Once in a Blue Moon

by Vicki Covington

  John F. Blair, Publisher

  1406 Plaza Drive

  Winston-Salem, NC 27103

  (800) 222-9796 | blairpub.com

  Copyright @ 2017 by Vicki Covington

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. For information, address John F. Blair, Publisher, Subsidiary Rights Department, 1406 Plaza Drive, Winston-Salem, North Carolina 27103.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Covington, Vicki, author.

  Title: Once in a blue moon / Vicki Covington.

  Description: Winston-Salem, North Carolina : John F. Blair, Publisher, [2017]

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016047235 | ISBN 9780895876799 (hardcover : acid-free paper)

  Subjects: LCSH: Interpersonal relations--Fiction. | Birmingham (Ala.)--Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3553.O883 O53 2017 | DDC 813/.54--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016047235

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Cover design: Brooke Csuka

  Book design: Anna Sutton

  For Haden Marsh

  ALSO BY VICKI COVINGTON:

  Bird of Paradise

  The Last Hotel for Women

  Night Ride Home

  Gathering Home

  Cleaving: The Story of a Marriage (with Dennis Covington)

  Women in a Man’s World, Crying

  Contents

  Mr. Kasir

  Landon

  Abi

  Landon

  Abi

  Landon

  Sam

  Jet

  Abi

  Landon

  Mr. Kasir

  Sam

  Jet

  Sam

  Jason

  Mr. Kasir

  Jason

  Jet

  Landon

  Abi

  Landon

  Sam

  Abi

  Landon

  Jet

  Landon

  Abi

  Landon

  Sam

  Landon

  Abi

  Jet

  Landon

  The Neighbors

  Acknowledgments

  MR. KASIR

  Sometime during the late sixties, Abraham Kasir began buying up property on the south side of Birmingham. He collected turn-of-the-century homes that had fallen into disrepair, built when industrialists from the North realized that the three main ingredients for producing steel—iron ore, coal, and limestone—were nestled together in Jones Valley. An impressive railroad system was already in place, and the industry exploded. Rapid growth propelled the city into the national spotlight and attracted a bounty of new residents, construction, and development. Wealthy investors built their mansions in Southside. The skyline burned brightly with furnace towers. Birmingham acquired a nickname, “the Magic City.” And yet as quickly as it had rocketed upward, the city began to decline. The industry changed. Factories closed. The once-splendid pieces of architecture that had been homes to the titans of industry were abandoned.

  But while others were leaving the city behind, Mr. Kasir saw an opportunity to build something new. He gathered properties, dividing each home in half, generally a downstairs and upstairs with separate entrances, and began renting them out. By the 1990s, he owned more than twenty properties sprinkled along the hills and forests of Red Mountain; six of them were clustered along Cullom Street. Despite Southside’s beginnings, its grandeur declined along with the city at the end of the twentieth century. And yet Mr. Kasir’s community of renters thrived. Hippies, artists, and other free spirits found solace in his collection of duplexes.

  During showings, when a potential renter met Mr. Kasir, the landlord often said, “I think you’ll find everything you need here.”

  What he meant was that the back of the house was a junkyard of sorts—old tools, two-by-fours, bedframes, pieces of fencing. The renters had to be a particular kind of scavenger to appreciate his words, and his properties. Yet he taught them to appreciate what was at hand, like how to piece together a makeshift dog pen or cut their grass with the ancient manual lawn mower that the neighbors shared.

  Mr. Kasir’s tenants knew they’d pay way less than with other landlords. Perhaps they knew family or friends who had rented from Mr. Kasir. Or maybe, while attempting to navigate around rush-hour traffic, they’d driven past one of the generic red For Rent signs that Mr. Kasir fished out of the back of his truck on the rare occasions when someone moved out. Maybe they intended to cross the mountain to the suburbs on the other side, but life had made other plans.

  Living over the mountain meant that you were guaranteed a good school system for your kids, that the neighborhoods were well kept, that doctors and attorneys lived alongside you, that you were safe in your home and didn’t find it necessary to keep your doors locked all the time. Indeed, Mr. Kasir himself lived over the mountain. But he had noticed that his tenants saw the suburbs merely as a reminder of their place within the city, which bred in them a strange sense of pride.

  Vulcan was a straight shot up the mountain from the cluster of Mr. Kasir’s duplexes on Cullom Street. The towering statue—a burly, bearded, bare-assed man, the Roman god of fire—lorded over the city. Still the world’s largest cast-iron statue, Vulcan was built by an Italian named Moretti for the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis and found a permanent home on Red Mountain in 1938. Visitors could enter through the pedestal on which Vulcan stood and climb the steps to a landing that gave a view of the entire city stretching east to west, with Southside directly below.

  LANDON

  The story of how Landon Cooper’s address came to be 1627 Cullom Street was a lament.

  And this wasn’t unusual. Many of Mr. Kasir’s tenants landed in this part of Southside via trauma or loss. Landon, for example, had just signed divorce papers. After nearly three decades, she’d left her marriage, kicking and screaming. To make matters worse, she and her husband had lived beyond their means for years, and the recession had necessitated a quick sale of the home in which they had raised their daughters.

