Some Rough Edge Smoothin'

by Louisa Trent

  “Lady,” he scoffed, his thumb hooked lazily in his belt loop, “Anderson's a bandito in Amandi threads. He took you for a ride to the tune of a coupla grand, and never looked back.”

  “W-what do you mean?”

  “Got a lease on this dump, lady?”

  “Why-why no. But we shook hands-”

  Tomas Ruiz winced, his body actually flinching. “Never, but never, not in this litigious world, does a handshake substitute for a signature.”

  Litigious?

  Big word for a disconnected brainstem.

  She sniffed. To be fair, though, he was making a good point. A very good point-

  Must have been a freak accident, a once in a lifetime stroke of luck.

  Ten seconds later, she was mentally whacking her forehead. Tomas Ruiz was right! What a complete idiot she was!

  “Mr. Anderson seemed like such a nice man too-”

  “Lady, beware of nice men.” Tomas Ruiz's dark eyes laughed. “Beware of not so nice men too.” Like quicksilver, those same laughing eyes instantly sobered. “You've got ‘til the end of the month to vacate this dump.”

  “But that's not-”

  “Fair? Just keepin’ it real, lady. Two days is longer than I legally have to give you.”

  “Stop finishing my sentences for me, Mr. Ruiz,” she snapped, incensed by this mercurial, street-wise young man. Incensed even more by her extreme reaction to him. Why, she was old enough to be his...

  Something. Not his mother, certainly. That was far too old. But another mature female relative.

  She assumed an older, sisterly tone. “And, Mr. Ruiz, if you call me ‘lady’ just once more, I'm very much afraid I'll feel compelled to disprove your assumption.”

  Here, with an action that had over-compensation written all over it, her finger actually waggled. “Furthermore, in the future, I would appreciate it if you would refrain from referring to my home as a ‘dump'. This mansion is lovely and historical, and it has more potential in its foundation than those ugly mausoleums you're putting up all over town.”

  His brown eyes heated as they rested on her in a look that was both assessing and complimentary. “Well, well, well. The pretty music teacher has got some kind of fiery temper. Have a care, ruca, you might just burn me up.”

  He then gazed at her soulfully, shining on her the kind of roguish male smile that almost had her believing that she merited his ‘Big Seduction’ routine.

  She would not be taken in by his shenanigans. Oh no, not her! Though, she had to hand it to him, he was darn good at what he did.

  This outrageous young man was only flirting with her because he wanted something from her. And that something was for her to leave the Monroe house. Quietly. For if his callous and high-handed treatment was leaked to the press it would create the kind of public relations nightmare that no amount of spin doctoring could fix.

  Ah, yes. She could see the headlines in the local paper now... ‘Brash Boy Builder Evicts Penniless, Practically Middle-aged Widow From Her Home'...

  What a nice little human-interest piece the story would make. Her sad plight might even warrant a continuing series. She was not above using her missionary background to wrench a little sympathy from the readership, and hard luck stories sold papers. Everyone knew that! By the time she got through with him, Tomas Ruiz would be the scourge of Fenton.

  Which is what he deserved. After all, her motives were pure and his motives were pure evil.

  “Naturally,” he said, “as a gesture of Ruiz Construction goodwill, I'll be happy to return your full rental and security deposit upon your vacating the premises.”

  “You know what you can do with your gesture of goodwill.” Her wagging finger jabbed his brick-house hard chest. “You won't get rid of me that easily, Mr. Ruiz.”

  “Like this is easy. I've had easy, and you ain't it.”

  Her poking finger was captured, gently imprisoned between two callused palms.

  “Just because you look like an angel don't mean I'm gonna stand by and let myself get clobbered by your wing spread. Now, quit thumping me, girl,” he said, returning her finger. “New home construction starts in three weeks. And if you're thinking about fighting the eviction notice, give up on it. That notice will stand up in any court of law. I can have a constable remove all your stuff at the end of the month and put it out front.”

