Home Improvement — a Love Story

by Tara Lain

  Gabe input his digits and handed the phone back.

  Clark extended his hand. “Better get my number in case of emergency.”

  Gabe passed over his phone. When he looked up, Harry, Wilson, and JZ were staring with proud grins on their faces. The new guys looked a little confused, but Harry’d probably fill them in later. That’d be an interesting conversation.

  Gabe swallowed his last mouthful of beer and pushed back his chair. “I better get home to my kid. Thanks for inviting me.” He put money on the table, gave Harry a look, and shook hands with the new guys. To Clark, he said, “Guess I’ll see you.” He flashed Clark a smile and walked out.

  In his truck, Gabe cranked the ignition, then paused. Harry and the guys had never taken an interest in his love life before. He was kind of flattered and kind of weirded out, but decided to go with the former. After all, they loved finding dates for the straight guys, why not him? And the fact that they thought Clark was the right kind of guy for Gabe was definitely complimentary.

  He headed for home.

  When he got out of his truck in the driveway and walked to the front door, the throb of drums and bass guitar rumbled from inside. As he opened the door, a blast of rock music hit him like a wall. He stopped. Wow. A lot of Ellie’s music underwhelmed him, but this was amazing. Complex, soaring, but still low-down enough to grab your guts while it expanded your brain.

  Ellie was bent over her homework on the dining room table. How exactly she could do anything besides listen to that he wasn’t sure. She looked up. The music clicked off. “Hi, Dad. Sorry. I thought you’d hang with your friends longer.”

  He took off his boots, peeled out of his jacket, and stashed them all in the overcrowded hall closet. “I had plenty of time with the guys.” He pulled out a chair at the table and sat.

  “I brought you home some tacos from work in case you didn’t get dinner.”

  “Actually, I had a late lunch with Jerry. Chinese. But I could manage a taco or two.”

  She got up, retrieved a paper plate from a bag on the counter, and set it in front of him with a cloth napkin—in fact it was a colorful dishtowel, but they liked big napkins. She resettled at her laptop. “Did you have fun with your friends?”

  “Yeah.” He picked up his taco and stared at it. “Remember I told you Harry seemed really anxious for me to go hang with him and the guys?”

  She nodded.

  “Well, I found out why.”

  “Hey, they don’t need a reason. They like you.”

  “Yeah, well in this case, they were fixing me up.” He took a big bite.

  “Fixing you—wait, you mean like with a woman?”

  He swallowed. “Nope. With a guy.”

  “You’re kidding!”

  “Not even.”

  She smiled. “Know what? That’s actually pretty cool.”

  “I was a little, uh, conflicted about it, but I came to the same conclusion. And the guy’s a professor at SOU, so we’re not talking some loser here.”

  “That’s really great. Did you ask him out?”

  “He asked me. To dinner on Friday. And he wants to meet you, so he’s even going to come pick me up.”

  She raised an eyebrow and put her hands on her hips. “Isn’t it a little soon to be introducing him to the family?” Then she laughed.

  “Actually, it is early, but that’s what he suggested, and I figured you wouldn’t be scarred for life if you didn’t like him.”

  “Or if you don’t.”

  “Exactly.” He started on taco number two. “That was amazing music you were playing. I don’t think I’ve heard it before.”

  She pressed her hands to her chest and sighed elaborately. “That’s my birthday concert. Jet Gemini. I listen to him a lot, but mostly through the earphones. Great, huh?”

  “Yes. I really liked it. So I get to hear this group too?”

  “Yep. Can’t wait.” She clicked a few keys on the laptop and turned the screen around toward Gabe. In the video, a singer in skintight jeans and not much else but pale hair almost to his waist stalked around a stage backed by four guys who mimicked the jeans but added a bit more clothing. He strutted and danced like some personification of everything your mama warned you about, but the voice was soaring and angelic.

  “Uh, wow.”

  She chuckled. “Yeah. They say his voice is nearly operatic, but it’s housed in a bad-boy body.” She clicked some more keys and turned the screen his way again.

