by Alie Garnett
Since she was still staring, he waved. She waved back and then smiled, but not to him. She had turned to the little girl walking up the street alone today. He couldn’t hear what they said, but they chatted about something, then the little girl sat down next to Agatha and waved at him.
Waving again, he headed across the street. Neither moved, though to be honest, he was watching Agatha more than the little girl. Today, Agatha’s gray shirt said “Cancan” across her breasts, very nice breasts.
“Hi, Violet.” He ignored the black-haired woman and ran his fingers through his still-wet hair, realizing that he had gotten his jeans a little wet also. But there was nothing he could do about it now.
“Hi! Are you fixing the house over there? My mom and dad bought a house but had to do so much to it. But now it’s done, and Dad can relax. Or so he says. Mom says he’ll get bored.” The girl seemed to give way more information than was needed.
“Do you think he’ll get bored?” Chris asked, leaning against the railing of the bottom step, something he would never do at his place because his porch was falling apart. Or it was now that he had tried to fix some of the railings earlier in the day.
Violet shrugged. “No, he didn’t really like to fix the house. He just did it for Mom.”
“I bet your mom is worth it,” he said. All moms are great when you’re young.
“She’s okay. You’re not wearing a shirt. The rule at my house is you have to wear a shirt, even Mom and Dad.” The kid looked him up and down with slight disappointment that he would break a rule.
“I just got dust all over mine, and the rest need to be washed.” He shrugged. His weekend plans included a visit to the laundromat. If Agatha wasn’t going to talk to him, he could talk to the girl; she wanted to talk.
“What size are you?” Violet asked.
“Extra large.” He looked at her blue eyes, different from her babysitter’s brown ones. Also different because Agatha’s were full of judgment. He would not be winning any cases in front of her.
Violet leaned toward him. “What’s your favorite color?”
“Blue.” He grinned at her random questions.
“Okay.” She jumped up and ran into the house, leaving him alone with a silent Agatha.
“What is Cancan?” he asked, looking at her shirt, or breasts, or both.
“The cancan is a dance. It’s a misspelling of Cancun. My sister made it a few years ago. She has dyslexia,” she explained, looking down at her shirt and pulling it out a little so she could see the letters.
“Why do you wear it if it’s spelled wrong?” He liked that she was finally giving him the time of day He was liking the quirky personality he was discovering. He was liking her.
She shrugged. “Because it’s more fun this way, and they’re free.”
The kid ran out of the house holding a blue shirt that she handed to him with a smile. Pulling it on, it he looked down to see it said “Basten.”
“What should it say?”
“Boston, I think. Lucy might know, but I’ve never picked up on her spellings,” Agatha said, standing up with her mail in her hand. “Time for a snack, Violet.”
“Bye! You can keep the shirt; we have more,” Violet said and followed Agatha into the house, blocking Chris’s view of her backside.
Once the door shut, he headed back to his place and wondered what to do now. The house was falling apart a little more every day. He was failing for the first time in his life, and it made him uneasy, but something was making him stick to it.
Chapter Nine
Hanging up her phone, Agatha headed away from her drawing to find the serving dish Harper had described to her over the phone. Most of Harper’s stuff had been moved to her new place months before, when her husband, Kaine, had remodeled his kitchen into a commercial kitchen for her.
But it seemed there was still a pile of serving platters she’d left at the house that she needed next week for a big event. Agatha would no doubt be roped into helping out, but now that she was only helping out a day or two a week, she was okay with it. When she had worked an event nearly every night, she hadn’t been. Or when she had to hold down a job. Then add working for her sisters, and it got to be a lot.
Agatha turned on all the lights as she went through the house. It was a little spooky to be there alone, so sometimes she just pretended one of her sisters was in their room so that she wasn’t alone. In the kitchen, she dug out the pile of platters from the pantry, still mostly full of Lucy and Harper’s stuff. It was from this pantry that they produced their breakfast meals when they came over. Agatha didn’t go into it when they weren’t around. Since they usually dropped off leftovers when they came, she didn’t need anything from the pantry. What little food she had in the house was in a cabinet, leaving the pantry as storage for her sisters. She carried the platters to the table by the front door so that they could be grabbed if Harper had no time to talk or Agatha was sleeping when she stopped by.
The neighborhood was dark at two in the morning. She was the only mouse stirring that night. Setting the platter down by the front door, she nearly screamed when there was a sudden knock. Hand on heart, she looked out the side window and saw a large form standing on her front step. It knocked again as she watched. When the person ran a hand through his hair, she recognized the movement: Chris.
Chris, who had so far not recognized her at all. Either he had not remembered her from high school and had been so drunk eighteen months before, or she had changed that much over the years. Or maybe it was a combination of both.
Eighteen months ago, he hadn’t remembered who she was the morning after. She had realized that right away when she was hunting for her clothes. His knowing her was lost to the booze he had consumed. Sober, he hadn’t remembered her. He probably didn’t even remember their night of sex. Hot, wild sex that she couldn’t get out of her mind even all these months later.