  He backed out her door. “I'd rather keep things friendly, but if you wanna rock ‘n roll with me, we can do that too. Just let me know. You've got my number.”

  Did she ever!

  “I don't do rock ‘n roll, Mr. Ruiz. I do classical,” she said self-righteously, and slammed the door in her landlord's filthy face.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Since his company's pickup was parked at the end of the pitted drive, Tomas was forced to retrace his steps along the mansion's winding back walkway, something he didn't relish doing. When he first arrived at the Monroe place, he'd tried using the more accessible front door, but a raggedy sign at the end of a frayed wire informed him that the bell was out of service-

  Like he couldn't have figured that out all on his own.

  The same message was tacked at the back door, which is why he'd done the knuckle rap and how come he ended up getting his face ammonia-sized for the effort.

  Shuddering at the mile-high weeds that passed as landscaping, shaking his head at the peeling paint, cringing at a roof that wouldn't make it through another snowy winter, Tomas made his way back to his truck, head down, eyes searching the grass.

  La cagada! Shit! He hated bugs. All bugs. Must've been left over from his childhood or something. He guessed he'd just spent one too many nights sleeping in insect-infested rooms. Welfare roach motels. Shelters. Cardboard boxes. Even now, anything that crawled, flew, or had more than two feet gave him the shakes.

  He was at the side of the house, closing in on the bug-free environment of his truck, when a summer breeze blew up from out of nowhere and carried a song to his ears. The melody was so damned...moving, he guessed was the word, that forgetting about the bugs waiting to jump out at him from the weeds, Tomas turned his back around.

  Surer than shooting pool with the boys on Saturday night, there was Seraphina Norris, gone back to washing the damn windows. The lady looked like an angel reflected there behind the glass. And not only did she look like an angel, she had a celestial voice to match.

  But her hands! Man, he'd noticed those dishwater-chapped fingers right away. The knuckles were all reddened and swollen, real sore-looking. And that just made her window washing all the more pathetic-

  And explained why he couldn't laugh his ass off over her useless housekeeping.

  The do-gooder just didn't get it! In this neighborhood, a shiny window was a gold-plated invitation for a re-glazing job. Those windows were gonna get busted, and all her shining and polishing wouldn't matter shit then.

  Pan dulce! Tomas thought.

  “Yum,” he said aloud. The lady was some pretty. In a delicate sort of way.

  Her tits were small, and with that killer bra she was wearing, it was hard to tell their shape. Luckily, as a strip club owner, he knew his way around tits, and so he knew her breasts were shaped real fine. A shame she didn't pitch the cast iron brassiere, and play up her perkiness.

  Fact was, she wasn't playing up any of her dainty attributes. If anything, the lady was doing everything she could to hide her delicate shape under a loose fitting shirt and boxy-straight skirt. Even her hair, a warm golden brown, was downplayed. It was real thick and wavy. Long too. Down to her sweet ass was his bet. He had to guess about that because she had her hair all pulled back, scraped tight against her skull, and rolled into an old maid's bun behind her head.

  And speaking of sweet asses-the lady was delicately built, but for all that, woooweee, she had some fine junk in the trunk. Fuck, that woman was ripe for some good Latino lovin'. Her rosy flush and dilated eyes and rapidly beating pulse, the one he'd had his thumb on to see if she was about to faint, to
ld him so.

  He'd like to get her to let her hair down and in more way than one. He'd like to get her naked, so he could see if those tits were as cute as he thought they were. He'd like to get it on with her, get it into her-

  Getting into Seraphina Norris was one place he wasn't going. She might look like an angel, she might sing like an angel, but her rose-colored view of the world was damned dangerous. The only thing he was up for with Seraphina Norris was getting her out of his damned business.

  Maybe where Seraphina Norris came from everyone had clean windows. Not on the Southside. In this neighborhood, most folks were too busy scrambling to get by to worry about niceties like clean windows. That's what the pretty do-gooder lady with the angel voice and the sinful body would have to learn, and it looked to him like she'd have to learn it the hard way.

