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Lizzie
Mountingtheporchsteps, I pause to admire the new front door. Made of soft pine and carved along classic lines, the window at its center bears a yellow tulip in stained glass. Gone are the bars Agatha Jessop had kept over her mailbox, and absent is the sign scaring off visitors. The new door is a sign of welcome.
I smile and take a moment to consider my reflection in the plain panels of the glass. How a person can look exhausted and invigorated at the same time, I have no idea, but there I am doing exactly that.
The shadows of the evening highlight the smudges beneath my eyes, the little furrow between my brows. Yet my skin shines and smile-lines bracket my mouth and eyes. Even in my ghostly, distorted reflection, they’re obvious.
It makes sense. For nearly ten days, life had been hit with the fast-forward button. When I’m not on shift at the auto shop, I’ve been joining Caleb working on the house. When the sunlight finally fades each day and we’ve been forced to surrender our tools, we’ve gone back to the cabin and enjoyed an entirely different kind of activity. The weeks had begun to roll by in a blurry cycle of exertion and passion, only pausing long enough to snatch a few hours’ sleep here and there.
Not that I’m complaining.
I roll my eyes, shake off the tiredness that’s starting to settle over me like sticky dust, and venture inside.
“Hello?” I call out.
“In here.” a familiar voice answers.
Following the sound toward the back of the house, I peer around a doorframe to find Caleb cleaning up his tools.
“Holy crap!”
When I’d last seen it, the room beyond had been a storage space for paint cans, tins of varnish, dust cloths, and all manner of other DIY stuff. The walls had been streaked where the first layer of ivory paint hadn’t yet covered the white undercoat, there had been a gaping hole in the wall instead of a window and the wooden floorboards had been more yellow with sawdust than brown.
Now, it’s a dining room.
Not only had the triple glazing been installed but the walls are now a flawless ivory sheen and the floor… I cannot stop staring at it.
Now cleared and swept, the wood had been varnished to a rich and warm cherry hue.
Caleb doesn’t ask me if I like it. He’s not the sort to prompt for compliments or nudge for praise. He can see my thoughts all over my face. But still, it deserves to be said out loud.
“Caleb, it’s stunning!”
When he smiles at me, any lingering exhaustion melts away. My muscles still ache, my eyes are still tired, and I’d kill for an hour-long bubble bath. But somehow none of it matters. That smile is enough to sustain me. That, and my new dining room.
“Glad you like it.” Caleb’s eyes are warm as he watches my face.
“I… there aren’t words!” Instead of trying to find them, I just bounce in place, clapping my hands together like a five-year-old. Caleb does that little snort thing that passes for his usual laugh.
“Any trouble with the installation?” I glance pointedly at the wide window set into the western wall. All of the windows had been due for replacements that morning. Old, plastic monstrosities had been replaced with white frames and thick glass. I can already feel the difference in the temperature.
“None,” Caleb says, shaking his head. “But the window installer’s apprentice, Henry Jr., put in the little frame in the downstairs bathroom. So if that one leaks, you know who to blame.”
I smile, knowing there won’t be any need. Caleb’s more of a stickler than I will ever be. If he’d allowed the window to go in, it had been done right.
For a moment, I wonder at that; at my instant faith in him. There is no shade of doubt. No concerns that the speed of the renovations is a symptom of poor workmanship. Caleb needed money for his mother’s facility and has been working like a dog from sun-up to sun-down, his every spare minute going into the house. But I know that every second had been spent with professional focus.
I just know.
“You know, you should do one of those home improvement shows,” I tell him, looking around at his handiwork. “The ones where they overhaul the place in less than an hour or whatever. You’re amazing.”
Caleb snorts again. He rubs the back of his neck and shakes his head dismissively, but I can see a slow stain of color in his cheeks. My belly flutters as I realize my compliment has touched him.
“Not really. I’m just doing my job. The faster it’s done the sooner I get paid.”
When Caleb had told me how close the deadline is for his Kenwood Homes deposit, we’d worked out a plan for him to be paid by task instead of by the hour. That way I can pay him weekly for however much he had been able to get done and I get my house all the sooner.
“You worried about the deposit?” I ask, glancing down at where my toes edge the shining floorboards. “Can I come in? Is it wet?”
