Hell and Back
Page 25
I piled up the boxes in the main hall, but I’d need help with the heavy mattress. The box on top of the stack was for the kitchen. I pulled the map out of my pocket and used the light filtering through the stained glass to figure out how to get to the kitchen. Where were the light switches in this place?
Beside the staircase, an antique push–button light switch tarnished with age turned on small wall sconces behind flower–shaped glass casings. Now I could read the map a little better.
There was no easy way to the kitchen. I could go through the formal dining room or through the servant dining room. I started down the hallway, past the covered seating, my feet leaving footprints in the dust as I maneuvered the labyrinthine hallways.
Once I found my way into the kitchen, I set the box down on the island. This room would need to be the first one to be fixed. While most of the house had preserved its Jacobian architecture and Edwardian decor, the kitchen had been redone in the ‘70s right before the city had taken possession. The small table under the windows was original, and so was the thankfully timeless subway tile. However, the clunky electric stove and pebbled linoleum certainly were not. I shook my head. Why would anyone cover this gorgeous hardwood with linoleum?
I went out and collected the other kitchen boxes and began unpacking. My dishes and silverware went on the counter of the butler’s pantry that connected the kitchen to both the breakfast room and the dining room. I set my stand mixer on the island and filed away the baking utensils and pots and pans in the drawers underneath. Baking was a therapy for me, though I didn’t know how much of a chance I would get to bake while I was here. The oven had a suspicious look that made it easy to imagine that it could burst into flames or smoke me out of the house. I gave it a once–over as I set my microwave on the counter next to it. Yes, this kitchen would be the first thing I tore apart, and I’d be ordering takeout for a while. Hopefully, it would be the only room I would have to completely gut. I prayed the rest of the house would be mainly cosmetic, only needing the repairs that came with age and decay.
A new stove, new cabinets, new countertops, new sink, new flooring. I would be so pissed if the linoleum had ruined the hardwood underneath. If it had, maybe I could replace it with new hardwood, or if I wanted to really spruce it up, travertine or marble. My concern was that anything other than wood would make it feel separate from the rest of the house, as it did now.
With everything in the kitchen put away, I went back to the main hall and grabbed the next box, marked in red. This needed to go to the study. I turned down the right hallway and set the box on the desk. This box was mostly papers, everything from the closing of the house as well as some other documents, like permits and floorplans. The study needed to be redone too; the wallpaper was peeling, and even if it hadn’t been, I would have changed it anyway, because it was a strange texture, like straw. In the meantime, the study would be my center of operations while I redid this house.
I sat down in the green armchair beside the desk to take a quick break. This was going to be the first flip I had ever done on my own. I was ready to prove my worth.
My parents had been real estate agents in the Twin Cities metro when I was growing up, but times got hard when the housing market crashed. I was in college when they switched gears and began flipping houses, and I lent them a hand so I wouldn’t have to get a real job. I started by assisting my mom with the interior design, and found I liked it. I switched majors, and eventually both my sister Kristy and I were allowed to work on our own projects under our parents’ company.
I loved what I did. I worked hard. Under my parents’ guidance, I was allowed to choose the houses, create the design, and sell. I was good at it, too. My parents let Kristy and I keep half the profits we made, and they would foot the bill for the purchases. The strategy had paid off well for them, and they were making more money than they ever had when I was a kid.
But I was left wondering. I was privileged, to be sure. I had gotten lucky, getting a job with my parents, and I happened to be good at what they did. My houses sold because of the Daniels’ Real Estate name. Could I make it on my own without my parents’ name as a safety net?
It was an idea that had festered for over a year. I had it made, working for my parents. While most of my friends were working two jobs trying to pay off their student loans, I had been able to buy my own little house in the city. Maybe I was insane for wanting to strike out on my own, but I needed to know if it was possible for me to replicate my success away from home. Was I really as good as I thought I was, or was I relying too much on my parents’ name?
That’s when I had discovered Glenwood Island. When I first saw the listing, I was sure they had forgotten a zero. The price was jaw–droppingly low for everything included, so I did a little bit of digging into the history of the house. I was still wary of the low price, but things were making more sense.