  This time, a slightly fuzzy photo showed the same long-haired man wearing a gaping leather jacket over his smooth, bare chest, sitting with a champagne glass in one hand, a curvy redhead in the other, and two gorgeous, twinky guys draped over his shoulders. He was kissing the girl with a lot of tongue.

  Shit. Sexy. “Not exactly a role model for his fans, is he?” He smiled tightly.

  “Yeah, well, all we have to do is listen. You can close your eyes if you want.”

  “Hey, it’s your eyes I’m worried about.”

  “Dad!” She smacked his arm.

  He chuckled. “So you put these child-morals-corrupting tickets on the credit card, right?” Ellie kept all their finances on track.

  She snorted, then stared at him with her concentration crease between her eyebrows. “I’ve got a plan to pay it off fast, so don’t worry. I paid off the other card, so I can use that money to—”

  He reached in his pocket, pulled out the bills, held them between two fingers, and extended them to her.

  “What’s this?”

  “My retainer.”

  “What?” She took the money, stared at it and then at him with an open mouth. “This is three thousand bucks.”

  “Yep.”

  “Wait.” She grinned. “This is from Jerry the Weird, right? The one with two camp chairs and no washer?”

  “That would be correct.”

  “Dad, what is this guy thinking?” Despite the fact that she was smoothing the bills lovingly, she actually frowned.

  “Yeah, good question. I don’t get him either. First, he gives me an American Express card. I mean, it probably has a limited amount of credit, but still, he barely knows me. Then he hands me three K and says let him know when it’s gone.” He shook his head. “So we need to put together an invoice accounting for my time at a reasonable hourly rate. He suggested a hundred bucks an hour, which is ridiculous.”

  “How about I research it for you and charge him whatever the going rate is for—what title shall I look for?”

  “Construction supervisor?”

  “No.” She tapped her computer keys. “You’re doing more than that. Sort of a design consultant, a personal assistant, and a supervisor, don’t you think?”

  “I guess.” He wiped his hand and took his wrappers to the trash.

  “Okay, so construction supervisors make about thirty or forty an hour. Personal assistants get less than that but they make a lot of bonuses. Design consultants make the big bucks. Up to three hundred an hour. So what if we settle on eighty-five an hour?”

  “That seems like a lot.”

  “It’s less than he suggested.”

  “Let’s say eighty.” He felt weird about that.

  “So give me your hours, and I’ll write up an invoice.” She petted the money again. “And I’ll put this in the bank.”

  He nodded. Maybe she ought to hurry.

  “YOU’RE SURE we can remove this wall so we can expand the kitchen to here?” Gabe pointed at the far wall of the laundry room, then looked back at Jorge Alvarez and his designer, Morris Matthews.

  Jorge, strong, solid, and silver-haired, banged on the wall that separated the laundry and kitchen. “Yes, this wall won’t be hard to take out. Like you thought, it’s not the dense plaster that a lot of the walls are. This is drywall, and I’m about 95 percent sure it’s not structural.”

  “Okay, good. So can you do a layout for the kitchen? Give me a lot of island space, but not so much you can’t reach the middle of it to clean it, and
a gas range, double ovens, big pantry, the works. But put the mess over here, right? Put a smaller sink over in the island or somewhere, but the big sink and scullery area needs to be over here so it’s not putting the dirty dishes out in front of guests. Make sense?”

  Morris, a pretty, blond, supergay designer, nodded. “Can do. Lovely ideas.”

  “How soon will you have the drawings?”

  “Give me a couple days.”

  “Okay.” Gabe turned to Jorge and glanced over the phased plan he’d priced out. “Get all the electrical reviewed and modernized. Start the painting and redo the drywall where required. Plus get the fireplace working. I’d like the great room to be operational in a week.”

  “It’s a lot, but we’ll give it our best shot.” He tapped a few things onto the keypad of his tablet.

  “Get the plumber working too, okay? We’ve got to know if we need big, expensive renovations.” And Gabe needed to know how much Jerry was prepared to pay for.

  “You going to use some of your own furniture in that living room, Gabe? Man, it’s made for it.”

  “Thanks, Jorge. But I don’t want my client to feel obliged to use my stuff. We can buy furniture a lot less expensive.”

