A Broom With a View

by Rebecca Patrick-Howard

  She hadn’t had her own people in a very, very long time. But then he’d talked her out of working at the day spa, convincing her that she’d be much happier traveling and going on the road with him. “Just think of how much fun we’ll have going to South America, Scotland–Japan even! You can do whatever you want while I’m on the road!”

  Starry-eyed and full of wanderlust those things had sounded great to her at the time. So, even though she’d paid good money to get her license, and she liked the people she worked with, she’d quit her job and let the license expire to become a stay-at-home wife who traveled with her husband.

  Of course, in reality the traveling rarely happened. Sure, they’d gone on a few trips at first, and they’d had a wonderful time during those trips. Mode was a different person away from home. He was charming, knowledgeable, and relaxed. The tours were exciting. Those trips had reminded her of why she’d fallen in love with him in the first place.

  But later when it came time for him to travel to San Francisco for a week he’d told her that the other members of the group were starting to complain since they couldn’t bring their spouses with them.

  “Sorry honey, but you might want to sit this one out,” he’d said with concern.

  “But we pay for my way, and my meals. Couldn’t their spouses and girlfriends do the same? It’s not like the group is paying for me to go.”

  He’d nodded in agreement and swore a little to show his “irritation.” Then he’d said, “Let ‘em simmer down a bit. Then you can come on the next one.

  Of course, the next one would come around and he’d said the same thing.

  “I think I’m going to get my massage license back,” she’d declared one June morning, five years ago. “I’ve painted every single wall in the house, learned to crochet and made more afghans than I ever thought possible, and have dug around in the garden so much I’m afraid if I go any farther I might hit Hell. I need a life.”

  “I like having you at home, though,” he’d all but pleaded. “You don’t know how much it means to be able to come home to a place that’s clean and ready for me. To know someone is inside and has food waiting. The traveling is getting old. You being there for me at home is what makes it bearable.”

  Liza had gathered her nerves at that point and said what had been on her mind for months. “Well maybe if I got pregnant…I mean, I think we can now. And I am really, really ready.”

  He’d looked away then, his face blank. When he’d turned back to her he’d been all smiles again. “Well, it might be hard if you’re on the road. We’re leaving for Bermuda next weekend and you can go with us. I was going to surprise you!”

  So, for the next five tours she was “allowed” to travel with them. That had continued on for a year and a half. Then it stopped again. She’d brought up pregnancy three times after that but he’d always changed the subject. She’d finally just stopped.

  In hindsight she realized that only one of the members had complained of her presence–the one he was currently engaged to. A trombone player. She’d been too blind to see it, or else too scared to look into it properly.

  “Serves me right,” she spat.

  Her voice, stronger than she’d realized, echoed in the cavernous room. It was a little thrilling. “I spent all my free time helping others see their future. I was too dim-witted to look at my own present.”

  At least she had some money. Along with the house and property, when Nana Bud died she’d left both Liza and Bryar a tidy sum from her life insurance policy and stocks she’d purchased back in the 1970s. In total, Liza Jane’s part came to more than $125,000. (Which made her wonder what her grandmother had left Mabel. She’d never asked her mother.)

  At one time, it would’ve been a fortune. Now she was going to have to make it stretch a good while to cover her expenses for at least two years, until her own business hopefully (definitely, think positive) took off.

  So far she’d used it to rent the apartment in Beverly, move to Kentucky, get the house up and running, pay the rent for her building four months in advance, purchase all the supplies she needed to get her business up and running (massage table, products, waiting room furniture, decorations, etc.), her recertification, and to get the utilities on for everything.

  And then there had been a few new outfits. Just because.

  She shuddered at the amount she’d already spent.

  “I will make this happen,” she promised herself, tossing her head back so that her hair shook in the shadowy light. “This is going to work for me.”

  The overhead lights flickered off and on, a strobe-light effect from the energy that flew from the snap of her fingers.

  She felt good, she felt positive.

  She was going to do this, do this well, and not use any magic at all.

  Oh, who was she kidding? She’d use as much as she could. A girl had to eat, after all.

  ***

  Liza knew whose voice she’d hear on the other end of the line before she was halfway across the room. Always a glutton for punishment, she continued towards the phone all the same. It was either now or later, after all.

  Mode’s voice carried that pleasant, cheery tone that had irritated her so much at the end and made her swoon in the beginning.

  “Hi Mode,” she said carefully, and then cringed. She’d promised herself to avoid that if she could.

  Nana Bud had believed that names had a tremendous amount of power attached to them, some of the greatest power that existed.

  “Don’t use someone’s name when you’re mad or flying off the handle,” she’d warned her when Liza was nine and first starting to recognize the fact that she could do things that others couldn’t. “If you use their name in anger, you’re trapping both of you in a web you’ll likely never get out of. And the same–don’t say it in love unless you’re real sure you mean it. That’s the thing that will bind you best of all.”

  Still, as she spoke Mode’s name aloud she was reminded of the number of times her mother had made fun of it.

