The Farmhouse

by Elizabeth Bromke

  “Will you get alimony? Child support?” It was an intrusive question, and he didn’t deserve an answer. He held up his hand and began to excuse himself, but she answered.

  “If I don’t request it, then things will go more smoothly. As far as we know, Travis doesn’t even have a job anymore. He could be living on the streets, even.”

  Rhett frowned. “Maggie, you stayed at home for a while, right? I mean, won’t you need some financial support? Don’t you want it?”

  She shook her head. “I have the farmhouse. I have my clients. I can do it. And I can do it alone, if I have to, Rhett.”

  He nodded slowly. “Alone.”

  They locked eyes briefly, before Maggie replied, “Will you come back?”

  “You mean to Hickory Grove?”

  “Yeah. Since your land is gone, are you still moving back?”

  Rhett swallowed. “I’m not sure. I’ll talk to Luke and see if that lot by him is up for sale. I want to, Maggie.” He stared hard at her. “I’d love to be back. Closer to Greta, for one. And I’m sick of the city, but—”

  “But what?” she pressed.

  He shrugged. “It doesn’t make sense. I had a plan, but it didn’t work out. Maybe it’s God’s way of saying I’m better off somewhere else. Closer to my rentals, for one.”

  “Right,” she answered quietly. “I understand.”

  A moment passed between them during which they could hear the boys upstairs arguing. Briar’s pipsqueak voice chimed in at intervals, and Rhett realized that even though he’d spent only a day with the Engel family, he was going to miss them. Maybe they’d miss him, too. Well, except for Ky. He opened his mouth to ask about that only to realize he knew the answer. “I’d better go. Before Ky challenges me to a brawl,” he added playfully.

  Maggie smiled. “Ky has always been my quiet one. Suspicious, too, I suppose. He’s not quick to love. But when he does, well, he’s all in. Maybe one day you two will find common ground.”

  Rhett nodded, wistful. “I’d like that. Maggie, I’ve really enjoyed my visit. I mean, I know it’s probably been the worst twenty-four hours of your life, but—” he cracked a smile and felt stupid for pointing out his joy against her hardship, but Maggie just smiled.

  “Come back to Hickory Grove, okay Rhett?” She moved a step closer to him, rose on the balls of her feet, braced herself against his chest, and gave him a peck on the cheek before whispering, “Come back soon.”

  Chapter 25 — Rhett

  A week had passed since his half-baked effort to move to Hickory Grove, but in that time a lot had happened. Emma, true to her word, had everything from his rarely worn tie pins to his barbecue utensils bagged and tagged and sitting by the front door with a note that told him to come back for his tools while she was at work.

  The lonely ordeal made him feel a little homeless, though not as much as Maggie might have been feeling.

  Part of his depression stemmed from just how little Rhett realized truly belonged to him. As a stable sort of guy, he felt naked to be reduced to one suitcase and three garbage bags. Then again, he’d been all too happy to allow Emma to sell off his small appliances and bachelor furniture before she let him move in with her.

  He spent another three days in a hotel until one of his tenants, whose lease wasn’t up until the following month, called to say they were unable to pay rent and therefore vacating early. When he drove down to meet the well-intentioned college drop-out who had been living in Rhett’s University-area studio unit, he could tell the kid must have bounced weeks back. The place was barren.

  But he collected the key and bid farewell—no hard feelings but no returned deposit—and promptly set up camp.

  Rhett kept about half of his rental units furnished—all of the ones that were generally sought after by the University set. With fresh sheets and a good scrub down, he could stick around the studio for as long as it took to find somewhere more... permanent for himself.

  After he finished cleaning the unit and running to the store for the bare essentials, he gave Greta a call.

  She answered the phone cheerily and after a brief greeting and the usual small talk, Rhett hit her with the question that had been on his mind since the estate attorney had handed over the bad news.

  “Greta,” he began, “you knew about the sale and never told me?”

