Page 61 of I Heart Mason Cartwright
AshLynn wrinkles her nose. “No. That is all you. Mommy is coming to get me, and we are going shopping.”
“For what?” Willow asks. I scoff thinking the same thing.
“Clothes. The weather is totally different here.”
“Not this time of year. If you are cold, just layer,” Willow says.
“No, thanks,” AshLynn says.
“What’s this I hear about shopping?” I hear a male voice from the doorway and turn to look.
“Zachy!” AshLynn cries, jumping into his arms like she didn’t just see him yesterday.
“Lil’ Brooks, how goes it.” Zach hugs AshLynn and sets her down quickly.
“They don’t think I need new clothes.” She pouts and pats her hair to make sure it’s still in place and pulls some forward over her shoulder.
Zach frowns. “Nonsense. There is never a time where a girl doesn’t need new clothes. Trust me, I know.”
“That’s because you’re a shopping whore.” Willow smiles, removing her safety goggles and setting her hammer down.
“Takes one to know one,” Zach says as he approaches Willow and kisses her on each cheek. “And, my goodness, aren’t you a straight man’s wet dream in this getup.” Mirroring my thoughts from earlier. I drink her in while the attention is on her.
“What?” Willow asks looking down, wiping dust from her clothing.
“Mm hmm.” Zach looks her up and down then turns to AshLynn. “Lil’ Brooks, you sure you want to leave your man with the likes of Willow today?” He gestures to Willow’s legs. Which, as I’ve noticed, look incredible in the cut-offs.
AshLynn waves her hand dismissively and looks down at her phone. “Oh, gotta go. Bye.”
Zach turns to me. “Where are the paint swatches, darling?”
“Living room,” she says to him, then turns to me and says, “Be right back.”
I take a deep breath when they leave. I find much of the charade to be exhausting, mostly the energy it takes to deal with AshLynn right now.
I start swinging, harder now that no one else is in the room. By the time they return, I’ve got over half the drywall and framing down.
“Zach is a genius. We are going withDorian Grayfor the living room.” Willow comes back in the room with Zach trailing behind her. “Hey, wow, you made a lot of progress. How long were we gone?” She laughs as she puts her safety glasses back on and picks up her hammer.
“Pity there’s only two hammers. I’ll just be over here,” Zach says. “Watching.”
“Do you want music?” she asks me.
“Anything upbeat is fine,” I say, swinging again. Willow’s eyes bulge just a bit, then she turns to Zach.
“Z—will you find us some music to listen to?”
Zach looks up from his phone and takes Willow’s from her, then disappears from the room. He comes back a short time later with a wireless speaker, from where I have no idea, and starts playing old-school Journey. When he sings along, he sounds eerily like Steve Perry.
“He’s a really good singer,” Willow says to me. “We kill it at karaoke.”
“I’ll bet.”
She starts swinging, and then singing. Unlike Zach, Willow does not have a good singing voice. It’s off-key and screechy. Which makes P-Tink start to howl along. At that point I figure all I can do is join in as well. As loud as possible to help drown Willow out. I look over at her, but she’s oblivious to how bad she sounds and seems happy just to be singing, swinging, and working.
Zach leaves the room, for what I’m not sure. I get in a zone and just keep taking down the wall and clearing away debris. Willow and I have the entire thing down in a short amount of time. I know Willow took a couple breaks to talk to Zach and to get us all some water, but I have yet to stop. Staying active helps calm my mind. My mind that can’t stop thinking about AshLynn and just how bad this whole situation is. I don’t know what kind of game she is playing, but I do know she’s not going to like it when I don’t play back.
I load as much debris as I can into the wheelbarrow and take it out to the front. Then repeat until I have the room cleaned out. We rented a half-ton bag at the hardware store that they will come and dump each time we fill it.