  Not his problem. Tomas decided, climbing back into the truck and gunning it. He planned on steering clear of Seraphina Norris of the pretty tits and passion-scented pussy. Hers weren't the only cute tits in the world. Her cunt wasn't the only cunt on the Southside with that subtle come-hither fragrance.

  One mile later, arousal over a pretty woman turned to disgust over an ugly neighborhood.

  Didn't matter shit how often he drove down the familiar streets, the conditions always got to him: the rusted and neglected trailers, the shabby little bungalows, the littered playground where broken beer bottle glass made it impossible for kids to play B-ball. The sound and sight and stink of poverty alternately filled him with despair and rage.

  Nothing had changed on the Southside since he was a kid. Then, as now, there wasn't much for kids to do in the summer down here, except dodge trouble and play keep away from the cops. You might even say, the only summertime recreation was running ... from blue flashing lights, screeching sirens, and the sad wail of EMT's arriving on the scene to clean up after yet another mother's heartbreak.

  It always seemed hotter down by the river too. And dirtier. It sure as hell smelled worse. And it shouldn't have. The waterfront should've been beautiful. But the river was so polluted, families no longer use it any more for recreation. No swimming, no boating, no fishing, not in years. When he was a kid, some big shot politician got the great idea of building a community swimming pool. It was during an election year, and he'd run on a ‘Save Our Youth’ platform. So the pool was built and swimming lessons were promised.

  What a joke! The pool was filled that first year, and that was the last time. The sub-contractor poured the poorest grade cement, and the interior walls cracked, then caved. That was just how things went on the Southside. Empty promises with no follow-through.

  Bone crushing weariness crept over Tomas. Some days, he just wanted to throw in the towel. The tendency to quit was one of the lingering aftereffects of growing up on the Southside. That, and the feeling that you just weren't good enough, that you would never be good enough, that you had no right to your dreams. It was a mindset he fought every single fuckin’ day.

  The Southside was a place that burned up dreams. And he should know; as a kid, he'd come real close to setting his own future on fire.

  Plagued by bad memories, Tomas put as many miles as he could between himself and the run-down house he now owned and couldn't wait to demolish, and from a woman who wouldn't take no for an answer.

  She'd just have to accept the eviction, because he had big plans and he wasn't about to let Seraphina Norris mess things up for him.

  Thanks to the steady in-flux of newcomers moving into town on the coattails of ‘Fenton's resurgence of economic prosperity’ Ruiz Construction was booming. The new Interstate made commuting to big jobs in the big city a sixty-minute snap. As a result, four-bedroom, three-car-attached-garage, colonials were springing up everywhere for all those briefcase-toting, keyboard thumping, stressed-out business executive types.

  Tomas Ruiz, the welfare kid who grew up the hard way, the punk who got his education from the school of hard knocks, was designing those trophy houses, all built on large tracts of land considered unsalvageable. Like the old Monroe homestead.

  With its hilltop location that overlooked the water, the fourteen acres should've been prime real estate. And it was...to the dopers.

  When vagrants busted up the windows and doors, then started setting fires, the town had stepped in and had the house boarded up. That's when the dealers set up shop. Now druggies made their connections in those once stately rooms. Yep, the mansion was a regular drive-thru pharmaceutical factory.

  About a year or so ago, the town put the estate up for bid-the place was a public embarrassment, a symbol of everything that had gone wrong on the riverfront, and the Fenton town fathers wanted their hands washed nice and clean by the next election. Anderson purchased the house and land for the price of the back taxes-way too rich for Tomas Ruiz's blood-and then proceeded to wait for the local law enforcement to get rid of the dope show.

  It never happened.

  The mansion went back on the block again.

  Lots of looking, nada offers. Seems like no one wanted to hassle the dealers. But, hey, one man's headache is another man's golden opportunity. When the time came for Anderson to unload the property, Tomas Ruiz was right there, ready to do the dude a favor. For next to nothing, all fourteen acres were his.