  In her new life, she was going to be alone, without so much as a familiar hallway to comfort her. She had envisioned herself in one of the sleek new lofts downtown, but they were too expensive and too small to hold all that she was moving. She considered the faceless suburban apartment complexes, but their thin walls would do little to mask the sounds coming from the adjacent units. Finally, she decided to drive around Southside. When she got to Cullom Street, she spotted a For Rent sign in front of an aging Victorian with a front porch swing, two private entrances, and the remnants of a garden she knew she might salvage.

  She called the phone number on the sign immediately.

  “Kasir here.”

  They agreed to meet at the house the following day.

  Landon woke the next morning feeling hopeful. Even if the house was in slight disrepair, it appeared to have a lot of space, and space was what she needed, since she was moving an entire family history. She arrived a few minutes early and sat on the porch swing.

  Moments later, a red truck pulled up to the curb. She watched a man—Mr. Kasir, she assumed—open the door and pull his legs out to rest on the running board. Then he slowly put his feet on the asphalt, using a cane. He was a tiny man, clearly old.

  “Abraham Kasir,” he said, extending a gnarled, arthritic hand.

  “I’m Landon,” she replied, taking his hand gently.

  She watched him fumble with a big set of keys. When her family lived in Homewood—over
the mountain—they had felt so safe that they locked the door only if they were vacationing.

  Mr. Kasir found the key he was looking for and unlocked the door. When Landon followed him into the foyer, she was taken aback. The home felt like a cathedral. The ceilings must have been fifteen feet high, and most doors had a transom. Sure, they were in dire need of dusting, but she’d take care of that. The floors were wood and recently waxed.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said to Mr. Kasir.

  Already, she was mentally placing her dining-room table, china cabinet, buffet, secretary, and, most importantly, her piano in the big parlor. These were all heirlooms from her grandmothers. Their history began to merge with what she imagined of the room she was staring at. Blinds were on every window. They were askew in a few places, but she figured she’d take them down anyway and hang some long ivory curtains or white eyelets.

  “How old is this house?” she asked.

  “More than a hundred years. Older even than me.”

  “Those pocket doors,” she swooned.

  “You like those?”

  Mr. Kasir walked over to the heavy mahogany sliding doors, which could close off the parlor from the next room. He pulled one door out a few inches, then tucked it back into its pocket. The second room, a living room, had a fireplace that was boarded up. Yet it still held its charm, thanks to its black tiles and carved mantel. In this room, Landon would put her television, her sofa, bookshelves, and comfortable armchairs.

  “I can’t believe the space here.”

  “You have a family?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she replied, then corrected herself. “But my children are grown, and my husband and I are divorced.” She hated saying those words, unnatural on her tongue. She felt it was a confession of failure, a dark place she now was sharing with this stranger.

  Mr. Kasir nodded, allowing Landon to take the room in. She started walking forward and he followed, his gait compromised by whatever was ailing his legs.

  Behind the big parlor and living room were three bedrooms, a kitchen, and a bath.

  “Well, I can take this master bedroom. And fix up the other two with what the girls left behind—you know, beds, clothes, artwork. In case they ever come back home,” she told him, her voice catching.

  They stood in the hallway that connected the bedrooms.

  “You have kids?” she asked him to steer the conversation away from herself.

  “One son,” he replied.

  Mr. Kasir was waiting patiently.

  “I have a dog,” she told him.

  “That so?”

  “A small one. He’s a wire-haired dachshund. His name is Alejandro.”

  Landon expected him to quote her a fee for having a pet, but he said nothing. He smiled, took a handkerchief from his pocket, and wiped his brow. It did feel a bit stuffy, but she had taken note of the many window air conditioners. Right now, the power was off.

  Landon walked into the kitchen. It was spare, not big enough for a table. The one redeeming feature was a stained-glass window over the sink. It stood out, so bright and colorful next to the tiny white refrigerator and old gas stove.

  “Here’s your washer-dryer hookup,” he noted.

  She was relieved.

  “The smaller units don’t have them. Like the girl who lives upstairs. She and all the others,” he said, making a small, sweeping gesture with his cane, “they all go to the Laundromat just around the corner, by the market.”

  Landon nodded, already sold.

  When she and Mr. Kasir returned to the parlor, she turned to him. His eyes looked big behind his glasses, magnified by the Coke-bottle lenses.

  “I want it,” she said. “I want to live here.”

  “That’s good news, Ms. Cooper. Let me get the lease from my truck.”

  They went back outside. Landon sat on the ledge of the porch and watched him limp toward his truck, open the door, and retrieve the papers from the passenger seat.

  “Sorry. I have a hard time getting around. Old war wound,” he said when he returned to the porch. “Shrapnel. Omaha Beach.”

  He reached into his pocket and retrieved a jagged piece of steel, dull gray, the size of a tiny pocketknife. “This is what they cut out of my leg. I carry it around with me for good luck.”

