The House on Sandstone

by KG MacGregor

  "And then on Sunday night, I had dinner with Carly."

  Valerie cocked her head and looked at her client with interest. Unconsciously, she began rocking in her wooden chair and started a new page in the yellow tablet.

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  "I called her and asked her to dinner and she said yes and we came up here to Morton's.

  We talked…it's all okay. Carly's…she's just a really good person and she made it easy for me to apologize for everything."

  That wasn't enough, Valerie knew. Justine didn't always accept forgiveness, even when it was sincerely given.

  "And then on the way home she told me that she was a lesbian. I told her I'd always wondered and we joked about it…but I couldn't tell her about me. I started to, but she probably would have made me pull over and let her out of the car once she heard how crazy everything got."

  "Justine?" The counselor's tone was mildly admonishing.

  "Sorry." They had agreed that using the word "crazy" to describe circumstances and events in her life was unhealthy. "But I told her I'd tell her all about it …if she plied me with enough wine."

  Valerie had to laugh at that. One of Justine's loudest complaints when she'd begun her therapy was that she'd had to give up her nightly glass or two of wine on account of the risks of interaction with the medication she was taking for her anxiety and depression.

  Once she'd gotten out of the habit–and once she'd started focusing on exercise and losing weight–she no longer craved it every night, but she'd insisted last week that it belonged on her list of things that might bring her "inner calm."

  "We had a really nice time."

  The therapist twirled her pencil casually, knowing that Justine would say more.

  "She's…her life's been so interesting. She's lived all over the world and seen so much.

  And she knows about prejudice firsthand, a whole lot more than I do. She had to leave behind someone she loved because of what others might think about it…and she nearly always had to be secretive."

  "You know a little something too about the secretive part, don't you?"

  Justine nodded. "But at least I didn't have to hide the fact that I loved somebody. That must have been awful…to have feelings like that and not even be able to tell people, or to always have to be careful not to show it. I mean what if all that time I'd lived with JT, we'd to try to make people think we were just friends?" Now remembering the last three virtually platonic years of their marriage, it suddenly seemed like a bad example. "On second thought, it probably would have been harder to convince people that we were friends at all."

  "So how did it make you feel to be with Carly?"

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  As expected, the redhead balked at the question until the little voice inside her head reminded her that she was after all in therapy to talk about herself. "It was nice. I like her…I mean…I…like her."

  "You mean you…like her."

  Justine nodded nervously. "Carly said something…something that sounded like it could have come right out of my mouth. She said that there were some people in your life that you were always going to care about, no matter what happened. Of course, she was talking about Isabel, a woman she used to be in love with. And I came this close…," she gestured with her index finger and thumb, "to telling her that she was one of those people in my life…one of those people who was always going to matter to me."

  Valerie touched her foot to the floor, causing her chair to rock again. Falling in love could be good for Justine…or it could send her spiraling out of control.

  **********

  "See, that's where the computer store moved to." Perry Jeffries pointed out the grand opening sign to his cousin. "They closed that one out on the bypass when this spot opened up."

  "What used to be here? Shoes or something, right?" Carly flicked her ashes out the corner of her window. It was chilly; the forecast was calling for snow flurries starting tonight with an accumulation of up to two inches by morning.

  "That's right. It was one of those casual shoe stores, but they couldn't do any business after Barber and DB Boots both opened up outlet stores at the plants."

  Carly chuckled at the synchrony of her cousin's attire, the reverse of what her dad had worn. Perry had on his Bucks today, but under his jacket he wore a DB t-shirt from the summer softball league. He was average height and built like a brick wall, thanks to over thirty years of moving furniture. His light brown hair was flecked with gray, and he had a neatly trimmed brown and gray beard.

  "I need to get some Diggers like Daddy's–Oh, look! You finally got a coffee house downtown. Leland, Kentucky enters the twenty-first century."

  "Yep, we got those four-dollar coffees too. I tell you, we're getting to be just like New York City. Pretty soon, you won't be able to tell us apart."

  "Maybe we'll stop in there on the way back in and get one."

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  "Phfft! I got no use for a four-dollar coffee. They don't even give free refills." Perry turned the truck out toward Branch Fork, an unincorporated area of Leland County.

  "How many stops are we making?"

  "Just two. We'll drop these bunk beds over in Cedar Hills first." Cedar Hills was a newly developed housing tract that appealed especially to young families. Lots of places like this were springing up around the county, a testament to the success of both of the rivaling boot factories, and Leland's position as a bedroom community for Lexington's University of Kentucky faculty. "You don't have to help, you know. I've gotten pretty good at doing this on my own, but I appreciate you riding along."

  "I don't mind helping if you need me. I'm not as strong as I used to be, but I can still hold my own." Besides, riding in the panel truck with Perry was just like old times, though both had aged twenty-five years.

  "I bet you can."

