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Hmm.
Heidi tilted her head and restarted her scan of Carine’s daytime variant form.
Either she had gotten a haircut recently, or something about her styling routine that morning had lifted a shorter layer into prominence. It wasn’t sticking straight up, but one idle tousle would tease the roots closer to vertical.
Annoyed by the erroneous—toher—placement, Heidi tucked the swath inside the surrounding waves and nudged the rest of the hair out of Carine’s face. “There. That’s better.”
Carine looked straight up as though she could see the top of her head and then rolled her eyes. “Lord, I meant to pin that.”
“So, I take it you didn’t experiment with a new style this morning.”
“No, the same old one. That piece of hair and its mate on the other side of the part have a different texture than the rest of my head. More brittle. I knew I should have gone easier with the flat iron, but I figured one more swipe couldn’t hurt. Then that turned into an extra swipe every morning, and the patch of hair finally broke today. Trimmed off the worst of it, but there’s no easy way to blend that in.”
“Well, it’s only an inch wide. The disaster could have been far worse.”
That inch-wide ribbon of hair would be a nightmare for as long as it took to grow out. Already, the broken layer was untucking from the intact wardens on either side.
Out-of-place things frustrated Heidi’s hardwired requirement of orderliness.
She flat-twisted the hair down and wove the ends into healthier strands until she was satisfied nothing would budge. She pulled hair from the other side of the part to cover the plait, pleased that Carine’s hair was heavy enough to stay put.
“Adds a little volume there you didn’t need, but at least you won’t fuss with it all day.”
Carine snorted and crossed the room to the no-frills door beside the credenza. She opened it and turned on the light, revealing a bright powder room.
Probably, she peered into the mirror, but Heidi was more concerned with the layout and features.
She hadn’t been on the prowl for a property. Still, curiosity was getting the best of her, and she wanted to see what people were buying.
Because the powder room was technically part of the Shora office, the room hadn’t been decorated beyond the insertion of a wicker storage unit that held guest towels, spare soap and toilet paper, and a variety of menstrual products. The walls were one tone warmer than contractor white—just enough of a tint for the bright baseboards to pop. The sink was deep and wide, ensuring less splashing onto the ceramic tile floor while washing hands or dog paws. The fixtures were brushed nickel. There was enough light in the small space, both from the skylight and the LED bulbs, that Heidi could tell with unwanted clarity which of her hairs were blond and which were silver.
Ugh. I prefer the mystery.
“I think that’ll work.” Carine turned to her and fluffed the side of her hair. “Oh. What’s wrong? You don’t like the skylight? Most folks seem to like it more than having a window in here. You can even open it. That’s what that third switch is for.”
“Actually, I was thinking that a bathroom skylight would be a feature that sets this space apart from other available properties in the price range. Everything else is cosmetic, but that…” Heidi shook her head and pointed to the glass, hating that she was even pondering such expensive possibilities. “That might make someone want to see what else compels about a Shora house.”
“Ooh! Let me show you. I have a whole speech memorized. After all, that’s what I do all day, right?”
Then Heidi found herself being pulled by the elbow through the office, around the highly polished staircase, and into the great room.
“Before I get started, remember that this wasn’t one of Valerie’s designs. This was a copy-and-paste from a different Lipton community. Valerie made some commonsense tweaks here and there, but the personality of this house isn’t going to be anything like the semi- and fully-customs.”
“Duly noted,” Heidi said, but Carine was already pointing to an item of apparent interest and likely wasn’t listening. Heidi had never seen Carine so enthusiastic.
“Now, this room spans from the front to the back of the house. Lipton surveyed a thousand people of home-buying age. They asked what people wanted to see most when they stepped through the front door. Guess what the surveyed folks said.”
“Living room?”
“Actually, yes, but in the catch-all field at the end of the survey, about half said they would have answered ‘nothing’ if they’d had the chance to. They want to open their front door and see nothing of particular interest.”
“Huh.” Resolving the picture in her imagination, Heidi gave a slow nod. Because she’d once had a small child, she knew exactly what they were getting at. People wanted to be able to hide the messiness of living from the main entrance.
That wasn’t what was represented in the model home, so Heidi suspected Carine had a point coming.
“Valerie actually designed some homes with those ‘Nothing’ barriers at the front,” Carine said. “There’s one townhouse in that row across the street and one traditional-style home. They were both on the market for less than three days. The grout hadn’t even had a chance to dry in the bathrooms before folks started offering to write checks. I’m getting off-script here, but I just wanted to make that point. Anyhow, this den-to-dining room has a—”
“I want to see one.”
