Catharine Bramkamp - Real Estate Diva 02 - Time Is of the Essence

by Catharine Bramkamp

  Pat and Mike were dressed casually as well. They wore shorts, but their legs looked pretty decent, not as wrinkled as Grandma’s, did they take better care of themselves? Probably. I think Pat is the same age, but Mike looked younger by at least a decade. Maybe it was clean living and a solid relationship.

  Maybe they hadn’t lost the only man they’d ever loved.

  I glanced at Pat, maybe that wasn’t entirely right. He loved my grandfather very much. I never thought of that before.

  They all held martini glasses filled to the brim with pretty red liquid. Cosmopolitans. That explained the mix in her refrigerator.

  “I saw them on Sex in the City and they really do taste marvelous!” Peter exclaimed. “Let me make you one.” He moved to the grill. Prue had tossed a plastic flowered table cloth over the top creating an outdoor bar. Peter’s attitude was very Noel Coward. Pat and Mike looked like what they were – refugees from the Summer of Love. My grandmother? She defied categorization. She was the Mame-style hostess, she was the political gadfly. She was the saver of souls and comforter of the lost. And she did it all in comfortable shoes. That’s why I’m always welcome. I think she considers me part of her lost soul category.

  I sank into a webbed lawn chair and accepted my fate as an extra in the party scene.

  Raul appeared as if on cue. “This is wonderful light!” He exclaimed. He juggled his camera and aimed it at Peter.

  “Peter, you are elegant, the sophisticate, so retro. Now, look more so. That’s it, stand up straight, what are they teaching children these days?”

  “How to hack into computers?” Mike suggested.

  Raul glared at him.

  “Be elegant Peter, shake that cocktail as if it is important.” Raul gazed into the screen on his digital camera and ignored the rest of reality around him. “That’s excellent, move to the left a bit more. Good, oh Peter, you are so good!”

  “When you sell the footage,” Pat called out as Raul danced right, then left as he angled for the best shot of Peter’s cocktail shaking motion. “Don’t forget to send Peter his cut, yes?”

  “You are a Philistine,” Raul retorted.

  I closed my eyes for just a moment. In the distance a chain saw started up, or a gas powered weed whacker, or a lawn mower. In Claim Jump, there was always someone making some whining, destructive noise in the background. As a kid I figured the source of the sound always came from a chain saw, or two, but the trees never looked any sparser, so I suppose it was a weed whacker. Weeds are forever. And gas powered weed whackers seem to serve as the modern equivalent of manhood. Like a first weapon.

  You are a man, intones the village of men, here is your collection of gas powered tools. Go forth on Saturday afternoon and be known by the high whine of your power.

  Grandma hates them, she asked her gardener years ago to just rake the leaves and debris and pile it all quietly onto the compost heap in the back of the garage.

  She pays him extra for his time.

  Raul scowled. “That is enough Peter. We will have to do this again when there is not so much distraction.”

  The detractors merely smiled at Raul and he disappeared back into the guest house in a huff.

  “I don’t understand how anyone could misplace the business license fees.” Grandma picked up the conversation.

  I didn’t even feel compelled to pay attention. Whenever Grandma and Pat and Mike got together, they inevitably turned to the subject of Claim Jump city politics. This afternoon was no exception. A long time ago, Grandpa use to be the front man, the four would argue into the night and then send Grandpa, the man with the biggest, loudest voice and the biggest, unmistakable body, and he’d present the views of the group to the City Council. After he was gone, I don’t think Grandma indulged in politics as much. Apparently she had recovered some.

  “They can if the fees are never collected in the first place,” Pat brandished his glass, slopping precious vodka over his hand.

  Pat and Mike are life long friends. I think of them as a set. Pat and Mike have been together for as long as I’ve known them, and I’ve known them as long as I’ve known my own grandparents.

  “Our people reported that no one ever came by,” Mike contributed.

  “Not in years,” Pat confirmed.

  Pat is tall and lanky and Mike just a little less so, so they appear very similar. As they’ve aged, they look more and more similar, something that I understand happens to old married couples in the mid-west. I’ve also read that people end up resembling their dogs, so I’m not that sold on the look-like-your-most-loved concept.

