by Claire Adams
“So, then I went upstairs and found her in a pile of clothes,” he said. “She had gone through all the drawers and taken everything out, building a pile so she could jump off the bed like Superman. Suffice it to say, I was rarely left alone with my own child as a toddler. Luckily, she has a bit more sensibility to herself now, and I can leave her out of sight for more than a few minutes and not worry that she has repainted the house with her finger paints.”
“Oh, my gosh.” I laughed loudly. “Being the youngest, I never got to see those things, but from my mother’s stories, my sister used to do the same thing. Mom told me that she came upstairs once and found me and my sister in the bathtub sliding around. Bella had taken the vegetable shortening from the cabinet and lathered us up completely, and we made our own slip and slide. I can’t even imagine how hard that was to get off the walls.”
“Your poor mother,” he said, laughing. “Hey, I did have a question.”
“Okay, shoot,” I said, wiping the tears from my eyes.
“What is your work schedule like?”
“Um, like today?” I was a little confused. “I’m working from home today and then spending the week managing the guys putting in floors at a client’s house. What’s up? You need me to watch Kayla?”
“No, no, nothing like that,” he said. “I was sitting around in the kitchen a few nights ago and started to really look around the house. I was thinking that a change in décor and the whole feel of the house might help Kayla and myself be able to move forward a bit easier. Christina was completely in charge of decorating the house, and it’s been pretty hard on Kayla, especially, to move on when the fact that Christina left is shoved in our faces every time we come home. I know she isn’t going to love the idea, but I think it is what is best for her at this point, something new and fresh.”
“Oh,” I said, smiling. “That makes sense.”
“I know it’s a lot, but I figured with your expertise, it could be a really great house,” he said. “Otherwise, it might end up looking like a ski lodge if I’m left alone with the reins.”
“Oh, God, we don’t want that.” I laughed. “Kayla is sweet, but a giant moose on the wall may just give her nightmares. It might actually give me nightmares whenever I come over there. Besides, it’s really hard to find overstuffed brown leather couches unless you are going for vintage. And by vintage, I mean thrift store.”
“See, this is why I need you,” he said with an awkward pause. “To decorate the house, I mean. Thrift stores are cool and everything, but I don’t want to lay down on a couch someone else’s leg skin has stuck to on a hot summer day.”
“That is disgusting,” I groaned.
“And of course, I would be more than happy to pay you your customary fees,” he said. “I would never imagine taking that much time out of your work schedule for this place. It’s a bit eclectic, which I think might be the opposite of what it needs to be.”
“Yeah, I mean your ex-wife definitely had an artistic vibe to her, which was not something I would have guessed when I met her that one time,” I said.
“Honestly, she read a bunch of magazines and like, copied rooms from them,” he replied. “I think all of the magazines are stacked in boxes in the garage still. I’ll probably use it for kindling for the fireplace this winter.”
“Waste not, want not,” I replied. “But yes, that is definitely something I can do, and it sounds like a lot of fun. I have a pretty stacked week this upcoming one, but after that, I can definitely put you on my schedule. I’ll be honest, it’s a bad habit of mine to dissect everyone’s house when I go into it, so after watching Kayla for so long, I have already put quite a bit of thought into what I would do if I could redecorate your house.”
“Uh oh.” He laughed. “I hope you weren’t miserable with the giant paintings hanging on the walls.”
“No.” I laughed. “But you will definitely be able to sell them for some good money. They are pretty reputable artists. The art itself may not be my taste, but the painters behind them bring in a pretty penny in the big cities. I’ll do some research on it and see where I can submit them to.”
“That would be awesome, because I don’t need any more junk in my garage,” he gruffed.
“Okay, tell me what some of your ideas are,” I said, interested in hearing what he thought.
“Seriously, you don’t want me to put my two cents in.” He chuckled. “I have no idea other than different than what it is. Besides, I don’t want to make you biased toward anything. I fear that bringing up the ski lodge was even a bad choice.”
“No.” I laughed. “Trust me. There will be no ski lodge influence in the décor of your home. I’m sorry, but I can’t allow it.”
“All right, it’s a deal.” He laughed. “Well, I gotta get to work, and I don’t want to hold you up. Just let me know later this week when you want to start, and I’ll make sure to be around.”
“Sounds good,” I said happily. “And tell Kayla I said hi.”
“I will,” he said before hanging up.
I set the phone down on the desk and smiled. It was really awesome that I could do this for them, especially since I would be helping both of them feel more comfortable in their home. It wasn’t very often that I could use my skill set to really help someone, so this was exciting. In fact, I was a little bit more excited than I should be about redecorating Ryan’s place. I wasn’t going to lie. It was going to feel good to get rid of that bitch’s fingerprints in their home. There was a certain amount of satisfaction I could already feel in getting rid of the gaudy new age décor she had hanging on the walls. On another note, I would get to spend a little more time with Ryan, something that had constantly been on my mind, but I wasn’t sure what I should do about.