  His question was met with a heavy sigh. “Rhett, how did you forget? The family land is what paid for Mom’s final round of treatment.”

  A chill crawled up his spine and he squeezed his eyes shut. He did not want to talk about his mom. Especially her cancer. Rhett shook his head. “I don’t remember agreeing to that.”

  Greta pushed on patiently. “Remember, Rhett? Dad was on the phone with the guy in Hickory Grove. They went through the last of their estate. Well, you weren’t there. You were at the hospital. But we told you about it. They put the lot up for sale at a really low price hoping to have it sold in time to tell Mom that she didn’t have to worry.”

  “Did it sell in time?” Rhett was wracking his brain but for the life of him could not recall any of what his sister was explaining.

  “No, but it was close. I think that realtor, Mr. Hart, put an offer in just around the time of Mom’s funeral. We had Peter handle everything. Dad simply signed the paperwork a few days later. I knew about it because I asked. Maybe you were too—”

  “Yeah, I know,” he replied, blowing air out of his mouth as he eased into a wobbly kitchen chair and wiped his face with his hand.

  “I thought when you texted me that you were going to try and buy the land back,” his sister said.

  Rhett had wanted to surprise her. He wanted to assess the property, make a plan—maybe even call in contractors—and then bring Greta down to Hickory Grove the day they broke ground and announce to her that half the acreage was hers. They could be neighbors, and she could build her dream house maybe.

  The idea was possible only because of Rhett. His savings from flipping houses would set Greta and him up for life. And his little sister could use that. She was a teacher, and her pay was dang near minimum wage.

  “No, I was going to build on Mom and Dad’s land,” Rhett answered, a deep sadness welling in his chest. He was disappointed in himself. Embarrassed, too. Had he really blocked out such crucial information? Was he really so distracted all those years?

  Greta clicked her tongue like a mother hen. “Rhett, it’s okay. And by the way, why would you want to move back to Hickory Grove? Emma hates small towns. And you have all those rentals in Louisville. I’d just as soon visit you in the city, besides.”

  “I’m done with the city, Greta. I never loved Louisville. I’m ready to go back home. You know?”

  His sister sniffed. “Well what about Emma? Did you ever even ask her what she wanted?”

  “We broke up. I’m staying in one of my units by the U.” He didn’t add that they’d broken up after his grand plans to relocate. What he also didn’t say was that he didn’t really care what Emma thought. He’d have moved to Hickory Grove without her if it ever came to that. Which it didn’t.

  “Oh,” Greta replied, emotion gone from her voice. He always suspected Greta didn’t exactly love his live-in girlfriend, but sometimes he wondered if it was simply because she was a live-in girlfriend and not a wife. Greta was traditional and preferred to refer to any of her own dates as male suitors and her situation as “trying” thanks to “a fast culture.” He’d always laugh at that. His sweet little sister and her old-world ways.

  “So what are you going to do now?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure,” Rhett replied, leaning forward and picking at a black scuff on the tabletop. “What would you do, Greta?”

  “I never wanted to move back to Hickory Grove,” she began. Rhett’s heart sank a little. His head spun. It was a fool’s mission all along, and he knew it. He just wouldn’t accept it. “Why did you even want to go there, Rhett?”

  He felt himself grow defensive. He was doing all of it f
or his little sister. So she could have something more than her crummy teacher apartment. So they both could have a nice home... a piece of Mom and Dad. But his sister didn’t even want any of it. She had moved on. Gotten over their parents’ death. He could not, for the life of him, imagine why. The last time they spoke—nearly a month or so ago now, well before he hatched his plan to see about the land—she had been on the same page as him. Vaguely discontent and searching. He had heard it in her voice. Her students were wearing her down. She was tired of living in her apartment complex. They were on the same page. It was the whole reason Rhett started brainstorming. It was the whole reason he started seeing his superficial relationship with Emma for what it was. It was the whole reason he made his plan.

  Then he recalled. “Hey, Greta,” he started, sitting up straight in his chair. “That Christmas cruise...”

