Seasons of Her Life

by Fern Michaels

  The bathrooms were quaint, their size alone intimidating, bigger than her bedroom on Ribbonmaker Lane. When she got to what Webster said was the master bedroom, she closed her eyes and tried to visualize a fire blazing in the baronial hearth. The room was furnished with a four-poster with a handmade quilt, ruffled curtains, a dressing table, rag rugs on the oak floor, and a rocking chair with bright red cushions. The kind of room she’d once promised herself.

  There was no way she was going to buy this dump. No way at all.

  “I want to see the kitchen,” Ruby said as they trooped down the long staircase. She did like the carved banister and the newel post at the bottom of the curved stairway.

  “Won’t like it. Needs work.”

  He was right, Ruby thought in dismay when she stepped over the cracked linoleum. The stove was a horror, the sink a nightmare. The shelves lining the wall were ugly and rotting. “What’s that?” Ruby said, pointing to a rusty fixture at the sink.

  “Pump. You have well water here. You have to prime it.”

  “Oh, God,” Ruby muttered. She closed her eyes again and imagined a Sears, Roebuck kitchen. A bow window with a window seat. She’d put a rocking chair next to the fireplace, and a basket of logs on the oversize hearth. Fieldstone was beautiful. Only a lunatic would buy this dump.

  Ruby screamed when she saw movement out of the corner of her eye.

  “Just a rat,” Webster said in disgust. “A couple of cats will clear them right out.” Ruby shuddered.

  “The floor’s rotten,” Ruby said.

  “Yep. Window’s rotted clear through, too.”

  There was no way she would even think about buying this monstrosity. No way at all. Andy would commit her.

  “Want to see the root cellar?”

  “No.”

  “Peach trees, apple trees and some pear, all over.”

  “I like plum trees. Those sweet green ones.”

  “Might be one or two. Can’t be certain. You want to see the outside buildings?”

  “Might as well.”

  She should have known better. The barn was little more than a roof and floor. Parts of several stalls remained. The garage didn’t have a roof, but it did have two sides and part of a third. There was no door. Ruby knew if she pushed real hard, it would tumble down. The chicken coop seemed to be intact for some reason, but it was an eyesore.

  A dimwit with no brains at all would pass this one up, Ruby thought.

  “I don’t need a hundred acres,” Ruby said again stubbornly. “Where’s the pond?”

  “Fed by a natural spring. A real beauty. You can swim in it. Good exercise, they tell me, swimming.” He pointed off into the distance. “Down there. You don’t have on the right shoes, Mrs. Blue.”

  “Who does the carpentry work around here? Who does renovations?” She was asking only out of curiosity.

  “The Semolina brothers. Fine work they do. Craftsmen. You don’t find real craftsmen these days.” His face wore a disgusted look when he said, “And they don’t wear hard hats the color of canaries, either.”

  “If they’re craftsmen, they must be in demand.” She was nuts, why was she even talking about this? She had no intention of buying this nightmare. None at all.

  “They take their time. You young folks, everything has to be done yesterday. You can’t speed up the Semolina brothers.”

  “I don’t need a hundred acres,” Ruby said for the fifth time, or was it the fourth, she couldn’t remember.

  “I hear you. Fifty.”

  “No.”

  “Thirty-five,” Webster said.

  “Twenty-five. Wait a minute, I didn’t say I was buying. This house should be torn down and rebuilt.”

  “Yep. Better to have the Semolina Brothers fix it. You want to buy this house, don’t you?”

  Ruby wanted to say no. She meant to say no, but what she said was, “I’ll take it, but only twenty-five acres.” They would lock her up and throw away the key. She felt light-headed with the words.

  “Contingent on the Semolina brothers doing the work and Sears, Roebuck putting in a new kitchen.”

  “They won’t like that, Sears, Roebuck doing their work.” Webster spat three feet, tilted forward to see if he hit the mark he was aiming at. Satisfied, he climbed into his truck. “Get in, we can negotiate inside, where it’s warmer.”

  Ruby’s head buzzed as she tried to recall exactly how much she had in her purse.