  “Mode,” she’d shuddered. “That’s ridiculous. It sounds too much like ‘commode.’ He should at least go by a nickname. He shouldn’t tempt the fates like that.”

  “I’m assuming you’re settling in down there in little old Kudzu,” he said.

  Condescending prick, she said soundlessly and then watched as the book she’d left on the coffee table the night before shot up in the air and slammed back down, sending the TV remote clattering to the floor.

  She was really going to have to get a grip on her emotions. Now was as good a time as any to start trying.

  And maybe she should give him the benefit of the doubt. After all, her goal was to live a peaceful life that was free of stress and unwanted excitement. She could start by being civil. Besides, she couldn’t be sure if he was truly being condescending or if it was his legitimate attempt at being cute/friendly and just sounded smarmy because she was currently pissed off at him for cheating on her and ending their marriage.

  Oh, screw peaceful and relaxing, her inner mind snapped. There’d be plenty of time for that later. She’d stick with the condescension because that’s just the kind of mood Mode put her in anymore.

  So far in the conversation, he’d rambled on about himself for at least six minutes, giving her information about his upcoming tour and problems with the guest bathroom’s pipes in her old, their old house.

  “Lizey?” he asked, his chipper tone falling an octave. “I asked if you were settling in down there.”

  “Fine and dandy,” she replied tightly. “I’m assuming you’re settling into little old Jennifer.”

  “Jennifer’s fine,” he replied, not losing the smile from his voice but speaking slowly, as though speaking to an insolent child. “Are you sure you’re holding up? It’s an awfully big house for just one person and you’re not used to being by yourself and having to do things alone.”

  Except for all those weeks you went off and left me alone while you were on tour, she
mentally snapped back at him. “I’m fine,” she replied instead. “I like being by myself. At least I know I am in good company.”

  “But still…you know you can always come back up here when you’re ready. Your mom or sister will be sure to take you in and help you.”

  Every hair on Liza’s head rose to angry attention. You don’t even know who I am, she wanted to scream at the top of her lungs. You never let me be myself so you don’t know what I am capable of! Don’t you remember? Don’t you remember that first year and what…?

  Her silence appeared to make him nervous. “Is there anything I can do for you on my end? Any way I can help you with, you know, official business?”

  What he really wanted to know was if he could do anything to help her clear the rest of her part of their storage unit out faster. If he could do anything to stop the loose ends of mail she figured were still being delivered to his house. If there was anything he could do to speed up the divorce process…

  He was asking if he could do anything to help cut their ties to each other quicker.

  “Not a darn thing,” she said. “I’m moving just as fast as I can.”

  “Oh! I know you are! I didn’t mean to imply that you were dragging your heels or anything,” he said smoothly.

  Yeah, the way you didn’t drag your heels when you invited your mistress to move in with you before I’d even packed my suitcase, she thought wryly.

  “Now we’ll be out of town for all of next month,” he said. “I’m going on tour with the group and we have sixteen dates on the west coast. So if there’s anything you need from up here–“

  “You telling me so that I can come up then and you two won’t have to run into me?” she finished for him. “Because I can tell you now that I won’t be coming up there until after Christmas, probably. I have to start working on my business this week. I have men coming in next week to start construction and I can’t leave them alone without any supervision.”

  Liza, who’d sat through most of the conversation feeling a bit depressed, straightened her back now, proud at how official she’d sounded. Ha! Take that. I have work, too!

  “No! That’s not what I meant at all. I just meant that Larry and Sheila next door have the spare key,” he replied, his voice beginning to sound a little strained.

  Liza was now confused. Her mind began to spin as she traveled backwards in time to the incident involving the house key and the ensuing argument. “Well, I still have my key. Remember? I tried to return it to you and you wouldn’t accept it. You brought it to my apartment and said that I needed to keep it until everything was final, until the house was completely in your name.”

  “Yes, well, we um…” Mode let his voice trail off his until his end of the line fell uncomfortably silent. It was in the silence that the implication of what he was saying struck Liza square in the middle of the forehead.

  Damn her third eye.

  “You had the locks changed,” she accused him, unable to keep the high pitch of anger from creeping into her voice. “Well I’ll be damned.”

  Mode coughed nervously and through the line she could see the tips of his ears, rosy from the anxiety he was feeling. Soon he’d be unbuttoning the top of his shirt. Good. “It’s just that there’s been a lot of thefts in the neighborhood recently and–“

  Enjoying his discomfort more than any decent person should, Liza allowed him to ramble while she closed her eyes and let herself drift hundreds of miles away and back in time.

  On the movie screen behind her eyelids she could see them a few days ago, the catalyst for the current conversation.

  There was Mode, with his stubby beard, tweed jacket he’d picked up at Goodwill, and red suspenders that she’d always thought looked ridiculous but kept quiet about because she didn’t want to hurt his feelings.

  And then there was Jennifer, pacing around the living room like a caged cat in her black tights and deep orange tunic sweeping her knees. Her voice was controlled but her skinny little shoulders were hunched forward and her eyes were bright with blue-tinted rage. “I don’t want that woman to have a key to my house Mode.”

