Tiny House in the Trees

by Celia Bonaduce

She took a deep breath. “How’s the car coming along?”

  “I should have it done this afternoon,” he said. “As promised.”

  Maybe things were turning around.

  “That’s great,” she said. “Manny’s outside—I’ll see you after work.”

  “Call me if you need a lift.”

  Molly was still hoping for Quinn to stop in at the perfect time, but it was sweet of Bale to offer.

  “Okay. Thanks!”

  Molly texted Manny that she was on her way down, then hand-fed Galileo some broccoli.

  “Bye, G,” Molly said, stroking the bird’s soft feathers through the bars of his enormous cage. “Will you miss me?”

  “Bite me.”

  “Back at ya.”

  Molly grabbed her bag and headed out the door. She turned on the TV so Galileo could watch the Animal Galaxy network. The shows kept the social bird company and gave him all kinds of animal noises to mimic. To date, the bird could impersonate barnyard animals, endangered species, and sea life.

  Molly didn’t glance at the model of the tree house on the dining room table. The lack of progress was just too overwhelming.

  “Good morning,” Molly said as she got in Manny’s truck.

  “What’s so good about it?” Manny asked.

  Molly looked out the window. She had to remember she wasn’t the only one at Crabby’s losing a job. They rode the rest of the way in silence.

  Manny and Molly exchanged a look as they pulled up to Crabby’s.

  “I guess word is getting around that Crabby’s is closing,” Manny said as they surveyed the small crowd waiting for the place to open.

  The breakfast rush was appropriately named. Everyone in town seemed to be stopping by, offering their “end of an era” condolences, revisiting memories of the place over the years. Molly couldn’t help but think if all these folks came in even once a week, none of them would be having these conversations now.

  Quinn rolled in around 9:30, when things were slowing down. He sat in his usual place at the counter. Molly poured him some coffee. She was about to mention the closing, but realized, since he was Crabby’s nephew, he must have heard—probably from Crabby himself. She decided against bringing it up.

  As if reading her mind, Quinn said, “I heard the bad news.”

  “Yeah,” Molly said, trying to muster her Gumption. “But maybe it’s for the best.”

  She cringed, hoping Quinn would not pick up on such a lame statement.

  “How so?”

  Crap.

  “I don’t know. Maybe…maybe there’s a better opportunity out there.”

  She worried that she sounded selfish.

  “For Crabby, you know,” she added.

  “I guess,” Quinn said, downing his drink in one gulp. “I’m sure the old goat will be fine. But what about you?”

  “What about me?” Molly asked, her heart pounding.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” Molly said, pouring more coffee.

  “Want to come work for me?”

  The pot of coffee clattered against Quinn’s cup. She tried to steady her hand. Could this possibly be happening?

  “Are you serious?”

  “Sure. April is a busy month on a Christmas tree farm.”

  Molly looked up quickly. Was Quinn joking? The whole town appeared to be aware of her tree house project and considered her an expert on all things related to horticulture. There didn’t seem to be any way to convince the townspeople that she knew more about how to fix the covered bridge that collapsed in the flood than how to keep chickweed at bay.

  Probably best not to announce that she knew very little about evergreens.

  “Seedlings and transplants go in this month,” Quinn continued, saving her from having to say anything. “I can always use a few extra hands.”

  “That sounds good,” Molly said. “I could start in two weeks. After Crabby’s closes. If that’s okay.”

  “That’s fine,” Quinn said.

  Molly could not believe this was happening! She took a quick look at her watch. Her shift was over. She caught sight of her words of affirmation on her hand. Summoning all her Bravery, Gumption, and Strength, she asked “Hey, Quinn. I need to pick up my car at Bale’s. Could you give me a lift?”

  Quinn gave her a dazzling smile.

  “Sorry, kiddo. Gotta get back to the farm.”

  She pulled her phone out of her pocket as she watched Quinn go. She dialed Bale—under “Favorites.”

  “Hey, Bale,” she said when he answered. “Looks like I’ll need to take you up on that offer to pick me up.”

  “No problem,” he said. “See you in a few.”

  * * * *

  “Wow,” Bale said as he drove her back to the tiny house lot. “So Crabby’s is kaput?”

  “In two weeks,” Molly said, absently scratching Thor’s head. “I’m surprised you haven’t heard. It’s all over town.”

  “I don’t really hear much gossip at the lot.”

  Molly blinked in surprise. She didn’t think of the closing as gossip. She thought of it as news. She stole a look at Bale. Gossip or news, he did seem concerned for her, which was nice.

  “Wow,” Bale said again. “Sorry, I know I just said that.”

  “That’s okay. It pretty much sums everything up.”

  Bale turned into Bale’s Tiny Dreams. As soon as Molly opened the truck door, Thor raced over to her car. He studied the driver’s side front tire from every angle before christening it. Even with his blank expression, Thor’s body language suggested he and Bale had done something marvelous. He waited patiently for praise.

  “Runs like a champ,” Bale said as Molly stared at her car.

  “Thanks so much for fixing it. I’m really grateful.”

  “Alternator brushes aren’t brain surgery.”