  “Not as beautiful, though. That credenza you designed for Mrs. Portico was the best piece of furniture I’ve ever seen. If she hadn’t paid in advance, I would have kept it myself.”

  Gabe gave him a light punch on the arm. “Happy to make one for you anytime you’ve got a few thou lying around. I’ll give you the friends and family price.”

  “Might just take you up on that.”

  Gabe shook his head. “Hey, I’m kidding. You don’t need to spend money on my stuff.”

  “Can’t think of a better investment.”

  They started walking toward the door. Gabe said, “The owner will be gone part of next week, but what I want to do is set up some safe spaces for him where he can have privacy and as little dust as possible. For now, you can renovate one of the other bedrooms and he can move into it while you do the master. I want to make big changes in there.”

  Jorge said, “So when are we going to meet the owner?”

  Gabe raised his shoulders. “Not sure. He’s pretty private. I’ll keep him in the loop. Meanwhile, send a bill for the first third of the initial phase.”

  Jorge pulled a folded piece of paper from his jacket pocket. “Just happen to have that right here. Hate to ask, but since we haven’t worked with this client before, I’d like to get paid pretty fast.”

  “Yeah. That’s why I asked for the bill. I—” His cell phone dinged. What? “Sorry. Probably my kid.” He glanced at the phone screen.

  Give him the credit card.

  Gabe glanced around but didn’t see Jerry. He stuck the phone back in his pocket so Jorge wouldn’t know they were being spied on. “Do you accept credit cards?”

  “Sure. Be out of business if I didn’t.”

  Gabe pulled out his wallet and extracted Jerry’s card. “You can put the first payment on this, if that’s okay.”

  Jorge took the card and frowned. “Is this legit?”

  Chapter Seven

  GABE STARED at the black credit card in Jorge’s hand. “I hope it’s okay. It worked once.”

  Jorge pulled a payment attachment from his pocket and plugged it into his laptop. After tapping a couple of keys, he swiped the black credit card.

  Gabe held his breath. The bill was a lot of money.

  Jorge chuckled. “Seems to work.” He handed the card back.

  Gabe exhaled very quietly.

  He stared after Jorge and Morris as they left through the breakfast room door that had a far more direct pathway to the parking circle.

  “I can’t wait to see your furniture.”

  Gabe jumped a foot at the soft voice that came from behind him. He turned to encounter a smiling Jerry dressed in his usual sloppy sweatpants and massive sweatshirt. His pretty face, surrounded by the odd beanie, stuck out of his baggy clothing like a piece of art someone had wrapped in an old towel. Gabe tried to look stern. “Wouldn’t it be easier to join in our meetings rather than lurking? That way you can make important decisions about your house.”

  “But I like the decisions you make.” He turned and walked back to the refrigerator, pulled out a bottle of iced green tea, and poured it in two paper cups. He handed one to Gabe. “So what kind of furniture do you have, and how soon can we get it over here?”

  Whoa. Talk about conflicted. He’d give a lot to see his furniture in that house, but making Jerry feel obligated to buy it was crap. Plus, if he was going to sell at a discount, he should offer the coffee table to Mrs. McRae, who’d expressed interest first. “You don’t need to buy my furniture.”

  “No. I know. So when can I see it?” Jerry leaned against the island and sipped his tea.

  “I can put a couple pieces in the truck. I have a coffee table that’s dry and a credenza I’m using in my own house, but I guess—”

  “You can make more for your house, and I bet your place isn’t as empty as mine.”

  Gabe snorted. “The Great Pyramid isn’t as empty as your house.”

  Jerry barked a laugh. “So go get some furniture.”

  “Now? It’d be better to wait until some of the work gets done. Otherwise, you have to cover it and move it around.” Still, his heart hammered at the idea of Jerry seeing his furniture. Jerry might only have a couple of plastic chairs, but he’d picked the house, and that showed pretty amazing vision. Gabe glanced at his work boots. “You might not like it.”

  Jerry gave him a long sideways glance. “Only one way to find out, right?”