  Greta scheduled a Christmas cruise for herself and her girlfriends. Rhett was bummed they wouldn’t be together to celebrate the holidays, but at the time, he had Emma and her oversized family to keep him occupied. All he remembered was getting a text from Greta when she returned home. It assured him that she was alive, and he distinctly remembered her gushing that it was the best time of her life.

  “Yeah?” Greta asked coyly before a muffled voice rose in the background. She giggled.

  His sister giggled. Like a teenager. “Greta Louisa Houston,” Rhett scolded lightly. “Whose voice is that?”

  Her giggle turned to laughter and she hissed something to the voice before answering her brother gleefully. “Rhett, I met someone.”

  And, with that, Rhett knew he had to let go of Hickory Grove.

  He had to let go of his pain over his parents’ deaths, and he had to let go of any lofty pipe dream about reuniting with Greta and making a go of recreating their childhood closeness.

  It was time for Rhett to move on from his past. For once and for all.

  Chapter 26 — Maggie

  It had been twelve days of high tensions and nonstop packing and sorting and moving.

  Becky, Fern, Theo, Zack and even Fern’s husband, Stedman, had all chipped in to transfer everything that belonged to Maggie and her kids over to the farmhouse on County Road 131.

  Through the stress, Maggie took great comfort in the fact that her friends—her community—had risen to the challenge and supported her. A meal train, courtesy of town busybody Liesl Hart, was in motion for Maggie’s first full week in the farmhouse. That week would start the following Monday, but Maggie figured it would be smart to begin staying in the farmhouse while they still had claim to their old place. Just in case they realized they’d forgotten something or wanted to go back just one more time.

  In fact, they hadn’t forgotten anything. The house on Pine Tree Lane was cleared and ready for bank possession, as depressing as that sounded. Her neighbor Fern, at one point, threatened to push all her junk out onto the driveway and front yard in order to bring down property values just to spite “the powers that be,” as she’d said. But Maggie reminded everyone that the real villain was Travis, not the people in Hickory Grove who did their jobs.

  It was early afternoon, and the boys were still at school; Gretchen had taken Briar to go on their first (though modest—necessities only!) grocery trip for the farmhouse, which is a thing Maggie would have been excited to do were it not for the insurmountable task of the day: to make the place livable for a night. Becky had to drive to Corydon for work. Fern was working.

  It amazed Maggie how fast life picked up and moved on. Not that she needed anyone, but still.

  Theo was up at Notre Dame for the start of his spring classes, but it seemed that he’d be returning for the weekend and spending much of it with Gretchen, if her constant texting was any indication.

  Then again, by that logic, Rhett Houston would be returning for the weekend, too. But Maggie knew he wasn’t. He told her about setting himself up in one of his tenants’ studios after some college kid broke his lease agreement. It was fate, Rhett had said.

  Fate.

  Fate that he go back to Louisville and stay there, probably. C’est la vie, as Marguerite would have said.

  And so, it was just Maggie there on County Road 131, alone for an hour in a creaking house in the middle of the woods far, far from any place she’d ever known. Alone, save for the distinct feeling that she was not alone. Perhaps that was a typical thing with old houses handed down through the generations. Someone was there with her.

  Maybe her mom.

  Maggie felt a sob form in her throat. Sadness and anxiety weren’t often a part of the redhead’s world. She was continually surrounded by people. Noisy, happy people.

  Even though Hickory Grove was too small for a downtown—or an uptown—and its central hub was nothing more than the crossroads of Main Street and Overlook Lane, Maggie had always lived her life right there: in the heart of it all. She’d never had cause to be alone, and she had never been so alone.

  Earlier in the week, Zack had helped her handle the divorce paperwork, but they were still waiting on Travis to sign so they could file. The deal Maggie offered was clear. Full custody would go to her, but he could see the kids whenever he wanted as long as he gave due notice. He could request them for a weekend so long as he could prove he had a place for the children to sleep safely. Alternatively, the children could stay at Travis’s mother’s house for a weekend. All this had to be on the up-and-up, but it was an option for him. No child support required.

