Page 18 of On the Line

“Thanks,” she says. “Maybe you could text me some pictures of the outside? And peek in the windows to see what it’s like. I’m going to see if I can find the listing so I can see more photos, and I’ll start the process of getting the deed transferred into my name.”

“I’ll stop by this weekend and let you know what I find out.”

“Jameson,” she says my name quietly, almost like she’s not sure what to say. “Thank you. I don’t know how you got roped into this, but I appreciate your help.”

“You know ...” I clear my throat so the words I was ready to say—that I’d do anything to help her—stay in me, where they belong. “You know I’m happy to help.”

“All right.” She sounds like she’s stalling, but then says, “Thanks again. And, goodnight.”

“’Night.” I hang up the phone, and it isn’t lost on me that my sisters are both sitting at the table with their chins propped on their fists, watching me intently as I step back through that door into the family room.

“We have so many questions,” Audrey says.

“Too bad. I’m going upstairs.”

“Hey,” Jules objects, crossing her arms over her chest. “I made dinner. That means you’re batting cleanup.”

“That’s not what that expression means,” I say as I close the distance between us. “How can you possibly know so little about sports when your brother was a professional athlete?”

“How can you know so little about carpentry when you literally own a construction company?”

If I didn’t love her so much, I’d probably want to strangle her.

“I own it in name only.” Getting the company out of my dad’s name so it could be saved for my sisters, like they’d always wanted, was the first thing I did after he finally left for good. At that point, he’d drained the business of all its cash, and I’d had to pay off a shit-ton of his subcontractors to avoid liens and lawsuits. But it’s saved, and it’s theirs now even if technically I still own a majority share of the company.

I head to the sink, rolling the sleeves of my dress shirt up as I go. “Alexa, play ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’” I say, and when the song fills the room and my sisters can’t resist singing along like they always do, I know it means I’ll be safe from any more questions about Lauren. For now.

* * *

The brick house sits up a hill and back from the street. The front yard is overgrown with ground ivy that’s taking over the brick retaining wall on either side of the steps leading from the sidewalk to the walkway. When I reach the top of the steps, I see the small details that show me the house and the yard were once well loved—the ceramic house numbers sitting vertically on the trim of the front porch, the ornate light that hangs near the front door, and the brick trim that lines the front lawn. There’s a big maple tree whose huge leafless branches loom over the front yard and the porch, and now-dilapidated planter boxes hang from the first-floor windows.

I take the steps onto the front porch two at a time and am impressed at the wide wood floorboards of the porch and the way the beadboard ceiling is painted a pale blue. This house has so much potential. The dark wooden door has a large glass panel at the top, and from what I can see through there and through the first-floor windows off the porch, the house is almost entirely gutted. Which makes sense, given the permit taped to the inside of the window and the big wooden sign staked into the grass in front of the house.

Mike Woods Contracting.

Woody, as everyone calls him, was a friend of my father’s and the last time we spoke, literal punches were thrown. How is this world so small that, out of all the contractors in Boston, Josh managed to hire one who knew my father?

I pull my phone from my pocket, both wishing I didn’t have to make this call and also strangely looking forward to it at the same time.

“Mike Woods,” the gruff voice carries through the phone, and I’m relieved he answered. Must mean I’m not in his contacts, so he doesn’t know it’s me.

“Hey, Woody, it’s Jameson Flynn.”

“You find the trophy, you little fuck-a?” Woody’s thick Boston accent and two-pack a day habit sometimes make it hard to understand him. But he’s coming through loud and clear this morning.

My father and Woody were on a weirdly competitive bowling team together for nearly two decades, and their claim to fame—besides how many beers they could drink and still bowl a nearly perfect game—was that they’d won the league championships five years in a row. The winning team got their name engraved on a trophy that dated back to 1965 and got to keep it until the next year’s championship. Somewhere in the chaos of my dad leaving town, that trophy disappeared.

“Jesus, Woody, was it plated in real gold or something?” He acts like my father lost the Stanley Cup. “That trophy is long gone, just like my father.”

“What the hell are you calling me about, then?”

“Funny story,” I say as I take another look through the windows into the house, “but I’m standing on the front porch of a property you’re working on in Brookline. Nice brick house set up a hill.”

“You know Josh Emerson?” His voice is distinctly hostile.

“Iknewhim. He passed away a couple weeks ago.”

“Shit,” Woody rasps. “That asshole owed me eight grand. I stopped work because he didn’t pay his last bill.”

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