Agatha slowly opened the door for him, secretly hoping he wanted to fuck her again. Over and over again.
“Hey, Agatha, I saw your light on. Could I borrow a flashlight? I’ll bring it right back,” he said with relief.
“Don’t you have a flashlight?” She leaned against the edge of the door, trying not to throw herself in his arms.
“No, I don’t. Nor do I have any lights in my house right now.” She could tell he was trying to hide his frustration.
“Hold on a minute,” she said and left him alone in the open doorway.
Finding the flashlights in the stairwell to the basement, she took two and headed back to Chris. She hoped she was only horny for him because she hadn’t gotten any in a while, not because she was back on Team Chris. She was too old and smart to join that team again.
“I brought two in case the batteries are low in one. What happened to your electricity?” She walked toward him. He had let himself in and was looking around the living room. His hands were stuffed in his jeans, and he was wearing a gray sweatshirt that hid all those awesome muscles.
He reached for one of the flashlights. “I don’t know. I was putting in a new light fixture and poof—all the lights went out.”
“Did the wires touch?” she asked, still holding the other flashlight.
“No,” he answered quickly, then added, “Maybe.”
“Do you have fuses or breakers?” She folded her arms, deciding that maybe he shouldn’t be dealing with electricity.
“Yes,” he answered and looked around the living room again.
“Do you have any idea what you are doing?” She pushed past him and headed over to his house.
He was close on her heels but let her lead. He was over a foot taller than her and an athlete. Agatha knew he could have carried her faster than she could walk over there.
“I have some idea,” he said as she opened the door on the old house.
“Where was the light?” she demanded as she turned on her flashlight.
Behind her, he turned on his as well and pointed it the center of the room. A
ladder stood under a little black hole in the ceiling. Agatha climbed up the ladder and looked at the hole. She tried to ignore that Chris was watching her every move, that he was very close to her, too close for her liking.
Realizing that the wires were touching, she knew what had happened. She climbed down the ladder and went back to her house to grab the tools she needed. She knew better to ask him for anything; he didn’t even have a flashlight.
Chris was still standing in the middle of the floor with his flashlight beam on the hole when she returned. Climbing the ladder again, she put the caps on each of the wires and turned to him. With her on the ladder, she was taller than him for once, and she liked it. She enjoyed seeing his face turned up and looking at her, or the hole, it didn’t matter.
“Fuse box?” she asked as she climbed down.
“Basement.”
Chris grabbed Agatha around the waist and lifted her to the ground as if she weighed nothing from her perch on the third rung. His hands lingered for a moment too long until Agatha pulled away from him. No need to give him the idea that she was interested; she was smarter than that now.
He led her to the kitchen and then down the stairs to the basement, which was as dark as the rest of the house. Agatha hated basements; they were dark and smelly, and all the spiders lived there.
He pointed to the box on the wall. “Here.”
Agatha looked at it for a moment and flipped the biggest of the switches. The lights blazed on around them, and the hum of electronics and appliances filled the silence.
“Fixed.” She grinned at him. “But you have got to stop touching anything that you don’t know how to fix.”
“How am I going to learn if I don’t try?” His brown eyes were on her.
“Not by burning down your house, because that’s what would have happened if the circuit breaker hadn’t switched. Fire, Chris.” She folded her arms.
“How did you learn?”
“My mom taught me. I don’t know if she wants to teach you,” Agatha said. Sera had taught them all the basics for house and lawn care. She had single-mom’d like a pro.
“Maybe you could teach me.” He shot his killer grin at her.
Agatha pushed past him. His flirting reminding her of everything that had come before today, but his charm wasn’t going to work on her again. She was over Chris Lowell, had been for years.
“I don’t think so.” She headed back up the stairs to the brightly lit kitchen and stopped in her tracks. “Was it like this when you bought it? Did Hilda live like this?”
The floorboards were twisted and separating from each other. Many of the cabinet doors were gone, and the fridge was in the middle of the room. There was no stove, and the sink was full and overflowing with Styrofoam food containers and pop cans and bottles.
“No, I was working and had some issues,” he admitted from behind her.
“Holy fuck, do you have any idea what you are doing?” she questioned and walked through the kitchen into the dining room that was full of small bits of plaster.
“I’m learning, Agatha!” he said angrily.
Covering her mouth with her hand, she replied, “Have you had this checked for asbestos?”
“I never thought of that.”
“And lead, because there is lead for sure. It’s an old house.” Agatha couldn’t believe what she was seeing. He had only been here a week.
“No, I haven’t,” he admitted and ran his fingers through his hair.
She turned to him. “You should. You’re not living here, are you?”
“Yup, there are five bedrooms.” He shrugged as if the mess wouldn’t kill him.
“I think you should find another place to live.” She suggested looking around the place and wondered if his bedroom was in just as bad of shape as the rest of the house.
“I guess I could get a hotel.” He said the words, but there wasn’t any conviction behind them.