I put my hand to my cheek and could feel the warmth swarming my face. He made me feel all kinds of different ways, and I still wasn’t sure if that was okay or not. I really wanted to talk about it with someone, but the idea of talking that way about my stepbrother still seemed too taboo, even for my free-spirited family. I would wait and see how this new venture went, hoping that it calmed whatever emotions I had going on in my stomach.
Chapter Nine
Ryan
It had been a week since I had talked to Alissa about redecorating the house, and she was on her way over to get started. I took the day off from work so that I could be there to go through her ideas with her, hoping that what she had come up with was more like a total transformation. We really needed the change in the house, and I was thinking this was going to help Kayla out a lot.
Kayla was back at school since spring break ended, and I was glad she wasn’t there to see us pick apart everything that her mother had done to decorate the house. The last thing I wanted was for Kayla to get hurt feelings over the entire thing. She needed to understand that life was moving forward without her mother, and that, although I would never pressure her to forget her mom, I wanted her to be healthy and happy at the same time.
“Hey,” Alissa said, walking in the kitchen door. “How are you?”
“Good,” I said, hugging her gently. “I am ready to get this started.”
“Awesome,” she replied, putting her bag down and pulling out a large notebook.
I stood there, very aware of Alissa standing so close to me. There was definitely something different about how it felt to be close to her when Kayla wasn’t around. There was an attraction that was almost palpable between the two of us, and I could feel my heart begin to beat faster and faster the closer we got. Our arms brushed against each other, and goosebumps ran up my spine. I glanced over as Alissa attempted to hide the blush on her cheeks. She was definitely feeling the same thing that I was.
“Okay,” she said, clearing her throat awkwardly. “Since we are in the kitchen, we can start here. I am going to give you the full rundown, and then we can change and not change anything you want. I tried to work around your current appliances so that you wouldn’t have to replace them. They are relativ
ely new. In here, I would say let’s lighten it up. You spend most of your time in this kitchen, and the last thing you want is to walk into a dark space like this. We should be able to strip and re-stain the cabinets a lighter color, then replace the granite with a white pearl granite and change the color of the walls from dark gray to a neutral, happier tone. It will keep the aesthetic look of the place but not turn it into a country home.”
“I like that,” I said, nodding. “What about the table?”
“Nothing a good wood stain can’t take care of.” She smiled. “Now, let’s move into the living room, the space you should be spending more of your time in. This is the main area that will undergo renovations, not counting the bedrooms. All the art, gone, the paint, an earthy neutral color. We bring in a large sectional couch, but one of the comfy ones that Kayla will actually want to sit on. To the left and right of the sectional, we pick out some sleek but comfortable chairs. This rug, gone. That entertainment center is way too ‘90s for my taste, so we bring in a deep chestnut to make the space feel warm. We redo the fireplace and take all that tile off, reclaiming what we can and fixing the rest with outside stone.”
“Wow.” I laughed. “That’s definitely different and sounds incredibly comfortable.”
“Basically, what I’m trying to do here is soften the entire area,” she said, looking around. “Bring warmth where there is supposed to be and shut out the dark corners. Christina’s style was dark, eclectic, and admittedly more artistic, but it felt more like a museum than a home, and Kayla and you need a home.”
I followed her through the dining room and up the stairs, stopping at Kayla’s bathroom and listening to her talk about whitewashing the space and bringing in bright pops of color, exactly what a soon-to-be preteen would love. As she walked out of the space, she turned to me and stopped, something floating through her mind. She looked almost embarrassed, and her cheeks turned bright red as her eyes darted to the floor.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“For what?” I chuckled slightly but could tell she was serious, so I straightened my face. “You haven’t done anything wrong.”
“I just, I went a little nuts with all of this,” she said. “When you didn’t give me any ideas, I just pictured the home as just that, a home, and went from there. I’m starting to realize that I may have given it a bit more of a feminized ideal than you might have wanted. I have to admit, when I was designing, I thought of Kayla more than I thought of you, only because when I was growing up, there was a certain comfort about being home, wrapped in a fleece blanket, curled up on the comfortable couch, and watching movies. I wanted to give Kayla a space where she could completely relax and feel at home. I didn’t really think about your needs.”
She was really sweet, and I could tell she felt genuinely bad for designing the house for a family instead of a man with a daughter. But that was what Kayla and I were: a family, just smaller than most. We still had dinner together every night, and we still had breakfast together every morning. There was just two of us instead of three. I grabbed her by the wrist and walked her into my room.
“What about this space?” I asked. “This is my bedroom.”
“Well, for your room, I pictured lighter walls, a blue and white pinstriped comforter, a different bedframe, maybe a platform bed,” she said shyly. “I was thinking dark cherry furniture for your clothes and track lighting that aimed either toward or away from a new large screen television. On the walls, I thought about a nautical theme, but not your normal paintings: more like enlarged photographs hung like a gallery from the ceiling.”