  “They send letters from the City.” Grandma said, she wrinkled her already wrinkled face and considered the situation.

  My mother, for instance, looks nothing like my grandfather and my grandmother has that deceptively sweet, little old lady look when in fact, she’s pretty tough and strong. My grandfather in contrast was a huge man. He sported an enormous belly and a deep booming voice. He could yell for me from the garage (with all the doors closed) and I’d hear him perfectly well in my room (with all the windows closed). My grandfather had that marvelous ability to pull everyone within a ten foot orbit into the vortex of his personality, and most were willing to take the plunge. He is a legend.

  “You can send letters, but no one will pay unless there’s a real visit from a real city official, it’s been that way since the Gold Rush and no one knows any differently.” Mike downed the rest of his cocktail and held out the empty glass to Peter who scooped it up.

  “We could even do it electronically.” Pat suggested.

  Grandma snorted, “That will never happen.” Grandma wears what ever she left on the floor the night before. She is a staunch advocate for comfortable shoes – Birkenstock, Teva, Crocs, whatever is comfortable and yes, as unattractive as possible and still merits the manufacturing cost.

  This is where I rebel. Yes comfort has its place, but not when it involves shoes. But I do go native to a certain degree, for instance, I was wearing a dirty tee shirt and faded shorts during the Noel Coward Cocktail hour, so I’ve managed to loosen up a bit.

  “Then we’re back to not collecting in the first place, and if someone did collect, they must have done something with the money.”

  “You do have to put it somewhere.” Grandma mused.

  Pat and Mike are landlords like Grandma. They own a half a dozen buildings downtown, what Grandpa didn’t buy, Pat did. And now, I believe, Pat helps Grandma manage her buildings as well as his. Good for them, I despise the whole rental situation. In California, tenants have a huge book of specific rights – owners have nothing except the honor of creating a perfect environment for the tenants in question and lengthy time lines in which to ask for the rent, beg for the rent, call about the rent, make compromises about the rent and drive three hours up to Lake County to pick up the rent. I hear too much about it at the office.

  I like to list property, sell the property and get out, maybe send the buyers a card at Christmas. But usually I don’t send the buyers anything. I like sellers better. Buyers are just a pain in the ass. Like Lisa and Timothy Brown. Oh, did I say that out loud?

  I glanced at my phone. Should I call? No, it was after 5:00 PM. Where did my afternoon go?

  The conversation had diverted from the missing fee monies, if they ever existed, to altering the boarders of the city limits, which would divert resources from down town to all the Lucky Master developments above Grandma on Red Dog Road.

  “In this town,” Pat commented laconically. “It’s a zero sum game.”

  “Pat came with your grandfather.” Grandma had explained - when I was old enough to understand. “It was a package deal and I took it.”

  Pat was with Grandpa at the end. He was sitting in grandpa’s room when I arrived from a long, stressful drive from the Bay Area, arriving at the last minute as it turned out.

  “Have you been here long?” I remember asking him. I don’t remember much about the last hours with my grandfather, b
ut I do remember how diminished my grandfather’s shape under the bed spread looked, as if he was deflating. And I remember Pat’s haunted expression, his sunken eyes.

  “Three weeks,” Pat said. Grandpa made Pat promise to care for Grandma, something, Pat assured me, Grandpa didn’t have to insist on.

  “I will always take care of her,” Pat assured me at the funeral. “You grandfather loved your grandmother more than life itself. I’ve never seen a love like that.” Pat looked at me as seriously as he had ever looked. “Something like that is worth preserving. Worth fighting for.”

  To this day, I’ve never understood what he meant.

  Mike watched Peter as Peter mixed, shook and poured more martinis for everyone. Pat wasn’t as entranced, he was engaged in conversation with Grandma.

  “Was George Schmidt still on the council when you were collecting the fees?”

  “Yes, I was doing him a favor. We were short an assistant city manager back then, I think.”

  “We saw him a couple of times in the City.” Mike observed.