  Ain't no rich CEO gonna buy an upscale house in a downscale neighborhood, so Tomas Ruiz was getting down and dirty with the dealers. Henceforth, he was on the dealers’ asses like chiqule. That went for the pimps and all the rest of the assorted outlaws too. He was sticking to them like bubble gum. He was up for hassling anyone who got in his way, and that included the do-gooder music teacher.

  Tomas parked his truck under one of the few working streetlights on the river and walked alone into the dark night.

  No one knew better than he that the riverfront was dangerous geography, which is why he was taking no chances; he stuck to the designated trail and went straight to the meeting spot. Leaning a hip against a stripped and torched car, he waited.

  When the group approached, about a half-dozen vatos wearing gang colors and head bandanas, and surrounded him, Tomas folded his arms over his chest in a deliberately relaxed pose.

  “Yo, man,” Enrico Cortez began. “You hauntin’ the old ‘hood tonight for a reason, Ruiz?”

  “I never left the barrio and you fuckin’ well know it. Do not dick with me, ‘Rico!” Tomas exploded.

  Chale', man! Be cool. Be cool. I know you got big chones, no need to prove it. Just say what's on your mind.”

  Tomas got right to the point. “I need a favor, ‘Rico. You think the R.P's can help me out?”

  “Holla up,” he replied. “You know me and my boys will be there for you.”

  * * * *

  Seraphina washed and shined the rest of the intact windows until they were sparkling clean. That done, and feeling more energized than she had felt in a very long time, she went back inside the house, picked up the cell phone, and dialed the number she had left on a piece of paper beside her purse.

  “Hello Dean Slater, this is Seraphina Norris, director of the Southside Conservatory of Music. We spoke earlier about your fine music department at the University. Well, I'm calling today because I'd like to set up some interview appointments with your graduating seniors to discuss September teaching opportunities at my school. I'm amenable to all music majors, regardless of their instruments.”

  She surveyed the home of her new school: The crumbling, plaster walls. The destroyed section of oak flooring vagrants had ripped up for firewood. The buckled ceiling caused by a leak in the roof. The trash and debris and broken beer bottles collecting in the dirt where there was once front lawn. Letting her imagination soar, the blight disappeared, and in its place, she saw possibilities.

  Telling herself that if the dream is your heart, it isn't a lie, she spoke once more into the phone. “As you probably know, Dean Slater, the Southside Conservatory of Music is housed in a lovely old shipbuilder's mansion, set high atop a rolling hill tha
t overlooks the scenic river park area of Fenton. The setting is absolutely breathtaking!”

  Seraphina squeezed her eyes shut, better to see the big picture.

  If the dream is in your heart, it isn't a lie...

  “The manicured grounds and perennial gardens are picturesque, and lovingly maintained,” she continued, seeing the image so clearly in her mind's eye that she could easily have given Dean Slater the names of the flowers, should he ask. “I don't know if you're aware of this or not, but I'm having the entire house remodeled. As we speak, an architect is readying his plans. “What's that, Dean Slater? Oh, yes. The mansion will be restored to its former elegance by the opening of school. I personally guarantee it. I also guarantee that the new teachers who are fortunate enough to work here will love the peaceful environment of the neighborhood. The town of Fenton is undergoing an economic resurgence, you know. It's a dream come true, really. Now I'll let you get out your appointment calendar and we can start talking scheduling...

  “For tomorrow. Yes. There's no point delaying. I want my teachers on staff immediately.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  En route to the trailer's metal door, Tomas took one whiff of the cloying cloud of air-freshener hovering around his office manager's front desk and stopped dead in his tracks.

  “Myra, what I tell you about smoking in here?”

  “I forget,” his sweetheart replied, reaching for her candy dish while doing a slow Titanic sink in her orthopedic chair. “You know how absent-minded I get at times.” A mint was hastily popped in her mouth; she started chewing real fast.

  Convenient memory lapses. Selective hearing. Office procedures that were pretty much non-existent. That stuff he could live with. But smoking? Un-un. Cigs were poison sticks. They had to go.