  Landon wanted to ask more, but he was handing her the lease. She skimmed it. Still no mention of a pet fee. What luck, she thought, feeling for the first time somewhat hopeful about the future. She signed her name, reached into her purse, and retrieved her checkbook for the deposit.

  Afterward, she asked how soon she could move in.

  “Tomorrow?” he asked, grinning.

  She laughed. “Well, maybe not that soon.”

  A yellow maple leaf floated softly to the porch tiles. She let her eyes travel up the street, then down again. She liked the feeling of living in Southside, living in a house that was old, the feelings of change and of history.

  Mr. Kasir took her check and handed her the key. “It’s yours,” he said.

  After he left, she went back inside and walked through the two smaller bedrooms. Maybe the girls would be pleased with her for saving their things. They’d move back in. They’d sit on the porch swing at night and listen for the trains in the distance as the crickets and cicadas sang a descant. The scent of fresh mint from her garden, the rustling leaves of the maple, the stars overhead—all those things would carry them back to how it was before they grew up.

  A week later, after an ill-fated attempt at packing up the Homewood house, Landon caved and hired movers.

  She sat on the porch after the movers left, not knowing what to do with herself. She heard footsteps coming down from the upstairs unit. A girl appeared, locking her door behind her. She was wearing a T-shirt and workout pants. She jumped when she turned to see Landon sitting on the steps.

  “I’m sorry. I’m Landon, your new neighbor.”

  “Oh, hi!” the girl said, and smiled at her. “I’m Abi.”

  She was tall, very tall. And slender. Her green eyes carried a look of wanting, but her smile was confident and unyielding. Landon saw that Abi was the kind of woman who could take a room, as her mother used to say.

  Abi sat on the ledge, pulling her long legs up until her chin touched her knees. “What’s your story?” she asked Landon.

  “I’m not sure anymore.”

  “I know what you mean.”

  Landon tried to guess how old Abi was. She looked to be in her thirties but had a youthfulness about her. She wore no makeup, her curls were natural, and she carried a raw, sharp beauty that Landon associated with Appalachian girls—poor but proud.

  “Do you have pets?” Landon asked, not sure where to go with the conversation as the two women took each other in.

  “A cat. Her name is Cinderella,” Abi replied.

  “I have a dog,” Landon told her. “You know, Mr. Kasir never said anything about a pet fee.”

  Abi pulled her curls up and secured them with a clasp that she’d been holding in her hand. “He doesn’t charge for pets. He doesn’t care if you’re late with your rent payment or scratch up the floors moving furniture. The flip side is that you’re kind of on your own. It takes him awhile to get here from over the mountain, and he’s so old, you know. But he does love to teach you how to fix things. I’ve learned a lot from him,” she said, and smiled her winning smile. “You will love the neighbors.”

  “Will I?”

  “Really, we’re like a family. I didn’t mean to pry when I asked what your story was. It’s just that most of Mr. Kasir’s tenants have a story. Take me, for example. I grew up in my family’s trailer park, left home at eighteen, and moved to Birmingham without knowing a soul.”

  “What do you do?” Landon asked, pleased with Abi’s candor.

  “I’m a waitress.”

  Landon nodded, waiting for her to say more, suspecting that she would.

  “I started off in pizza parlors, burger joints, coffee shops. But I’ve worked
my way up to a rich people’s restaurant over the mountain. I’m taking classes at the university, thanks to some government grants.”

  “So,” Landon said, “a good story.”

  The sun was setting, washing the sky pink.

  “Do you work?” Abi asked.

  “I’m a psychologist. But I’m taking a few months off from my practice. I feel a bit distracted by my own troubles.”

  Abi nodded. “I guess all your friends want you to fix them without having to pay you.”

  Landon shrugged. “It’s not so bad, and I usually don’t mind. I hope I’m not keeping you from anything.”

  “I’m going for my run, but I wanted to meet you. Mr. Kasir told me you were moving in. He said I would like you. And I do, of course.”

  Abi grinned and hopped off the ledge. It was as if she understood that Landon wasn’t ready to tell her story.

  “We’ll talk more,” she said. “And if you need anything, just knock.”

  “Thank you,” Landon replied, extending a hand.

  Abi held it for a moment, staring straight into Landon’s eyes. Then she nodded slowly, as if Landon had just told her everything.

  ABI

  “Get out of my fucking house!”

  Abi woke with a start to the sound of Landon’s voice screaming downstairs. She grabbed her phone and a hammer that had been forgotten some time ago on a nearby bookshelf. On her way down the steps, she dialed 911. When she got to the porch, Landon was running toward the sidewalk.

  “What happened?” Abi called to her.

  Landon whirled around. “There’s a man in my house,” she gasped.

  “What’s he doing?”

  “He’s just sitting in a chair. He’s asleep or something.”

  “I’ve already called for help,” Abi assured her, hustling to Landon’s side and putting her arms around her. She pulled Landon close and whispered, “Don’t worry. The precinct is only a few minutes from here. They’ll be here soon. Just stay calm. I’ve got you.”

  “He’s young,” Landon told her. “He doesn’t look like an intruder.”

  “But he is one,” Abi said.