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We’re both looking at the pile of scrambled eggs in front of us before I turn to look up at him, noticing his dark lashes fanning over the most beautiful blue eyes I have ever seen. “What about now? If you were my 1950’s husband and this is what you came home to for dinner, I bet you’d think differently about me.”
He cocks his head, a glimmer of teasing in his eyes. “I’d settle for jarred alfredo if it meant keeping you as my housewife.”
His comment should make me uncomfortable. I should scoff at how bold it seems, given we barely know each other. Instead, I smile, feeling an unusual sense of comfort in my skin.
By the time the bell rings, signaling the end of my first day at my new school, Emmett Owens has become my first real friend.
Chapter Two
Present Day
Iwonder if anyone has been murdered in this house.
Not that it looks like a crime scene or anything, but I’m about to sign my life away only to spend the next thirty years wringing sweaty hands together every time the mortgage statement arrives in the mail. If there is a chance I have to resort to selling feet pics online to keep my house, my realtor should tell me the truth now.
Notice the traditional crown molding, it’s one of the original features within the home. Also, arguments over repeated plumbing woes have ended three marriages.
Or, this house boasts a stunning, four thousand square foot backyard! However, every spring a family of feral raccoons gives birth under the back porch, preventing you from using your large yard unless you are ready to win the fight against rabies.
Or in this case, this house checks all the boxes I asked my realtor to find andis under my budget, which in my pessimistic mind seems too good to be true. Hence, my assumption of someone having been murdered in the basement.
“So, what do you think?” my realtor, Jessica, asks.
“Umm . . .” I'm ready to throw out my usual response: “It’s nice, love the wooden floors.” But I pause. When I turn toward her and see the hope in her big doe eyes, I can’t lie anymore.
This poor girl has spent the better part of the last eight months house shopping with me, dragging me from neighborhood to neighborhood, showcasing every bungalow, classic craftsman, every single ranch-style home that showed some similarities to my ever-growing list of non-negotiables. If I was her, I would have found a way to ditch my indecisive ass after week one, but here she stands, tall and proud, believing that our time together might come to an end with this home.
She reaches a perfectly manicured hand up to squeeze the bridge of her nose in frustration. “This haseverythingon your list, Jenna. We’re talking about an open-concept kitchen/family room that boasts a set of French patio doors overlooking the backyard. Thevery spaciousbackyard, might I add. You can’t get any more specific than that!” She walks to the patio doors, heels click-clacking on the wooden floorboards with a hand up like Vanna White to show me said backyard, as if it didn’t pull my attention as soon as we entered the room.
Itisa ridiculous yard for this part of the city, and the refinished hardwood floors are exactly how I pictured them. Looking past Jessica’s shoulder through the patio doors, I can make out the perfect spot for a stone fireplace. I’ll need a set of Adirondack chairs, for sure. Probably in a darker charcoal color that hides the claw marks from that family of feral raccoons.
“I know, I know. It does check off everything I asked you to find.” It really is my dream home. Well, the dream home I’d perfectly curated in my head when I sat down with her to write down in extreme detail what I was looking for.
“Is it the neighborhood? I know you don’t have children and aren’t married, but this school district . . .”
She drones on, my mind refusing to listen after she tossed out that dagger.I know you aren’t married.No husband, no kids. Not even a creepy neighbor that won’t stop texting me. Poor, single Jenna. Maybe I’ll need the company of that family of feral raccoons after all.
“No, no. It seems like a fine neighborhood,” I tell her, cutting her off. “In fact, I lived in this part of the city for the last few years of high school.”
I turn back toward Jessica. Hope drains from her face. “I’m sorry, you’re probably so annoyed with me, but I don’t think this is the one.”
She doesn’t falter, instead plasters on a very practiced smile. “I understand if you are in the early stages of looking to buy a home, and you want to look and see what’s out there. But when we first met, I was under the impression you were truly looking to buy. I’ve been putting a lot of effort into this for you, Jenna.”
“I amserious about this, I promise. I’m sick of living in my apartment.” I always thought finding a home was like finding your wedding dress. Granted, I don't know what it’s like to shop for a wedding dress, but I’ve seen enough reality TV to know it’s a process.
You spend hours poring over hundreds of online options, take your best friends to local stores, try on fifty nearly identical dresses to see how they look, and how you feel. And then, when you try on theone, you know.
I thought buying a home would feel like that. I imagined walking in the front door and feeling a certain warmth, a comfort, and I’d see myself staying up all night repainting the living room, surviving on cold pizza until the job was complete. I thought I’d find my happily ever after.
Even though this house has literally everything I told her I wanted, I don’t get that feeling.
“I thought I’d be able to see myself living in one of these houses. It checks every box I have. I don’t understand why I don’t feellike it fits, why it doesn’t feel like it could belong to me.”
She waves a hand in the air, glossing over my confession. “Oh, that’s because it’s hard to imagine a home when it’s empty.” She strolls away from me, toward the kitchen, running her hand over the dark splattered marble counters. “Imagine your coffee maker right here, and your favorite stack of mugs hanging from these little hooks.” Her hand reaches up to slide a finger through the dainty silver C-shaped hooks, hidden under the cabinets and the perfect spot for the handle of a coffee mug. She waltzes back into the living room, gesturing to the far wall. “I see a TV mounted in this corner over here, a splash of color along this wall. A sectional to tie it all together. Once you paint, decorate the way you want, that’s when it will feel like yours.”
No surprise, her decorating ideas are spot on, but my gut doesn’t agree.
Maybe I won’t ever find somewhere that feels like home. My childhood was spent moving from one military base to the next, getting used to the idea of never feeling settled. I lived life out of a suitcase with a new city, a new school, new acquaintances, and a new set of four walls to call home without ever knowing what that feeling of home should be.