It didn’t take too much digging to discover why it was being sold at such a low price, or why they hadn’t had any takers. A quick Google search revealed page after page with titles like “Most Haunted Houses in the United States,” “Twelve Haunted Places in Minnesota,” and “Ghosts of Brutal Murders.” The articles included “evidence” such as almost every Chester family member dying in the home. I found interviews with city employees who had worked as tour guides who claimed that things would disappear, or they would swear they saw the figure of a woman down the hallway. It made me roll my eyes, but it was enough to scare away plenty of people.
When I told my parents about my plan to branch out, they had been wary. When I told them I was buying Glenwood Isle, the blood drained from their faces. Even Kristy tried to talk me out of it. She claimed it was going to be too big, too much. My parents said no one would ever buy it, no matter how nice it looked. I didn’t care. That’s what made this exciting. Besides, I was using my own money and my own name to fix and sell it. This would have no effect on them.
Despite assuring them that this wouldn’t ruin their company name, they were still concerned. They thought it was too ambitious for my first project. They showed me houses they were looking at, told me I could purchase one of them instead, but it was too late. I had fallen in love with the pictures and story of Glenwood Isle. I was in love, and there was nothing they could do about it. I’d bought it sight unseen and paid in cash. As soon as the keys were in my hands and I had someone to rent my house, I packed up the car and headed up north.
I went back out into the main hall. The only boxes left on the dusty carpet needed to go up to my new bedroom. I glanced at the stack of six boxes and glanced at the lengthy staircase. After moving and unpacking, I really wasn’t in the mood to carry everything up to the next level.
Maybe I didn’t have to. I pushed the boxes down the left hallway, past the sewing room, and over to the box on the map marked Lift. I pushed the ivory button and the metal grate slid to the side with a clang, the elevator doors opening. Preventing the doors from closing with my body, I loaded the boxes inside. I wondered what the weight limit was in here. I was mostly loading clothes and toiletries, but who knew when the last time was this thing had been serviced, so instead of riding up, I pressed the button for the second floor and stepped out, watching the doors close and the elevator rise.
I climbed the carved and dusty staircase and met the elevator at the top, pushing the boxes into the bedroom I had chosen. It was as pretty as the pictures, and immediately my attitude improved. The large windows let in the sunshine, and though dust danced in the beams, the light colors and lace curtains put me at ease. I could stay here all day, but there was work to do.
I spent about a half hour going through the house room by room, making notes on what needed to be changed. Finally, when all that was done, I went to the kitchen and pulled one of my hard lemonades from the fridge. Since they had only been in there about an hour, they weren’t cold yet, but I had kept them in the cab of the SUV with me so the air–conditioning had kept them under room temperature.
&n
bsp; I leaned against the island as I drank, looking around the ugly room. Stupid linoleum. I was thankful it wasn’t in any other rooms. I was also thankful for the subway tiles. It was not only in the kitchen but also in the bathrooms. Thank God it was becoming trendy again, although I knew that the sort of buyer who would choose this house would care less about trendy and more about history. Still, linoleum wasn’t from the right period of history, and it would have to go. It was covering the floor of the pantry and butler’s pantry as well, but it hadn’t infected any of the dining rooms. Like the rest of the house, they were covered in a hardwood that I hoped would be as stunning as the pictures once the dust was cleared away.
I sneezed. There was so much dust in this house. Where had I put my cleaning supplies? Before anything could get done, I would have to clean the house just so we could get it messy all over again. I’d tried to hire a cleaning service to do it before I arrived, but every single company in town had claimed they were booked. Even if I only dusted and swept, it would take me all night to clean this place.
I was lost in thought as to the best way to tackle everything when a knock on the door rang through the house.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty–One
Chapter Twenty–Two
Chapter Twenty–Three
Chapter Twenty–Four
Chapter Twenty–Five
Chapter Twenty–Six
Chapter Twenty–Seven
Chapter Twenty–Eight
Epilogue
Free Chapter #1
Free Chapter #2