  “Maybe not,” Molly said as she ruffled Thor’s red patch. She looked up at Bale. “But I didn’t need brain surgery.”

  “How is the tree house going?” Bale asked.

  Molly loved that Bale referred to her eighteen-inch model as “the tree house.” It was as if he saw it as clearly as she did.

  She didn’t want to burden Bale with the truth: her money worries were paralyzing her. Her creativity was limited to trying to un-teach Galileo swear words her father had taught him.

  “Slowly,” Molly said. “But it’s a process. You know?”

  “I do know! Come see something I’ve been working on. I think you’ll find it interesting.”

  Molly followed Bale and Thor to the Tiny Dreams workshop—a cavernous lumpen structure. Molly was always surprised that such gossamer designs were created within its hulking walls. She noticed that Bale’s staid maturity disappeared whenever he walked inside the shop. He became like an excited boy, ready to show off his new toys.

  “Check this out,” he said, leading Molly to an elongated tiny house on a ten-foot-by-thirty-six-foot trailer bed.

  She stared up at the modern green-and-glass house on wheels. Without going inside, from her endless discussions with Bale and her engineering research, she knew the house had a loft on each end. She could see the kitchen through a wide opening in the front. She studied the house. The opening seemed oddly large.

  How could any door fit?

  “Right?” Bale asked, grinning.

  It was as if he were reading her mind.

  “Watch,” he said, climbing into the house by way of the makeshift stairs in front of the house. Thor started after him, but Bale gave him the signal to stay. Thor looked up at Molly. Even through Thor’s blank expression, Molly felt accused.

  Molly could hear Bale rummaging around, then he returned to the theatrical doorway, a remote of some kind in his hand. He dispensed with the stairs this time
, leaping to the ground.

  “Look at this!” he said, sounding like a kid.

  With a rumble, a glass-and-steel garage door slid effortlessly down its tracks into place. The house was now sealed.

  “I tried several different garage doors,” Bale said. “The problem was getting one that would travel. Super sturdy, so it wouldn’t twist out of shape on the road, but light enough to work with the weight restrictions.”

  Molly loved coming to Bale’s Tiny Dreams. She could put her own problems behind her and immerse herself in the fantastical world of tiny houses. Bale’s imagination was limitless. Molly studied the garage door with a practiced eye.

  “I love that you can see through the door,” she said. “It makes the place look open—like a dollhouse.”

  “I like that too,” Bale said proudly. “I’m working on adding a technology that can turn the transparent glass opaque, but the cost is out there right now.”

  Molly sighed. Money always seemed to get in the way.

  “May I go inside?” Molly asked.

  “Sure.”

  She thought of him as a mad scientist, keeping his experiments under wraps until they were perfected. It was a huge compliment that Bale always let her check out his works in progress.

  The house was amazing. A kitchen with full-sized appliances greeted her as soon as she stepped inside. Bale’s artistry included interior as well as exterior design. The glass and steel of the garage door was mirrored in the cabinetry of the kitchen. The whole main level looked sophisticated and modern without coming across as sterile. Bale was very serious about making sure each tiny house looked like it could easily be “home” to someone.

  “The challenge with this place,” he said, pointing toward one end of the house, “is the bathroom. Because I gave so much real estate to the kitchen, the bathroom is a little smaller than I’d like.”

  Molly followed Bale through the tiny house, taking in all the perfect details—the carpentry around the wheel wells, the little extra storage spaces tucked in every conceivable space, the moveable kitchen island—before they arrived, in a few feet, in front of the bathroom.

  Molly stopped dead in the doorway.

  “Wait!” she said, putting her hand on Bale’s arm.

  Thor, who had followed her toward the bathroom, shot off in the other direction at the sound of her voice. Bale turned to look at her.

  “Is there a problem?” he asked.

  “Not exactly.”

  “So…”

  “It’s just that…I’m having trouble designing a workable bathroom for the tree house,” she said. “I don’t want to steal any of your ideas.”

  “You can’t steal my ideas,” Bale said, “if I give them to you.”

  Chapter 4

  Bold

  Clear

  Confident

  Bale’s innovative tiny house sparked Molly’s imagination, and she returned to working on her thesis. After trying and rejecting many media, including the extremely modern 3-D approach, Molly settled on making her tree house out of an ultralight wood fiberboard that was easy to cut and form. After much trial and error, she found a board that was rigid and strong enough to be carved and shaped into the tree but, when damp, could also be molded into the various minute house design elements.

  Molly had been hard at work incorporating one of Bale’s space-saving bathroom ideas, a toilet that pulled out from under a vanity, with limited success.

  “Damn it,” she said, as a delicate chain she was constructing broke in two.

  “Shit,” added Galileo.

  Molly sighed. After countless hours of trying to break Galileo of his swearing, her frustration at her lack of progress had her cursing like a sailor. She really wasn’t in any position to castigate him.

  But she needed to be firm. An African Grey was hard to train, but even harder to un-train.

  “Don’t swear,” she said, pointing her fine-point pen at him.

  “Bite me.”

