taser me, they all turn into fast friends over a conversation about their sidearms. The cops impart some wisdom on how to properly seat a toilet on a wax seal, and only then do we finally get something accomplished. Now, like Agent Jack Bauer, I shall whiz indoors exclusively.

  Right before I go to bed, I finally think to check my messages. I have an increasingly panicked string of texts from Kara beginning at five fifty p.m., ending with the final one that says simply:

  where were u?

  Shit.

  Chapter Seventeen

  SPANISH TILE

  “It’s a jungle out there.”

  “You got that right,” Mac agrees from behind his American Rifleman’s annual “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” edition.

  I come up to him at the table and bend his magazine down. “No, it’s a jungle out there.” I point out the window. “You promised me you were going to take care of the yard.”

  He sips his coffee before returning to his reading. “I will, as soon as I finish fixing the light.”

  Instead of letting any of the fight grenades in these statements explode and have the shrapnel ruin yet another day, I simply walk away. I’m tired of being angry. Yet I’m not sure which frustrates me more—the yard or the goddamned light.

  A couple of weeks ago we had to discontinue the landscaping service because we can’t afford to keep paying ninety dollars a week for a little mowing and some light weed whacking. A lot of our property is woods, so our place doesn’t require nearly as much upkeep as one might think.143 We have some flowering perennials out front, and I’ve done a fine job144 of keeping them up myself. When I get blocked in my writing, it’s nice to go outside and take my frustrations out on the weeds.

  Given my current level of frustration, those beds are impeccable.

  However, we do have lawn on the side and in the back of the house, and it’s almost up to Daisy’s shoulders now. The grass doesn’t look like single blades anymore so much as short stalks of wheat and corn. One more good rainstorm and the yard might swallow her whole. As is, I can barely get her out there. I’ve been quietly resenting the yard for a while now, especially since the novelty wore off for the dogs. Sometimes I think they’d be happier back in the city, because the smells there were so much more interesting.

  Mac’s been promising to run the mower, but it rained most of last week and he didn’t get the chance. Then he was supposed to do it a couple of days ago, but that’s when the light on the garage blew out. I asked him to change it because the fixture is below the peak of the roof between the two garage doors and he’s better on a ladder than I am. I’m not afraid of heights so much as I am particularly susceptible to gravity.

  Mac agreed to change the light before tackling the yard, and I estimated this project would take, what? Eight minutes start to finish if he actually put the ladder away and six if he didn’t.

  But no.

  Nothing is that simple in this goddamned house.

  “The four-packs of floodlight bulbs are in the hall closet,” I told him.

  “I’m not using a regular bulb out there,” he replied. “I’m installing an EcoSmart LED light. I figure if I’m going to all that trouble of replacing it, I want a bulb that’s long-lasting. I’ve got to go to Home Depot to pick one up.”

  “Can’t you just save yourself a trip and stick in a regular bulb and take that time to cut the lawn?” I asked, mentally adding at least an hour and a half to the task, since he’d involved the Depot.145

  “Being able to see the garage is a priority. I’ll be back in a few minutes,” he said.

  Two hours later, Mac arrived home and was, ostensibly, ready to tackle the task at hand. However, I had to wait another fifteen minutes while he “strapped on his bags,” because God knows you can’t change a lightbulb without donning thirty pounds of tool belt. There’s got to be a joke about how many do-it-yourselfers it takes to change a lightbulb, but my sense of humor was such that I probably wouldn’t have appreciated it had I heard it.

  When he was finally ready to climb the ladder, I positioned myself at the bottom, primed to hand him stuff as needed. While he removed the glass around the lantern and unscrewed the old bulb, I inspected the new one. That thing didn’t look like the regular kind of bulb you’d see popping up in thought bubbles over cartoon characters’ heads when they got bright ideas about how to best roadrunners and wascally wabbits. Instead the bulb had a flat glass surface in the middle that was surrounded by what appeared to be white plastic gills or spokes. Odd.

  “What’s so special about this?” I asked.

  “This bulb is extra bright and environmentally friendly, and it’s guaranteed to last five years. According to the manufacturer, it should save us two hundred dollars over its life span. That’s why it costs a little more,” Mac told me.

  My ears instantly pricked up. “How much more?
”

  “A lot more,” he admitted.

  I did not care for the sound of that. “How much?”

  Mac appeared to be very interested in the fixture when he answered me. “Forty-five dollars.”

  I practically crushed the bulb with my bare hands when I heard that. “Are you shitting me? Forty-five dollars? For a frigging lightbulb? Are you high or do you just hate money? I could buy groceries for the week with forty-five bucks! For two of these bulbs, I could pay for a week of landscaping! Forty-five dollars is insane!”

  Mac steadied himself against the garage. “Can you stop shaking the ladder, please? We need it, it will last, end of story. My dad always says buy cheap, buy twice. This may not sound like a great idea now, but when we have five full years of a clear, cost-effective lighting solution, you’ll thank me.”

  I snorted. “Yeah, talk to me in five years about that.”

  “Hand it up, please; I’m ready for it.” I did and then he screwed the Hope diamond of lightbulbs into the socket.“Okay, now go into the garage and flip the switch.”

  What I thought was, Oh, I’ll flip something, all right.

  What I said was, “Got it.”

  I entered the garage, located the yellowed switch plate, and flipped the first switch on the right. “Done.”

  I walked back out as Mac called to me, “Mia! Flip the switch!”

  “I did.”

  “Clearly you didn’t, because the light’s still off. You must have hit the wrong switch.”

  “No, I did the one on the far right. You probably just have a bum bulb.”

  With a tad more condescension than I’d deem appropriate, Mac said, “Mia, Home Depot doesn’t sell defective forty-five-dollar bulbs. Now please get back in there and flip all the switches.”

  So I did . . . and nothing happened.

  Mac didn’t believe me, so he got down from the ladder and kept trying all the switches himself. “I don’t get it,” he said, and then he snapped his fingers. “Oh, wait. I figured it out. This fixture has got to be thirty years old. I’m sure that’s the problem. I’m going back to the Depot to buy a nice new wall-mount outdoor lantern. I’ll be back soon.”