Page 75 of All In
At her place, I noticed the green and magenta paint outside had been freshened up. Jonah’s whiskey lights hung over a porch that looked sharp and sturdy, and Kacey fitted a key into a brand-new front door.
“Ready?” she said. “Prepare to be amazed.”
“Holy shit,” I said, stepping inside and setting my bag down on the new hardwood floors. “It hardly looks the same.”
She snorted. “After fifteen grand, I hope not.”
The hardwood planks were gray with shades of beige running through the grain. New travertine tile in the kitchen picked up the light browns. The cabinets were new, pale gray, the countertops beneath a shiny white quartz. Gone was the fridge, and the stove that had seen its heyday in the seventies. Stainless steel appliances gleamed in their place.
“It looks amazing,” I said. “You did good.”
She beamed, buffing a smudge on one of the refrigerator doors. “I had help. Yvonne worked her butt off and then I hired some guys for the floor. But the tile work in the bathroom? All me. Check it out.”
I chuckled as she planted two hands on my back and pushed me toward the bathroom. The tile was dark gray, smattered with graphite and glittering under the light of a small chandelier. Its light sparkled off chrome fixtures and a claw-foot bathtub with a rainfall showerhead.
Kacey planted her hands on her hips, surveying her handiwork. “What do you think?”
“It looks amazing.”
“You said that already,” she said, her smile brilliant. She took me down the last little stretch of her shotgun house to the bedroom. “I didn’t do much. Just the floors and some new furniture.”
“Looks good,” I said, my eyes on the glass ball Jonah had made for her. It was no longer in the center of her bed, but on a stand on the dresser. “Looks real good.”
Back in the living room I sat on the couch.
“Tell me everything. How are things back home?” Kacey asked, curling up in her new high-backed chair.
“Did you just call Vegas home?” I asked as casually as humanly possible.
“Well, shit,” she said, laughing. “I did.”
“Graduation is coming up,” I said. “My dad’s being a dick about my tattoo shop idea, as usual. He’s pushing me to use my degree for something else, for the business side of dealing art, or maybe curating. And he still hasn’t given up on me using my art as a graphic designer. Shoot me now.”
Kacey frowned. “No offense to Henry, but fuck that. You’re crazy-talented at what you do. Born for it.”
“Thanks.”
“I can’t wait to see you in your cap and gown, accepting your diploma.”
“You’re coming?”
Kacey cocked her head and fixed me with a look. “Theodore James Fletcher…”
I laughed and waved my hands. “Okay, okay. You’re coming. But fair warning, it’ll be boring as hell.”
“Wouldn’t miss it for anything.”
A short silence fell but it was a good one. A silence where two people who hadn’t seen each other in a long time basked in each other’s presence, getting re-acclimated. Settling in. Zelda’s advice to me to talk to Kacey rattled in my head.
How do I start? ‘So I came all this way to fuck up our friendship forever…’
“That couch folds out,” Kacey said.
I blinked at her, wondering if she’d just cut to the chase and I’d be taking Zelda’s second piece of advice. “What?”
“So you can sleep here,” she said.
“Oh. Right. No, I got a hotel room,” I said.