  “What’s your offer?”

  “Offer?”

  “What do you want to chew me down to?”

  Ruby rattled off a price that was fifteen thousand dollars less than the asking price.

  “Done.” He scribbled out an agreement, in pencil, on a crumpled piece of paper. The pencil was barely two inches long and the eraser was worn down to the metal cap. He spit on it first, his gold tooth winking.

  “Shouldn’t you be drawing up a contract? Shouldn’t I sign something?”

  “No need. I’m a man of my word. You look like a lady of your word. We can do business. I seen that right away when I saw you close your eyes in that upstairs bedroom. That was my mother’s bedroom.”

  “You own this!” Ruby said, startled.

  “Yep. Me and my brother, but he’s senile. I handle his affairs.”

  “I need to move in now. I can pay rent till we close.”

  “No need. We can close when we go back to the office. I’m selling and you’re buying. That’s how we do things. Tomorrow you can have the deed. How you paying for this here property, Mrs. Blue?”

  “Cash.”

  “That’s a fine way of doing business. I accept.”

  “And the Semolina brothers, when can they start to work?” This was all moving too fast for her. She’d never done business in such a crazy way. No warning bells were sounding, so it was probably all right. Still, she wouldn’t tell anyone until it was official. It was an adventure. That’s how she had to look at it.

  “Tomorrow morning. Bright and early. You can move in today.”

  Ruby nodded. All she needed was some food, a sleeping bag, and a car full of cleaning supplies.

  “If I’m going to come back here, I think you’d better draw me a map of some kind. I don’t think I could find my way without one.”

  Angus Webster spat out the car window at some invisible target. “No need. Two lefts, a hill, a right, another left, and here you are.”

  “What about the field?” Ruby gaped at the man.

  “That’s your last left. Can’t miss a field, lessen you’re blind.”

  But she did miss it, and it was six o’clock when she returned to the house on Orchard Circle. One of these days she was going to find out why her driveway was called a circle. There wasn’t a house for three miles in either direction.

  Ruby sat in her car for a long time with the heater running. Once she entered the house, she had to lug in wood and then lug it to the upstairs bedroom, if she was going to sleep up there. On the other hand, she could lug the wood as far as the kitchen and sleep on the floor in her brand-new down sleeping bag.

  She kept her coat on while she built the fire. The minute the dry wood caught and spewed out warmth, she removed her coat and began to rummage in her bags for something to eat. She chomped down two apples, an orange, and a container of bullion she’d picked up at the pharmacy that doubled as a cafe. She was so hungry she wanted to cry, but the thought of being laid out in a coffin was frightening. She ate another apple.

  In her spacious tote bag, she kept all the literature about her blood problem. She knew she had to eat a lot of salmon and other fish, a lot of beans and broccoli. The only sweet she could have was angel food cake. She would stick to the diet Nick gave her or die in the attempt. The only thing she really hadn’t done was exercise, but she had that under control, too. She’d run up and down the steps a few times for starters, and tomorrow after the Semolina brothers arrived, she’d go for a long walk and explore her twenty-five acres. If they could get the old stove t
o work until she got a new one, she might be able to cook.

  An adventure. Andy was going to have a fit, she thought as she started to run up and down the steps. She made it twice before she collapsed into the sleeping bag. She thought about the rats as she started to doze off, but flashlights she’d placed all over the floor might scare them off. Tomorrow she would set traps. Right now, her only concern was her health and the fact that she’d followed the doctor’s orders for three full days. She thought she felt better. Most likely it was wishful thinking on her part. She didn’t care about that, either.

  Ruby slept deeply and dreamlessly. She was wakened promptly at seven A.M. by a sharp rapping at the door. The Semolina brothers chose not to be formal so early in the morning. They opened the door, walked in, and introduced themselves. Ruby gaped at them. They were as old as Angus, maybe older. They doddered.

  “I’m Dick, and this is Mick, my brother. Tell us what you want done,” they said in unison.

  Ruby told them. They nodded until she got to the part about calling Sears, Roebuck for a new kitchen.