  “That’s right, he was down there once for Gay Pride week.” Pat put in. He accepted his martini from Peter with a bow. Peter bowed back and fetched another cocktail for me.

  “What was he doing in the City?” Prue demanded.

  The older men exchanged glances and shrugged.

  “Getting votes?” Pat suggested. He pushed up his wire frame glasses and solemnly blinked at Grandma.

  I sipped my cosmopolitan. It was very strong. “Excellent, thank you Peter.”

  Peter nodded and moved next to Mike. The both simultaneously crossed their legs and sipped at the edges of their martini glasses.

  “Votes. You don’t go to Gay Pride in San Francisco to get votes in Claim Jump.” Grandma said scornfully.

  “Doesn’t matter, we don’t see him down there anymore.” Pat said.

  “Nope,” Mike agreed. “What happened to him anyway? Is he still on the council?”

  “I’m not sure, I’d have to look it up.” Grandma mused. “Funny, I didn’t even bother with the last election. Did I vote?”

  “You always vote,” Mike assured her. “We drove you down to the polls.”

  “I didn’t walk?” Grandma said, surprised.

  “It was raining.”

  “Oh.”

  I was tired of the conversation already. I tossed back the martini, grinned at Peter, he was kind of charming in a flighty way, and headed up to shower and change. I always shower after an afternoon at the river. Because I’m dirty of course, but also, cold water and lots of soap is the best way to rinse off the oil from poison oak.

  Merging from Prue’s driveway into traffic was like participating in a game of Double Dutch jump rope. Two jump ropes cross and re-cross and you have to wait, wait, wait for an opening, no, that wasn’t good, no, that wasn’t big enough, no, the rope is moving too fast, finally you have to bite your lip and jump into the fray. And hope you don’t trip. Or crash into someone.

  I waited for fifteen minutes for the traffic to spread out enough so I could wedge the car into the long tail of cars traveling up to the first phase of Lucky Master’s masterpiece.

  Just past the turn on March Ave, when the road changes names and become Red Dog Road, there is forest. Thick pine trees as far as I could see to the right and left of the road. It’s not as dense as it used to be, but thick enough for a city girl. For the longest time it was owned by the Fantle family. I don’t remember what happened to them, I suppose I could ask Grandma, but they were the family who sold to Lucky Masters a while back. God, I was fuzzy, was it the martini? Anyway the steep land lay fallow for too long, ripe for building and improvements a la Masters. And I suppose it made sense to finish the building between the high land development and the city limits, but it would be so much more traffic, so many more people. But an irrefutable solution. Lucky was clever. I have to admire clever. But I did not admire Lucky’s first efforts, which began to materialize as I climbed up the hill.

  There is no shoulder along Red Dog Road, or even March Avenue. The edge of the road simply stops, hovering a few inches over the red dirt that has dips and gullies and no place to park or put a vehicle anywhere to the side of the road. When it rains, the gullies fill and threaten to overflow onto the road, but Prue pointed out that often it freezes just before that happens so it’s okay.

  I kept my place in the line of cars, twenty miles per hour, past the occasional dirt road jamming into the main road at an odd angle, or a real paved road with a mailbox and newspaper tube marking the top of an official driveway. Many drives were layers of loose rock. The rocks were banked up against the road for a smoother transition, easy to keep in line now, but as soon as winter comes, the bank of rocks will wash away and it will take the efforts of the whole family hoist the family SUV from the drive to the main road. Many people bought four wheel drive SUVs or trucks, just to get from garage to street.

  I hit a pothole that almost wrenched my hands from the steering wheel. The cars ahead and behind me did not peel off at these jury-rigged driveways, the cars were headed further up.

  I glanced at my phone, call Ben? I picked up my phone – two bars and fading.

  After just another mile, I entered Lucky Master’s first development. Houses lined the road, all distressingly similar. Most homes were fairly simple, built in the non-descript style that is hallmark of the architecturally barren seventies. The Brady Bunch moves to the forest kind of look.

  I kept driving, moving with the long tail of traffic. I braked, and moved forward. No one brakes driving up hill, but I did. Traffic thinned as cars peeled off for driveways paved and unpaved. I traveled up another mile or so before the houses became sparser again and I spotted the mail box with three balloons limply dangling from a grimy string.