  "So tell me about Debbie. Where'd you meet her?"

  Perry's new girlfriend was a divorced mother who had moved to town to get her son out of the clutches of a gang in Louisville. Carly had already gotten the lowdown on Debbie Claxton from her dad, but she wanted to hear it from the horse's mouth.

  "Where do I meet anybody? I delivered a dinette to her apartment."

  "Love at first sight?"

  Perry laughed sheepishly. "Yeah, pretty much. She was having some trouble getting the cable to work right with the VCR and her son's video game, so I played with it for awhile.

  We talked and had a Coke. I stopped by a couple of days later to make sure everything was still working."

  "Couldn't get her out of your head, huh?"

  "Something like that. She came down from Louisville because Kevin–that's her son, he's thirteen–got expelled from school for having a knife. She either had to put him in private school, which she couldn't afford, or move to another district."

  "What kind of work does she do?"

  "She works at Barber Boots. She's a bookkeeper."

  "So is it serious?"

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  "It could be…it'd be nice if we could get a little more time together with just us. Kevin's alright–most of the time, anyway–but he stays up till ten every night, so we don't get much time alone."

  "Sounds like you need to get away with each other."

  "Yeah, but she doesn't really know anybody here to look after him. His father's up in Louisville, and he couldn't care less."

  "You get along with him okay?"

  "Mmm…pretty good. They're a package deal, so I work at it. I don't think he liked me much at first, but we went fishing a couple of times–just me and him–and that was alright. He knows the score, and it don't seem to bother him anymore." Perry turned the truck into the subdivision.

  "These are pretty nice houses." The new homes were attractive, but on postage stamp-sized lots with high wooden fences sealing the back yards from one another.

  "Let's see…1356
…here we go." Perry pulled forward then backed into the two-car driveway. "Two-story. On second thought, I'm glad you're with me."

  Carly chuckled and flung the creaky door open. "I knew you'd appreciate me."

  When they'd finished the setup, Carly got back into the truck to wait while her cousin wrapped up the paperwork. As they'd slid the top mattresses into place, she'd felt a twinge in her lower back, a reminder that she was not only a lot older than the last time she hauled furniture, but also dreadfully out of shape. About the only exercise she got these days was what she squeezed in on the weekends, usually a stroll through an open air market or a museum. The demands of her job left her tired at the end of the day, and her idea of relaxation was not getting all sweaty at a gym.

  "Okay…just one more stop," Perry said as he hopped into the driver's seat and picked up the clipboard. "We got a washer going to Lakeside Drive. Can you read that number?"

  Carly rolled her eyes and grabbed the clipboard. Her close-up vision wasn't any better than his, but he didn't want to have to dig in the glove compartment for his reading glasses. She pulled hers from the pocket of her jacket and studied the invoice. "Six-eighteen. A JT Sharpe, Jr." Shit!

  Lakeside Drive was the main corridor into the Lakeside subdivision, a cluster of houses like those on Sandstone where the newly-moneyed families lived. There was no real lake to speak of, but the developers had widened a section of Katie's Creek to give the landscaping some flair. It would have been prettier without the obtrusive red sign listing all the things one couldn't do in the water.

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  The driveway at 618 was cluttered with cars, including a lime green Beetle that immediately brought to mind Justine's son Trey.

  "Great. We're going to have to bring this across the yard." Perry parked the truck as close as he could and tucked the clipboard under his arm. "You wanna go ring the doorbell while I put it on the dolly? Maybe somebody'll get the brilliant idea to move all those cars."

  "Sure." Carly was hesitant, but intrigued about the chance to get a glimpse into how JT

  and his new family lived. From the front porch, she could hear raucous laughter and shouting, and was ringing the doorbell for the third time when it was finally opened by a woman of about thirty. "Hi. Griffin Home Furnishings. We have a washer." The new Mrs. Sharpe wasn't exactly a teenager, but Carly immediately understood why Justine had made the crack about her ex. This lady was petite, with short wavy dark hair and brown eyes. Looking past her into the formal living room, Carly saw five or six teenage boys, a deafening video game their apparent focus. She immediately recognized Trey from the picture she'd seen.

  "Thank god! Can you bring it in around back? The laundry room's got a door to the outside…that way you won't track in."

  Carly bristled at the gibe but agreed nonetheless when Mrs. Sharpe indicated the sidewalk on the other side of the driveway. She was about to return to her cousin when she heard the woman call to someone upstairs.

  "Emmy? Can you come down here and take Alexandra? I need to meet these delivery me–people."

  If she'd have said men, I would have found a way to track mud from one end of that house to the other.

  Perry wheeled the dolly to the edge of the drive, where Carly guided him carefully through the maze of cars. For some reason, she wasn't at all surprised that no one had come to meet them at the back door. Finally, the woman arrived to let them in.