  Gabe looked up. “You want to come with me? Then if you hate it, we can leave it behind.”

  Conflict played all over Jerry’s face.

  Gabe said, “I need help getting it into the truck if you do want it.”

  After flexing his bicep, which inside the massive sweatshirt was pretty funny, Jerry said, “Uh, okay.” He inhaled deeply, then bounded out of the kitchen and returned a couple of minutes later with the damned sunglasses in place and a floppy windbreaker on top of the sweatshirt. Seriously?

  Jerry led the way out the front door and locked it behind him, which made Gabe smile, since someone breaking into the house would assume a transient was squatting there.

  At the truck, Gabe held the door and was tempted to help Jerry in, but with his usual grace, he sprang up into the high cab, causing the floppy sweatpants to tighten across his ass for a tantalizing minute.

  Gabe turned on a pop radio station but played it softly. They rode quietly for a few minutes to the strains of Beyoncé, followed by John Legend.

  Jerry kept glancing at Gabe. Gabe caught the movement in the corner of his eye. Jerry suddenly blurted out, “Gabe. Is that short for Gabriel?”

  “Yes.”

  “I like that name.”

  “Yeah. Me too.”

  “It’s biblical.”

  Gabe shrugged and looked at Jerry quickly. “I guess it is, but I doubt my mother knew it. She liked Gabriel Byrne. Named me for him.”

  He chuckled. “Good taste. The dark Irish type.”

  Gabe plastered on a smile to cover his flush. Does that comment mean Jerry likes guys? He swallowed. And why do I care?

  They were both quiet for a few seconds, and then Jerry said, “It means man of God, or his strength is in God.”

  “It does?”

  “Yes. I looked it up once.”

  Gabe pulled off the freeway in Talent, just a short drive from Ashland. When he stopped at the light, some people were standing on the corner waiting to cross. Jerry pulled his beanie down farther over his ears and turned his body more toward Gabe.

  Before he could censor his mouth, Gabe said, “You seem pretty shy of people.”

  “Yeah. I guess.” Jerry stared at his hands.

  “But you talk to me okay.”

  “You’re different.” He flashed a quick glance at Gabe. “You’re you.”<
br />
  Wow. “Uh, thanks.”

  “I like talking to you.”

  Gabe smiled softly. “I like talking to you.”

  “You do?” He looked surprised and as pleased as a kid in a toy store.

  “Uh, we’re here.” Gabe nodded toward his house as he pulled into the driveway. His heart slammed. What if Jerry didn’t like his furniture? Worse, what if he didn’t like it and said he did?

  Gabe stopped the truck. As Jerry reached for the door handle, Gabe put a hand on his arm. “Jerry?”

  He looked back and smiled.

  “I really want you to tell the truth about the furniture. Stuff like this is very subjective, so I won’t be offended if it’s not for you, okay?”

  Jerry looked very serious. “Okay. I promise.”

  Gabe nodded and climbed out of the truck. By the time he got to the other side, Jerry was standing there waiting for him. “Nice house.”

  “Thanks.” The fact that Jerry said that didn’t portend well for his honesty about the furniture, but Gabe didn’t say so. He walked to the door and unlocked it.

  “Is your daughter here?”

  Gabe couldn’t tell from Jerry’s sunglasses-covered eyes if he was happy or scared about Ellie’s presence. “I don’t think so. She told me she was studying with a girlfriend after school.”

  “Oh.”

  Gabe walked in and stood back to let Jerry cross in front of him.

  “Oh my God.” Jerry stopped in the middle of the living room and stared into the dining area.

  “What?” Gabe followed his line of sight.

  Jerry rushed into the dining room and ran his hands over the combination of polished and unpolished woods of the dining room table. “You made this, didn’t you?” He looked at Gabe—or rather he pointed the sunglasses in Gabe’s direction.

  Gabe nodded.

  “Can you make another one?”

  “Uh, probably. No two are ever exactly alike.”

  “Make one for my dining room, okay?”

  “Seriously?”

  “Of course.” He kept caressing the wood, but he raised his head. The noncaressing hand came up and ripped off the sunglasses. “Is that the credenza you spoke of?”