by Terri Kraus
As he dumped the last dustpan full of dirt into the bag, he heard a soft knocking on the door. It was not Leslie, he was sure. Her knocks were solid and direct.
“Yes, can I help you?”
An elderly woman with large earrings stood there, peering inside, then eyeing him up and down.
“So you’re Jack Kenyon,” she said, making it both a pronouncement and an introduction. “I live on the other side of the building. Gladys. Just wanted to see what you did to the place. Leslie told me all about it.”
She leaned in farther than Jack thought possible, without falling forward.
“Come on in, Gladys,” Jack said, having no choice. “I’m sure Mrs. Ruskin would love to have you see the finished work—even if it’s not totally done.”
Mrs. Stickle shlupped inside, her rubber-soled cloth slippers making a grandmotherly, raspy noise on the bare floors.
“Beautiful, just beautiful,” she said as she walked into the kitchen. She touched the countertops and cabinets gently, like she didn’t want to disturb them, then carefully walked down the hall and peered into both bedrooms and the bathroom.
“Beautiful,” she said as she looked at Jack.
“The bathroom isn’t finished. Just waiting on the tub,” Jack said, feeling as if he had to explain.
“Well, you’ve done a great job,” Mrs. Stickle gushed. “I can see why Leslie really likes you and your work.”
Jack, surprised that Leslie would be talking about him to her tenant, didn’t know what to say.
“Well, I have a niece who’s looking for a place to rent—her and her husband—who I never liked, but he does have a good job with the county,” Mrs. Stickle said. “I’ll tell Leslie about them. I bet they’ll snap it up once they see it.”
She headed to the door. Jack started to follow her.
“Thanks, but I can let myself out. This place is just like ours—except nicer, and it’s the opposite sort of layout. Like a mirror image. Or is that a negative? Well, whatever.”
The door snapped shut, almost in midsentence.
Mrs. Stickle carefully made her way down the steps, holding onto the handrail. Walking was not a problem for either her or Mr. Stickle, but neither of them liked navigating stairs. Mr. Stickle had a great aunt, Aunt Thelma, on his mother’s side—the clumsy side of the family, Mrs. Stickle always said—who pitched herself down a steep set of stairs and broke both arms and a hip and was never the same after the accident. Mr. Stickle must have told that story a hundred times and often muttered, “Remember Aunt Thelma,” just as Mrs. Stickle was about to ascend or descend any set of stairs, anywhere.
She made it to the ground floor without mishap.
I can see why Leslie finds that man attractive. Jack is one wickedly handsome fellow, she thought as she made her way onto the sidewalk, then scolded herself for thinking impure thoughts about the contractor she’d just met.
Maybe we should have some work done on our place. She grinned broadly, amusing herself.
Even though Leslie never really talked about him in that way, I could tell from her eyes. A woman can’t hide when she’s interested. You can always see it in the eyes. Now I recognize why. He is a beautiful man.
Back in her own kitchen, Mrs. Stickle tried to decide between iced tea and gingersnaps or hot tea and gingersnaps.
She decided on iced tea this time.
I need something to cool me off.
She did not stop grinning until she had consumed an entire plate of the crisp little cookies, then chided herself for her gluttony—and her lustfulness.
I guess there are worse things.
“Well, you should call. The loan has been preapproved. The contractor can do all the work. We need to act—especially now that we know the zoning is okay with the city.”
Frank Adams sat behind his sleek desk, twirling his Mont Blanc pen, staring at the screen of his ultrathin laptop. His wife was sprawled in the black leather easy chair in the office, picking at the fringe of the Hermes scarf she’d purchased in that “absolute riot of a sale” in Paris on their trip.
They had gone to Europe with one suitcase each and came back with more than a dozen pieces, all jammed with indispensable items—all sample items that Alice was sure she could sell at more than twice their cost, providing they had a venue to sell them in.
Frank scrunched up his face. He had just lost at Solitaire for the third time in a row. Besides e-mails, accessing his favorite comic strips via the Internet, and occasionally writing a letter, Frank primarily used his multiple-thousand dollar, ultrafast, ultrathin, ultrachic Macintosh computer to play a simple card game.
“Alice, you have to make the call. She’s a woman. I think a woman will respond better to another woman.”
“And I think you should call. Men are better at getting what they want from a woman. Natural intimidation and all that.”
Frank exhaled loudly and clicked to start a new game. “Well, we’re more evolved than that, right? We don’t want to perpetuate old stereotypes, do we? We want to break free from the sexist, patriarchal molds of the past.”
Alice threw a wadded-up Post-it note at him. It bounced off the computer screen. “You just don’t like to make phone calls, do you?”
Frank sighed theatrically. “And then there’s that, too.”
Alice reached over and snatched the card with Leslie’s phone number scrawled on it. “Fine, fine. But now you owe me.”
Alice flipped open her new iPhone—the kind that took pictures, videos, played music, sent text messages, and accessed the Internet—or would have if she had ever read through the manual to find out how to do all those things. Basically, she only made phone calls with the ultrachic phone.