  And though Travis had made two gravely poor choices of late—allowing their mortgage to default and taking off like a scared weasel when times got tough, Maggie still cared about him. Even if he was with some other woman, he was still the father of her children.

  But never again would he be Maggie’s husband.

  In some ways, she liked to think, he never really was.

  Thoughts of Rhett flit in and out of her mind as she got to work in the parlor. After he left, she just could not shake the thought of him. But it didn’t bother her. Rather, it was the other thing—other than the drifting non-memories of her ancestors who’d lived in that very house—that kept her company as she got down to work.

  Maggie’s plan, then, was to deep clean one room at a time. They could all camp out in the parlor the first night. They had the mattresses leaning against the foyer and front hall walls, ready for business.

  Vacuuming the floors was hard enough what with years and years of dust and dirt and whatever else had ground into the cracks and crevices, but once she began on the decades-old sofas, she realized some of what her family had left there was simply not salvageable.

  Maggie finished vacuuming, dumped the can of her upright and set about a second round, then a third, then rolled the vacuum out and swapped in her mop and bucket.

  In the days before they finished moving everything, Fern helped her see about getting hot water running. In all, they had to have the septic pumped, the well tested, and the water person ensure the pump was set up and working, and then re-establish electricity. Maggie found herself surprised that her grandparents ever even had electricity running to the out-of-the-way property. It had to have been an expensive upgrade.

  But the place was as well maintained as could be, thanks in large part to old Marguerite.

  So, Maggie had running water and basic electricity. However, she did not have hot water or the use of any appliances. And, most bizarrely, she did not have a toilet.

  They planned to shower at Becky’s house, but Maggie quickly realized that cleaning without hot water was difficult at best. She paid for the septic out of her cash hoard. She paid for the well assessment and service. She found out that Dirk had been paying taxes on the property for the past few months, but surely she’d need to take over on that. Plus, she had to put up money to file for divorce just as soon as Travis got around to signing.

  Maggie was officially low on money. She had no access to her credit card or ability to get a new one. And she hadn’t done hair in over a week.


  So, a water heater and a toilet had officially become luxury items.

  Taking a deep breath, she reminded herself just one room at a time. They had a place to shower. They could continue with dry food or takeout for a few days more—until they got the fridge going or the meal train began. She just needed to line up some clients. Maybe start looking into a night shift at Mally’s or something.

  And though Maggie hated to ask Gretchen to help financially, it was a back-up plan. If things got dire, Gretchen could help. Would help. She was a good girl. Maggie’s children were good children.

  An hour later, Maggie had effectively scrubbed the wooden floor of the parlor into submission, and only once did she wish it was covered in linoleum like the halls and kitchen.

  Gretchen and Briar had returned with a modest haul which served to remind Maggie to once again tackle the daunting task of prying open the old Frigidaire. It couldn’t have been in that bad of shape, based on its exterior.

  “I think it’s very cool that we have an antique fridge,” Gretchen offered, as she neatly organized the five paper sacks on the kitchen table.

  Maggie nodded. “It’d be cooler if we could crack it open.”

  Maggie now wondered if she ought to have taken Fern up on her suggestion to take their old fridge and move it to the farmhouse. However, Maggie worried over asking her generous helpers to lift and haul one more thing. “Besides,” she had answered, “we have a fridge at the farmhouse.”

  Now, as the two women tried with all their might to tug loose the white door, Maggie could kick herself.

  “We can always go back and get ours if this one won’t open or if it doesn’t work, like Miss Fern said,” Maggie told Gretchen as she scooted the unit forward from the wall to assess the back of it. A humming noise purred and air blew up from a vent at the bottom. So, by all accounts, it was operable. And she really didn’t want to go back to the Pine Tree house unless she absolutely had to. Besides, her fridge there wasn’t anything to write home about. It was probably almost as old as the farmhouse one.