  The mental tussle with Galileo took her out of her zone. She stretched to unkink her muscles, which tightened with the detailed work required to build a miniature tree house complete with moving parts. Taking a deep breath, she willed herself to count her tips, hoping to find enough money to pay at least one of the three months’ rents now due.

  She opened the carved box in which she tossed her tips every night. When she first started working at Crabby’s, by week’s end, the box was overflowing with ten- and five-dollar bills. Now she only saw a smattering of ones. She felt fear travel up her spine. Even with the promise of the tree farm job, her landlord had already warned her that he would have to start the eviction process if she didn’t pay up. Some of her friends at Crabby’s told her that she could probably fight the eviction for a few months, but she didn’t want to do that. It wasn’t the landlord’s fault she didn’t have any money.

  Molly looked around the apartment. It was just a nondescript furnished one-bedroom on a busy road—or as busy a road as there was in Cobb, Kentucky. She could certainly vacate quickly. She prided herself on traveling light. She only had a suitcase or so full of belongings.

  And the tree house.

  And Galileo.

  Maybe she didn’t travel as lightly as she thought.

  She quickly dug her pen out of her purse. Time for her affirmation words! She closed her eyes and visualized what she needed to write. Concentrating on what she had been accomplishing the last two weeks, rather than focusing on the negative, she opened her eyes and wrote:

  Bold

  Clear

  Confident

  She closed the cash box without looking at it.

  Positive thinking was not for the faint of heart.

  The alarm on her phone sounded, reminding her that tonight was what Crabby was calling his “Grand Closing.” As nervous as she was about the future, she was looking forward to the party. Most of the town would be there. Except Bale. She knew Bale was on one of his tiny house convention circuits, which took up more and more of his time. He was bringing several of his tinies with him and didn’t expect to be back for almost two months.

  “These conventions are a necessary evil,” he had said to her one day as he was heading out of town. “I wish I could just stay in one place and work on my designs.”

  Molly looked at the model of her spectacularly unfinished tree house and sighed. He was preaching to the choir. If only she had no worries but her thesis.

  But then again, who really had that sort of fairy-tale life?

  Quinn?

  He seemed to live a magical existence flying in and out of town in Old Paint, dipping over the town as he made his way throughout the South, taking orders for his trees. Nothing signaled the start of the holidays in Cobb like Quinn flying through the air with his first haul of evergreens. While that sight was still months away, Molly was excited about being part of the process that made that vision possible. Once the party was over, she’d be ready to start at Quinn’s—and she couldn’t wait. She hoped she wasn’t going to be too busy taking orders to get a chance to speak to Quinn tonight. They really hadn’t nailed down the particulars—when she’d start, what she’d be doing, or how much money she’d make. As she brushed her hair, it occurred to her that these were details she should have hammered out sooner.

  No wonder I’m poor.

  She stole a look at her cash box, the closed lid offering no relief from the grim reality inside. Coaxing Galileo off the open perch and into the cage, Molly was ready for her last shift at Crabby’s—and her new life as Quinn’s…Quinn’s…assistant? She exchanged her pleasantries with the bird, then slipped out the door, Galileo’s “Bite me” sounding as encouraging as a kiss from her mother when Molly left for school.

  Ever since the day her alternator died, when she put the key in the ignition, she expected the car not to start.


  But it always did.

  Good old Bale.

  She wished he was going to be at the party tonight. A big event in town wasn’t the same without Bale. He was such a fixture.

  Pulling into Crabby’s parking lot at sunset, Molly realized she had started to take the old place for granted. She sat in her car and really looked at the restaurant. There was no denying the building had seen better days. All the servers had started calling it “Shabby Crabby’s,” but the place had its charm, sitting right on the Kentucky River. This was especially true at dusk, when its worn edges were softened by the fading light.

  Molly shook herself. She had no time for sentimentality. After tonight, she would be working side-by-side with Quinn. She caught a glimpse of herself in the rearview mirror and stared sheepishly at her reflection.

  She actually had no idea what she was going to be doing for Quinn. The farm was huge, and it was possible she wouldn’t see much of him. But, as a new employee, she could certainly find excuses to seek his counsel. Or, she realized, she could offer advice as well as ask for it. After almost two years working on her tree house model, she knew quite a lot about horticulture.

  Perhaps that’s why Quinn offered her a job in the first place.

  She took a Bold, Clear, Confident breath and walked through the kitchen entrance to Crabby’s for the last time.

  Crabby insisted the employees wear their starched “Crabby’s” white shirts. He was wearing a tuxedo shirt, bow tie, and jacket over his “good” jeans. The staff could already hear the buzz of guests in the restaurant and out on the deck.

  “So, Crabby,” Manny said, as everyone grabbed trays of champagne and appetizers. “What’s next for you?”

  Since the big announcement two weeks ago, there had been much speculation as to what Crabby had in mind for his future. Would he stay in Cobb? Would he retire? Start a new venture somewhere? Everyone in the kitchen pretended to busy themselves, waiting for an answer.

  “Bought an RV,” Crabby said, straightening a few glasses on Molly’s tray.

  The staff waited for more, but that appeared to be all the explanation they were getting.

  Molly caught sight of “Bold” on her hand—and decided to go for it.