“Mrs. Ruskin,” Alice said, her voice louder than it might need to be, full of life, almost lilting, as it were, “how are you this morning?”
Frank played a red ten to a black jack.
“I mentioned to Mr. Lowell at the bank that I would be calling. We are quite interested in renting out the first floor of your building on North and Cedar.”
Frank tried to play a red nine to the red ten and the card bounced itself back into place with what Frank saw as an angry, condescending snap.
“Yes, yes, we saw the interior a week or so ago. Your nice contractor was kind enough to let us in. We know it will be just the perfect space for us.”
Frank appeared to be resigned to another loss as he flipped through the cards again.
“We checked with the city over zoning requirements and necessary permits and all that. We will have to file for a license, of course, but everyone told us that what we planned on doing with the space would be perfectly fine with the city. All we need to do now is to negotiate a lease.”
Alice sprawled to a more prone position, nodding as she listened.
“Yes, we’re planning to do what we did in Shadyside. Coffee, breakfast pastries, soups, sandwiches, salads, desserts, accessories and gifts, books—things that I find absolutely wonderful. No late-night hours. No horribly early morning hours. A sedate crowd that understands good taste. That’s our market.”
Alice listened and sat up. She grabbed for a pen and the yellow legal pad on the desk. She crawled out a number and added a lyrical dollar sign in front of it. She was smiling. Frank leaned over, read the number, and arched his eyebrows in surprise.
He mouthed the words: That’s cheap.
Alice scowled and wrote: Inexpensive!
“Sure, that would be fine. The nice fellow at the bank said he would be able to help you draft a lease. I am simply all thumbs when it comes to legal mumbo jumbo.”
Frank snorted as he started a new game. His losing streak now stood at seven.
“Yes, we do have a contractor in mind. We haven’t signed anything yet, but he is the most handsome contra
ctor in Butler—and most exclusive as well.”
Alice laughed into the phone, louder than Frank liked, but that was his Alice.
“Of course you know him, Mrs. Ruskin. He’s the gorgeous fellow who is doing the work on your vacant apartment.”
Frank turned when he heard the word gorgeous.
“Oh yes, he is attractive, isn’t he?”
Frank would have gotten upset, but he knew he was more attractive than any carpenter. And that was just how his Alice behaved.
“We will see you tomorrow morning at the bank. Ten a.m. would be just perfect.”
Alice pushed at several buttons until she found the one that made the phone go quiet.
“Good negotiating,” Frank said as he played a black queen to a red king.
“It takes skill,” Alice replied. “And the rent will be cheaper by half than what we paid in Pittsburgh.”
“You have to love Butler, don’t you,” Frank replied, snapping a jack to the open queen.
Jack was sitting alone in his apartment, the television humming quietly in the background. A pot of water was slowly coming to a boil on his small stove, a crinkled square of ramen noodles waiting on the counter. Normally, Jack did not return home for lunch, but today he had slept later than anticipated and had rushed out of the house without packing any food. Ramen noodles were not his first dining choice, but they were the least costly. There was a foot-high stack of the square noodle packages on Jack’s kitchen shelf.
His phone warbled.
“Kenyon Construction.”
Jack stared at the tiny bubbles in the water and delicately slipped the noodles into the pot, using a wooden spoon to stir.
“Of course I remember showing the space to you and your wife. Have you decided to rent it, then?”
Jack stirred the mix, not that it was necessary, but it felt more like actual cooking when he did.
“Alice and Frank’s? No, I don’t think I’ve heard of that place. But I haven’t been in Pittsburgh for a year or so. And I seldom made it to Shadyside.”
He tapped at the seasoning packet, balancing the phone between his shoulder and his ear. He wanted to make sure he used the entire packet. The noodles were bland enough without shortchanging on the seasoning.
“Sure. I could do that. Will you need a full commercial kitchen?”
He tapped out the seasoning into the pot and took it off the heat.
“What about display cases? I could do that—but I’m not really set up for fine cabinetmaking.”
He stirred the noodles.
“Okay. That I can do. When do you need an estimate?”
He kept stirring and reached for his one clean bowl.
“I can meet you there this afternoon. I’m still finishing up at Mrs. Ruskin’s vacant apartment.”
He took a soupspoon out of the canister that held all his silverware.
“Three o’clock would be fine. I’m looking forward to it.”
He took the bowl and spoon and sat on the sofa.
I should have gone for a real meal—this time to celebrate. It looks like I have another great job.
Leslie wondered how many more days she might be able to comfortably walk to Ava’s school. The air carried more of a chill now, or more like a sharpness to it, as if gently warning of the weather to come. But for now, with the sun out, and the wind slight, walking the few blocks was a pleasant interlude.
Caring for Ava, finding a job, making wisest use of her limited financial resources were a constant worry for Leslie. She knew there were services for working parents that picked children up at school and then took them to an after-school center. Leslie saw the vans every day, parked at the end of the block, waiting for their small customers. It might be necessary, Leslie thought, but it was also expensive. The increase in childcare costs would eat up much of whatever salary Leslie could hope to earn. And she hated the thought of Ava having to go from school to day care.