  "Sorry…Emmy! Please come get your sister." A small child of about five stood in the doorway that led into the main part of the house, humming loudly and wearing a pair of adult athletic socks on her hands and forearms. The reason for the strange attire became obvious when she lifted her wrist to her mouth and began to bite, prompting her young mother to reach for her arm. "No, honey. No biting."

  Moments later, a jean-clad teen entered and swooped up the child. "You know, Trey was a lot closer, and he's not busy with his homework." Despite her unconcealed irritation, Emmy made a wide-eyed happy face for her sister.

  "Trey's friends are here."

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  "Trey's friends are always here," she grunted, disappearing back into the house with the little girl in her arms.

  As Perry disconnected the broken washer, Carly removed the tape and packing from the new one. The whole switch took less than five minutes, and soon they were headed to the county dump where they would unload the discard.

  "Did you see that little girl?" Perry asked.

  "Yeah."

  "What do you think was wrong with her?"

  "I don't know…maybe she was autistic or something." The low opinion she'd had at first of the seemingly spoiled suburban mother had been mitigated by the obvious challenges this woman faced with caring for a child with special needs. People like that needed all the support they could get.

  Carly picked up the clipboard and slipped on her glasses. At the bottom of the paperwork, the customer had signed her receipt: Justine Sharpe.

  **********

  Justine squinted to read the closed-captioning on the TV news channel. A story about a bombing in Jerusalem had captured her attention, and she was unaware that she'd already completed her four-mile run. That's right where Carly was!

  From the corner of her eye, she saw a heavyset woman take a seat on the window ledge, apparently waiting for the next open treadmill.

  "Here you go. That's a great top, Frances. The lines really show off how much you've slimmed down." Her compliment was rewarded with a shy smile from the older woman, who had joined the Wellness Center soon after double-bypass surgery. One thing Justine had learned early on in her quest for fitness was how important it was to get encouragement from others.

  Wiping her face and neck with a towel, the redhead hopped off and took a long pull on her water bottle. Dutifully, she completed her two circuits on the weight machines and began stretching to cool down. It was ten after six, and that gave her plenty of time to get home and shower, find something nice to wear…even fix her hair a little. Carly wouldn't be there until eight.

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  Justine was faithful with her workout regimen, not allowing anything to interfere, even dinner plans with Carly Griffin. When she'd first adopted this routine, she'd given herself permission to miss a few workouts for one reason or another, and she found right away how easily she could fall out of the habit. No, she needed the rigid commitment, not just for the fitness benefits, but to avoid the guilt that always ensued when she skipped it.

  Still sweating when she walked through the glass doors toward the parking lot, she pulled her collar up against the chill. A light dusting of snow covered her windshield, though it hadn't yet begun to stick to the ground or the street.

  An hour and a half later, Justine stood in her bathroom, applying the final touches of mascara and blush. She'd dressed tonight in her favorite jeans, the ones that hugged her hips and showed off her flat tummy. A tight-fitting red sweater completed her outfit, a look Emmy had said made her appear younger than her forty-three years. Nothing wrong with that.

  After much discussion, she'd left things with Valerie that "liking" Carly that way probably wasn't a good idea. There were too many complications…not the least of which was the fact that the woman was going to be leaving the country again in just a few weeks. Besides, her relationship with Emmy and Trey was the best it had been in over three years and she wasn't about to rock that boat.

  So why am I standing here in front of the mirror primping?

  Next, she did a quick tour around the house, just in case her guest wanted to look around.

  Justine was kind of a neat freak–emphasis on the freak part, according to Emmy.

  Everything had a place, and within those places–the drawers, the cabinets, the closets–

  order was the rule. She'd cut the kids some slack to get them to visit more often, fighting herself not to go into their rooms to tidy up. Their compro
mise was to limit food to the kitchen and den, and to place their dirty laundry in the bathroom hamper. Justine topped that off by keeping their doors closed when they weren't there.

  Passing through her own bedroom one last time, she crouched down to look under the bed. She was practically compulsive about storing her vibrator on the top shelf of the closet, but she'd gradually given herself permission not to get up and do that every time before she went to sleep. Still, it would be awfully embarrassing to have her company find it poking out from under the bed because she'd forgotten to put it away.

  Justine hadn't been this nervous since that night in Cincinnati at the lesbian bar almost two years ago. Back in the kitchen, she reached into the cabinet and took down two plates for their pizza, and two wine glasses. A corked bottle of California red sat in the pantry, and it seemed like a good idea to take the edge off with…oh, a half a glass or so before her guest arrived.

  Chapter 5

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  "I didn't hear your car." The redhead had practically jumped out of her skin when the doorbell rang just as she was peeking out the beveled window that lined the front door.

  "That's because I walked." Carly turned and pointed to the footbridge across the street.

  "That path leads right up to the park, and our house is just a few doors down."