  “She’s not ‘that woman’ Jen. Liza’s a great girl. She’d never do anything to hurt you or us!” Mode, who abhorred conflict, looked crushed. His eyes were lowered to the travertine tile Eliza had installed two years earlier and his mouth dropped at the corners–the way it got when he thought the world was stacked against him.

  “She’s vindictive and mean-spirited and I don’t trust her as far as I can throw her,” Jennifer spat. “Change the locks!”

  Liza chuckled at the scene playing out before her eyes on her own private movie screen.

  She was the vindictive one who couldn’t be trusted? She hadn’t been the one to make it her goal to sleep with a married man on a twelve-city tour and document the affair in Instagram posts.

  Liza still couldn’t believe they’d carried on that affair as long as they had without her knowing. When he’d told her about the Starbucks girl and that he was moving out, she’d thought he’d gone insane. Insanity she could fix. But when she learned he was actually leaving her for someone he worked with, that was different. That was serious. That’s when she knew she’d lost him.

  Mode was still babbling some nonsense when she interrupted him. “Sorry, I’ve got something on the stove. I’d better go.”

  “What? You’re cooking! That’s great. I am so glad that you’re–“

  She’d never know which part of her cooking made him “glad” because she hung up before he finished.

  Eh well, she shrugged as she stared at the blue light on her phone’s screen.

  Perhaps she was a little vindictive. After all, she hadn’t made an entirely innocent exit from their house. With Bryar at her side, begging Liza to let her curse something or put out a good hex, she’d loosened some things in all the toilets so that they’d overflow and run for the entire two weeks that the happy couple was on vacation, removed the new thermostat which effectively left them without air or heat until they could call someone in to replace it, and then removed all the towel racks and light bulbs and taken them with her.

  Just for the fun of it.

  ***

  The last of her boxes were unpacked.

  Liza’s meager personal belongings were either neatly stowed away in closets or arranged on bookshelves and credenzas throughout her grandparents’ house.

  Her house.

  She wasn’t sure it would ever completely be hers, but she knew she belonged there.

  Liza didn’t bring much with her. The few items she’d deemed important enough to transport from Boston were sentimental and random. In fact, from the looks of some of the things she packed, Liza was now worried she might have unknowingly suffered from some kind of mental breakdown before she left. Her belongings had clearly not been chosen by someone who was in full control of their decision-making and cognitive skills.

  For instance, she hadn’t brought a single cup or plate or towel with her yet somehow managed to carefully pack the collection of foreign Coca-Cola bottles she’d gathered during their international travels. They were now artfully displayed on a library table in the living room.

  She’d forgotten to pack any underwear (and, since all her drawers were empty when she left the house, had no idea where they were, which was a little disturbing) but had packed a box of nothing but melted candle wax that she’d collected from all the candle holders in the house. Yes, she liked to melt down the old and make new candles but why had she deemed that wax necessary?

  And then there was the plastic bag full of more than three-hundred corks.

  Still, she’d managed to bring every single item of clothing she’d ever owned, including the sweatshirt she’d cut the neck out of back in 1989 when she was just a kid. Well, other than her underwear. That, she’d managed to leave…somewhere.

  “Liza Jane,” she declared, her voice booming through the empty rooms. “You’re a little pathetic.”

  The drye
r buzzed in response, a reminder that she needed to change loads. The sheets and blankets on the bed were clean, but musty from non-use over the past few years. She’d spent the previous night coughing and sneezing. She wasn’t ready to throw them out yet so she hoped a good dousing with Tide and that fabric softener with the annoying white teddy bear who was always laughing would help.

  Momentarily forgetting her self-deprecating speech to herself, Liza scurried to the dryer to take action. With each thing she’d done that morning, she’d mentally hit Mode over the head with it.

  He didn’t think she could hack it. He didn’t think she’d stay down there. He didn’t think she could be alone.

  Liza Jane was a stress cleaner. She enjoyed dusting, washing dishes, mopping, and organizing. It just wasn’t cutting it today, though. The more she thought about Mode’s phone call, the madder she got.

  Thinking about Mode frolicking around her house with Jennifer did not help. Changing her locks. Ha! Like a lock could keep her out.

  Mode would’ve known that, too.

  Oh, he knew she was a witch. He was embarrassed by it, but he knew. “Just don’t do anything out in public, okay?” He hadn’t even had the decency to look ashamed or embarrassed when he’d asked.

  “Like what, Darren?” she’d snapped. “Ride my broom? Turn the waiter into a frog?”

  She’d looked at his face then and saw that it wasn’t awkwardness of her abilities that had him humiliated, it was old-fashioned fear. He was afraid of her. She’d softened a little then and changed the subject after promising him she wouldn’t make a public spectacle of herself.

  Hours later something must have clicked inside and he’d felt guilty. As a peace offering, he’d brought her a broom, one of those old-fashioned ones that looked handmade and like it belonged by a storybook witch’s front door.

  In fact, it was now standing by her front door. She was sentimental, after all. And it was a nice broom.