  “No need for that, missus. We can put a kitchen in here in two days’ time. One you won’t be ashamed of. We can have this pump primed in thirty minutes, and Dick here can jerry-rig some e-leck-tricity until the power company comes out. We can fire up them Franklin stoves if you bring in the wood.”

  “Okay,” Ruby said, flustered. “I want you to do the whole place. The roof first.” God, she hoped they lived that long. “For now I can get by with a kitchen and bedroom and bathroom that work. Is that . . . is that okay with you gentlemen?” Both men nodded. She wondered if they were twins. And she would have bet her last five dollars they were related somehow to Angus Webster.

  “We know this place like the back of our hand. We played here when we wuz youngsters with Angus. We’re cousins. We know what to do to make this old place livable. Didn’t think anyone would be fool enough to buy it. Gonna cost you a poke of money, missus.”

  “We should . . . we should discuss just how much it is going to cost,” Ruby said.

  “No need to worry, missus. We buy on tic from the lumber mill. We’ll give you all the receipts. We wouldn’t cheat a fine woman like yourself, even if you is fool enough to buy this place. It was grand in its day. Just grand.”

  “Let’s . . . let’s do one room at a time.”

  “We wuz going to suggest that, missus. First thing we’re going to do is fix the back steps so you don’t go breaking your legs. We have the lumber on the truck. You start fetching in that wood and we’ll have you cozy warm soon.”

  There was no need for further exercise for Ruby after she’d carried in her last armful of wood.

  The Semolina brothers ignored her when she said she was going to Port Jervis to order the things she needed for the house.

  It took most of the day to pick out furniture. She bought a kitchen set the proprietor of the store told her had been hand-crafted by the Semolina brothers and would last a lifetime. The table was round, with big claw feet that jutted from the center of the pedestal. The chairs were heavy and the back intricately carved. Ruby knew right then and there her dilapidated house was in good hands. She bought a gorgeous four-poster with a stool to climb into bed. The mattress was firm but comfortable, though it was so high that if she ever fell out of the bed, she’d break every bone in her body. She bought two double dressers and two rocking chairs, one for her bedroom and one for the kitchen. Her last purchases were a washer-dryer combination, a refrigerator, and a stove that worked on propane gas.

  Ruby was so pleased with her accomplishments, she headed straight for the nearest diner and ordered a broiled salmon steak, rice, broccoli, and a huge salad with lemon juice. Then she drove to a motel, where she rented a room, showered, changed her clothes, and headed back to the house.

  It wasn’t until she was driving across the field that thoughts about Dixie, Calvin, and her health began to pester her, but now she knew the secret to dealing with those thoughts: keep so busy that you don’t have time for them.

  The Blue project, as they called it, proposed a challenge to the Semolina brothers. They debated for all of fifteen minutes before finally deciding that they had to call in reserves if they didn’t want to go over their deadline. They allowed themselves only two weeks a year to work on renovations. The rest of the time, they built furniture. Elias, Eggert, and Eustace, the Semolinas’ cousins, were recruited to put in a roof, new windows, and a new floor on the front porch.

  Not to be outdone, the Semolina women, consisting of Hattie, Addie, Erline, and Delphine, brought basket lunches to their men, clucking in approval at their handiwork. When the picnic baskets were repacked, complete with red-and-white checkered napkins that were washed and ironed on a daily basis, they cleared the flower beds, raked the yard, and stacked firewood.

  While all the pounding and hammering was going on, Ruby whiled away her time with trips to Port Jervis, buying whatever struck her fancy. Each merchant was told the same thing: delivery in two weeks. Ruby thought it an impossible deadline, but the merchants didn’t seem to think so when she told them who was doing the work on the house. She could hardly wait for delivery day. This would be the first time she had full control of decorating a house that belonged solely to her. She didn’t have to consult anyone.

  The first weekend after the house was completed she would invite Andy for a look-see. Andy would be the final judge.

  The roof had been repaired, and she now had electricity and an electric pump as well as a generator in case the power went off, which Mick said happened real often. She had a telephone and answering machine hooked up in one of the empty rooms.