  Up ahead was the end of Red Dog Road. The top of the world.

  A road used to connect Red Dog Road and Miner’s way, in the summer months when everything had dried out, Grandpa would drive me all the way up Red Dog and over a rutted dirt road, narrow and uninviting, and thus, exciting, and we’d eventually emerge, the car dirty from the dust, onto Miner’s Ridge, and then we’d drive all the way back down. It was an adventure all contained in the general area of one town. It was like magic.

  I glanced at the clock on the dash. I had some time. I took note of the balloons, because you never know, there could be another home with limp balloons at the front entrance and I could become confused and end up at the wrong party. And I probably wouldn’t even be able to tell.

  I drove all the way to the ridge connection, Johnson Pass. The pass was now just dirt and overgrown with black berries. Grandpa was never overly fastidious about his vehicles, but I was. I nudged my car to the end of the pavement (in Claim Jump there are many places where the sidewalk ends). Further down the road I saw the tangle of Manzanita bushes, small pine beginning to grow. Completely blocked.

  I left the engine on and just looked at the pass. Considering how many cars back up on Marsh Ave. I found it odd that some hardy soul hadn’t punched through all this to exit down the other side of the mountain to make better time to their job in Sacramento.

  I turned around on the packed dirt and headed back to the limp balloon party.

  Jimmy’s house had no number and except for the balloons, the narrow road wasn’t marked.

  My car just fit down the lane, which wasn’t even wide enough to qualify as a driveway. I’d list it as “scenic drive to home.” I winced as bushes and pine limbs shrieked against my paint job. I passed another narrow opening, a driveway of sorts, but again not official, probably not legally built. I pulled into an open space before the house, indifferently covered in patches of asphalt. From the appearance of the other cars, mine was the only car worthy of paint job angst. A collection of vehicles, some covered in just primer, some sporting impressive rust stains, littered the parking area. None looked freeway-ready. But all were probably driven fiercely, with great speed and daring.

  I b
alanced on a porch jury rigged with stacked cement blocks and two by fours, and knocked on the unpainted door.

  “Welcome!” Jimmy said before opening the door. His face fell a bit in disappointment when he saw it was me. But to his credit, he recovered.

  “Allison, you made it.”

  “I followed the balloons,” I explained.

  “Oh, yeah, well good! Let me get you a drink. Know anyone here?” He gestured to the area behind him that served as living room/dinning/video game battle ground.

  I scanned the room, the walls were plywood, the blue manufacturing marks still vivid. Five middle-aged men were crammed on a single green sagging couch. Two held controllers the other three gave deep, well thought out advice.

  “Oh fuck, you miss that, that’s an easy one.”

  “Don’t fucking tell me what to do.”

  “It’s my game.”

  “It’s my shit.”

  Lovely. We hadn’t even updated the insults and slang. I didn’t even pause at the couch. Jimmy returned and handed me a plastic cup filled with red liquid that I assumed was wine.

  “Hello Allison.” I think it was Pamela who greeted me. She had cleaned up since this afternoon and wore a newer pair of cut off jeans, the long threads hung down her slender legs like fringe.

  “Hello Pamela,” I said.

  She smiled, pleased I remembered her name. Those tattoos are helpful, maybe we could get our names tattooed on our hands or arms to avoid perpetual confusion at cocktail parties.

  “Hi again.” Cindy of the Celtic knot tattoo walked up and joined Pamela as if to support her against me. I nodded, took a sip of wine and flinched. I looked around for a table on which to abandon the cup. But there were no tables. A coffee table, scarred with watermarks, served as the food table. It was littered with bowls of ruffle chips, onion dip, neon green guacamole, and the feet of at least three of the five video game players.

  Tiffany, with her blue nail polish, sauntered over and filled a chip with the green stuff.

  “Hi again, did you have a nice rest?” She talked over the men as if they weren’t there, and they craned to see around her, because she stood in the way. She said the word rest like I was an ancient adult and she was the young carefree girl who never needed to sleep.