If only my parents were close.
They weren’t. A number of years earlier, her mother and stepfather had moved to North Carolina—to escape the cold, they said. Leslie never understood the reason. It might not get as cold in North Carolina as it did in Pennsylvania, but it still grew chilly and damp, a most miserable combination.
Leslie had talked with her mother about her predicament, and while her mother sympathized, she’d made it clear that Leslie could expect no financial help from them.
“Your stepfather isn’t made of money, you know. A postmaster doesn’t get a huge pension. You’ll have to handle this on your own. No one forced you to get divorced, Leslie.”
Leslie had grown weary of such conversations.
Maybe I can trade babysitting with another mother in class, Leslie thought. Even Mrs. Stickle said she would help out. Maybe for a day or two a week …
Leslie’s thoughts were interrupted when she stopped at the corner of North and Main Street. Regardless of what the crossing guard indicated with her stop sign, Leslie always stared hard up the steep hill that made up North Main.
One of these days there’s going to be a runaway truck. There will be.
Today was not that day.
Leslie waited at the corner of the playground at Ava’s school, where she always waited, her hands in her coat pockets. The playground had gotten a new coating of wood chips and Leslie sniffed the air, thinking that it now smelled like a pet store or a huge hamster cage, filled with cedar shavings.
She smiled at the thought.
Across the street, she saw Mike Reidmiller, waving enthusiastically.
He is a nice guy, she told herself. I should try my best to be pleasant.
She smiled as broadly as she could and waved back.
Mike Reidmiller almost jogged across the street. He didn’t appear to be the sort who jogged very often. Not that he was heavy, but he had more the physique of a football player—not one of those sleek players who catch passes but one of the fellows in the middle of things, who fall down on every play, buried underneath other players in a big jumbled pile of arms and legs.
“Leslie, how are you?” he said, not out of breath, but on his way to being a little winded.
“I’m doing very well, Mike,” she said. She would not have used his first name, but he had scolded her, or at least mock-scolded her, for using “mister” too often. She went on to tell him that the ground floor of the building would soon be rented, which was going to be a great relief.
“Well, that makes it perfect.”
“Makes what perfect?” she asked.
“A perfect opportunity to celebrate.”
Leslie wasn’t sure what he meant.
“I always take Trevor out for ice cream on Friday afternoons. You know, celebrate one more successful week of kindergarten. For Trevor, that’s a big accomplishment.”
Leslie wanted to say that Trevor was a much better student than his father gave him credit for, but didn’t. Ava said Trevor was so smart and nice, but sometimes got “squirrelly, like somebody poked him with a pin or something.” She knew Mike was concerned and let him have his concern without diminishing it.
“So, we’re going out for ice cream. At my cousin’s place. I told you about my cousin’s place, didn’t I? Cunningham’s? On Main Street?”
“You did.”
“And remember when you promised to think about going out for coffee with me? No time like the present, I always say. Well, I never say that, actually, but come and join us—you and Ava. We can walk there. What do you say? Okay? A good time to celebrate, right? Okay? Then you’ll be off the hook—coffee-wise, that is.”
Leslie wanted to say no. She didn’t want to start something that might not be right—not right just now, anyhow. Mike was a sweetheart—so pleasant. A nice man most women would really appreciate being
next to. A sweet, pleasant, nice man who would make a great …
“Sure. We can go with you. Ava would love it.”
Mike beamed, like a small puppy that has just been presented with a Milk-Bone dog biscuit.
Both Trevor and Ava screeched when Mr. Reidmiller told them the news, screeched like only small children can do—a mix of joy and happiness in a teeth-grinding squeal.
The four of them set out for Cunningham’s, only a few blocks south on Main Street. It would be a short walk home for Leslie and Ava afterward.
“Have you ever been here before?” Mike asked. The children had run ahead a half block, which allowed for adult conversation.
“No, I haven’t,” Leslie answered. “Isn’t that terrible? I love good coffee and it’s so close to home.”
“He does a good job. I stop here a lot. I think I would stop a lot even if my cousin didn’t own the place. Maybe if he didn’t, it wouldn’t be so good. But it is. So I am one of his most loyal customers, I guess.”
The north side of downtown appeared to be regentrifying at a faster pace than the blocks south of Jefferson Street. Two new restaurants had opened within the last few months, and another entire building was being renovated and turned into condominiums.
“I figure if he can hold on for a few more months, he should have all the customers he wants from the new residential building.”
They stopped for just a moment by the sign offering the condominiums for sale.
“Starts at $295,000? Isn’t that a lot of money for an apartment?” Leslie asked.
“It would be for me,” Mike answered. “But my cousin says the workers stop in at his place all the time. He says the new places are really big, and have granite everywhere, and marble, and all sorts of snazzy features. I guess you need to do that if you’re charging so much.”
Mike called out to Ava and Trevor, “You wait at the corner. Don’t you dare try to cross the street without us.”