  Ruby had no idea how they did what they did. After one day she had a new roof, after another, a brand-new kitchen. It didn’t take a day to sand all the floors. The new windows went in so quickly, she was dazzled. Eggert said that when you knew what you were doing, things ran smoothly.

  The cousins, who admitted to being on the shady side of seventy, hung new chandeliers, bopping up and down the ladders like youngsters. Elias said they were sure-footed.

  Eustace, the only cousin with a wife, was the plumber of the group. With Hattie handing him his tools, he had all the drains working and the toilets flushable. They squabbled often and loudly, with Hattie calling her husband a horse’s ass more often than she called him darlin’. Eustace called her his buttercup, and it was easy to see who wore the pants in the family.

  Ruby wondered what would have happened if she’d said she didn’t like oak. The brothers and cousins probably would have departed en masse because they said oak was the only wood worth using, as it lasted a lifetime. Ruby wasn’t sure whose lifetime they were referring to.

  “Missus,” Mick said on the morning of the thirteenth day, “you won’t be able to stay in the house today. Today we varnish all the floors and lay the new floor in the kitchen. Tomorrow afternoon you can return. We want to be paid then.”

  “Of course,” Ruby said. “What time?”

  “Afternoon,” Mick said out of the corner of his mouth.

  “Need to talk about the barn and outbuildings,” Dick said. Ruby waited.

  “We can do it next year. It will take two weeks.” Ruby nodded again. “House is good as new.”

  “It’s beautiful,” Ruby said sincerely. “You do magnificent work.”

  “We know. Big house for just one lady.”

  “I’ve been thinking about a pet.”

  “Used to be square dancin’ in the big room years ago.” It was the first casual sentence Mick had volunteered. The big room was the living room, which ran the whole length of the house. Seven thousand square feet of living space. What was she going to do with this big old house after she furnished it, and who was going to clean it? She gave voice to the thought.

  “Tsk, tsk,” was the only answer she got.

  “I guess I might as well get my stuff together. I’ll be at the Holiday Inn if you need me.”

  “Why would we ne
ed you?” Dick asked.

  Ruby shrugged. “You never know,” she said lamely.

  “Four o’clock tomorrow,” Mick said.

  Ruby looked at Dick, or was it Mick? “You said afternoon, you didn’t say a time.”

  “I did now. Four o’clock.”

  “Okay.”

  When Ruby returned the following day, promptly at four, the Semolina brothers, their male and female cousins, and Angus Webster were waiting for her on her new front porch. She felt curious as to how much it was all going to cost. For days now she’d kept a running tab in her head. Somewhere she’d zeroed in on a hundred thousand dollars, probably when she’d seen the loads of lumber arrive, or maybe it was when all the new windows and sliders appeared. She also wondered if they made out receipts or if they worked like Angus Webster, on a handshake.

  She noticed something different about them today. They weren’t in their working clothes; even Hattie had a dress on. God, she dithered, it must be closer to one hundred fifty thousand dollars.

  Mick handed over three sets of keys to brand new locks. “Front, back, and side.”

  “Wood for the rest of the winter is piled up on the back porch and covered. ’Nuff wood upstairs to last a week or so for your bedroom,” Dick said.

  “Stoves all fired up. Got a real good blaze in the kitchen going for you,” Eustace muttered.

  “Brought you a picnic supper,” Hattie said. “A bowl of lemons, too.”

  “You want to look around, missus, before you pay us?” Mick asked.

  Ruby nodded. She fit the shiny brass key into the lock of the heavy oak door. She blinked, first at the shiny floors and then at the braided rug she was standing on.

  “I made the rug,” Addie said. “One by all the doors.”

  “Thank you. Thank you so very much.”

  For twenty minutes all she said was thank you—over and over again—as she trooped from one room to the other. She’d saved the kitchen till last.

  She was speechless, tears brimming in her eyes. She clapped her hands in delight. The bow window was beautiful, and one of the cousins, probably Erline, as she said she had a green thumb, had hung a monstrous, lush green fern in the center of the overhang. Bright green pillows lined the window seat.