I stood there, imagining what she was talking about, every single inch of the space. She had really put a lot of thought and care into this design, and there was no way that I could take a home away from Kayla. I wanted her to feel a sanctuary there, and I loved the idea of completely changing my bedroom. Christina and I had shared this space since we were married, and I still hated going to sleep in it every night. I smiled and turned to Alissa, who was staring out the window across the room.
“I think that Kayla would love every inch of this space the way you have described it,” I said carefully. “I love your ideas for the bedroom. It was actually always a dream of mine to have a nautically-inspired bedroom, but Christina shot that down really fast. And I love that you want to create a space for Kayla more than me. She is the one that needs his change more than I do. It is enough to me that the house will look completely different than what Christina decorated it with. Honestly, I’d take pink cotton candy walls if it meant I didn’t have to continue to live with her painful memory every day.”
“So, you are okay with everything that I have discussed?”
“More than okay with it,” I said, putting my hand on her shoulder. “I love the care that you put into it more than anything.”
“I thought that once we were through most of the rooms, and Kayla had gotten used to the fact that there was going to be change, we could let her help us design her bedroom,” she said. “Really make it her space, instead of the blank canvas that it is now.”
“I think that’s a great idea,” I said, taking in a deep breath. “I really can’t wait for you to make all of these changes. We have needed some serious change in this house for a very long time, and these ideas are really going to make us feel more at home.”
“Good,” she said, smiling. “That is the idea: to make you feel like you live in a home. Like you can’t wait to be within these walls with the laughter of your daughter, friends, and family.”
“I’m actually thinking I’ll take a few days off of work and help,” I said. “That will leave you the ability to not worry about hiring a carpenter or painter, and I can really put my hands into this redecorating. I want to feel comfortable, but I want to feel accomplished in the work as well. Proud that I had a hand in making this place mine and Kayla’s. Maybe it’s a guy thing, but it will make it all that more rewarding in the end.”
“It’s not a guy thing.” She laughed. “I feel so much more accomplished when I am able to do these things on my own as well.”
I watched as she pulled out her tape measure and began writing out different measurements for the curtains and the photographs. Ten years ago, I would have done anything I could to get out of shopping for curtains, but with Alissa standing there, I couldn’t wait to help her do that kind of stuff. It almost felt like we were creating a space together, and that feeling was warm and comforting, not what I had expected at all. Me wanting to give her free rein was not like it was with Christina. I gave my ex the reins so that she would leave me alone about it. I was giving Alissa the reins because I trusted her and I wanted this to be something we did together.
Alissa finished up her measurements and smiled at me before walking out of the room and into the hallway. I stood there for a moment, watching her, wondering what she was feeling and what she was thinking about me. I was going to be spending quite a bit of alone time with her over the next couple of weeks, and that was exciting to me instead of scary. When I was with her, all the anxiety over our parents being married just floated away. I didn’t know if it was comfort or just not giving a damn, but it was nice to see her for who she was and not worry about labels or societal views on everything. It was the first time in a very long time that I didn’t feel an ounce of guilt for my feelings, and I liked that feeling.
She looked up at me and smiled, motioning for me to follow her to the guest room to hear her thoughts. At that moment, I felt like I would have followed her anywhere if it meant that we could extend our time together. In reality, I didn’t care what she did with the guest bedroom. I was just happy to watch her eyes glimmer as she explained what her vision for the room was. She was passionate about her career, like I was with landscaping, and I realized why she loved to do what she did. It wasn’t always fun or exciting, but it was what she was really good at, something I understood very well.
Standing there and watching as the sunshine cascaded through the windows a
nd lit up her face, I couldn’t help but feel like I was making the right decision. Getting involved with Alissa was no longer wishful thinking to me. Getting involved with Alissa had become a goal, something I wanted more than anything at that point.
Chapter Ten
Alissa
It had been hours since I arrived at Ryan’s house, and we had made some seriously good headway into the decorating. He had been okay with all of my ideas, including his bedroom, and after we toured the place, we sat down at the computer and started going through the different furniture and accents for the house. I was surprised, but he actually had a lot better view on things than I thought he would, and I was more than excited at the different pieces he picked out.
I tried to stay focused as well as I could, especially since there was a serious intensity between us that I couldn’t put my finger on. It had been there since I walked in the door, and I was finding it harder and harder to breathe every time we were close to each other. While we were looking at the different sites on the computer, my knee brushed against his, and I could feel the heat rise in my chest. I didn’t think I could have moved if I wanted to, which was okay because he seemed more than happy to have my leg rest against his.
I was still there when Kayla came home, and she looked at me and half-smiled as I poured her some juice and got her a snack. She thanked me and made her way up to her room, leaving us alone again in the kitchen. Ryan finished bookmarking several things that he thought would be great in the house and sighed, stretching his arms over his head and smiling.