Agatha knew it was late, and by the time he got a hotel room, it would be morning. But she also had empty rooms, a lot of them. Though she hated being a good person, she was.
On a sigh, she said, “Get your stuff. You can stay with me tonight. You’re just lucky I have empty rooms, and I think you might kill yourself if you’re left alone.”
“Hey! I have yet to kill myself,” he said and folded his arms and grinned at her, not saying whether he was taking her up on her offer or not.
“‘Yet’ is the key word. Get your stuff and come over; I’ll make up a bedroom,” she said again and took the flashlight from his hand. She didn’t want to lose them in case he never came over.
Walking out of his house, she wondered what she was doing by letting him stay with her. Really? Christopher Lowell! She was a moron, and she knew it.
Chapter Ten
Was his entire house really full of carcinogens? Looking around the two rooms that were complete disasters, he wondered if Agatha was right that his house would kill him one day. Now or in the future.
He wondered if she would be willing to help him fix the house since he wasn’t doing so great at it. Then he could spend his days watching her ass as she sashayed around, being an expert on everything. Today’s green shirt said “Hlltam Hoob” in bright pink. Her black hair had been the same as it was almost twelve hours before, just a bit messier.
When his lights had gone out, and he had seen that hers were on, he went over to borrow a flashlight—another item to add to his list of things needed for the house. That list was so long. Not that he had thought she would actually answer the door because it was two in the morning, and he was practically a stranger.
Once she had opened the door, he had learned something completely new about the woman. Agatha was small, smaller than he had thought she was sitting on her front step. She was maybe just over five feet tall, and that was with her orange tennis shoes on. Since he was 6’5”, she was tiny compared to him, tiny and light. He had noticed when he had lifted her off the ladder. He grabbed a few things upstairs and turned off the lights as he left the house. She may be a stranger, but her house wasn’t trying to kill him. Until he got things checked out at his place, he was homeless. Tomorrow he would have to find a place to live for a while. Tonight, he was happy he would be staying across the street even if Agatha didn’t seem exactly happy about the idea. She had offered, and he had taken her up on it. Not only was he getting a place to stay, but he would get to spend time with her.
When Chris made it to Agatha’s door, he wondered if he should knock. She had invited him, but did that mean he should just barge in? He decided it must, so he walked into her brightly lit house. He had noticed the comfortable furniture before when she got the flashlights. There were two couches and a loveseat in tan with bright colored throw pillows, which contrasted with the walls that were a bright yellow, and the ceiling was even brighter yellow.
Chris didn’t see Agatha, but he could hear her upstairs, so he headed up to find her. On the top floor, he realized that her house must be bigger than his because there were eight bedroom doors visible. Hearing her in one at the far end of the hall, he followed the noise and found her throwing a light blue comforter on the top of the bed, which matched the paler blue of the walls. Leaning against the door, he watched her. He could tell she had not been ready for company.
“Sorry to put you out like this. I could get a hotel for the night.” He stood, holding his stuff, hoping she didn’t send him away.
“No, I just have to change the sheets. I don’t remember who was the last in here or even when.” She tossed a pillow back on the bed that she had put on the dresser.
“So long ago?” he asked.
“Not too long. Maybe a few months. But who was it and why?” She bit her lip as she thought about it.
“Best to change the sheets then.” He grinned.
“Oh yeah, sheets needed to be changed,” she said, not looking at him.
Chris walked in and set his stuff on the dresser. “Whose room was it?”
“
Mabel, but she moved in with her boyfriend—sorry, husband now, Cliff.”
“Mabel and Cliff? Was he a soldier fighting in the great war?” he teased.
She laughed at his joke. “I wish. His name is Clifton Scott V. Yes, those Scotts, and she had shit parents.”
“I don’t recall any Scotts,” he said, racking his brain for who they could be. Probably someone important. His dad probably knew them.
“Old money. I’m sure you heard about the new library. They’re putting up half the money.” She shrugged as she stuffed the pillow into a case.
He let out a whistle. “Mabel married well.”
“Cliff married well. He got Maby.” She turned to him. “Bathroom is down the hallway, and sleep as late as you want.”
“See you at the bathroom, roomie.” He watched her walk out the door.
“Nope, I have my own,” she said as she left. He followed to see what door she went in. It was one closest to the stairs and farthest from his bedroom. He wondered if that was why she had chosen this room for him.
Looking around him, he saw no cracked or falling plaster. Everything looked neat and tidy and lived in. Even though the house was basically empty, it was still clean and tidy.
Chris probably spent too long in the working shower, but he was just glad he didn’t wreck anything while he was in there. The room was well-organized and stocked with anything imaginable one might need. Or anything if you were a woman, because there was nothing but girly stuff everywhere. Since it was there, he used the body wash and shampoo and ended up smelling like a field of flowers. Like Agatha.
After crawling into bed, he wondered about the woman of the house. Tonight, she had been less prickly than she had been before. At first, he didn’t think she would give him a flashlight, much less a bed, though he had to admit he would rather be in her bed for the night.
Chapter Eleven