Page 50 of Make it Real
Callie’s grin shot through me like a soda can shaken up and fizzing over. She had the kind of smile I could build my whole day around, especially when that dimple peeked out to drive me mad.
“Why don’t you show Jed your rooms?”
Callie closed her eyes as though praying for patience. “Granny.”
“What? They’re not a secret, are they?”
She flashed me a look of silent apology. Didn’t see the need, since the second Suzie had suggested it, I’d wanted to see where Callie lived. The parts of the house I’d been in more likely matched her granny’s tastes, not hers. I wanted to see some of the bright and colorful Callie shine through.
Leaning in, I bobbed my eyebrows. “I won’t say no to seeing your rooms.”
She shook her head at me but grabbed my hand and pulled me from the kitchen. On the far side of the living room, a short hallway led off to spaces I hadn’t been in yet.
Tugging me into the next room, she hitched a shoulder. “There’s not that much to see, really.”
I stopped, several arguments springing to mind. The other rooms mostly subscribed to her disliked beige and gray color scheme, but in here, she’d given the house life. Turquoise walls with white wainscoting made the space look both sophisticated and playful. An orange TV console held dozens of DVDs. The off-white couch had been livened up with multi-colored pillows, and a bright rug tied it all together.
At least, that sounded like something I’d heard my sister say.
“You should definitely talk about houses with June.”
She hitched a shoulder. “My style is too much for Gran, so I haven’t messed with the rest of the house. But back here, I’ve kind of done my own thing.”
“I like it.”
“Yeah?”
“Hell, yeah. It’s fun.” Better than my bland walls any day. I wouldn’t even know where to start to liven up my place. June would have gladly told me, but I didn’t think my landlord would appreciate it if I put my own stamp on a place I had to renew every year. “Exactly how I pictured the Callie Lou wing.”
“Ooh, I like that. It used to be a den and office, but when I moved back in after college, I took it over to have a little more space. I couldn’t sleep in my old bedroom again, not after my mom passed away here. She wanted to be home, not in a hospital or hospice center, and I understood that, I guess. But it’s hard to be in the bedrooms and not think about those days. I don’t even go in the room where she died anymore.”
I slipped my hand into hers, twining our fingers together. “I’m sorry. That’s got to be rough.”
No wonder she wanted to sell this place. I wouldn’t have wanted to face the place someone I cared about had died, either. Just the thought of the hospital where my mom had died or the desert where I’d lost Zach made my skin crawl.
“Yeah. But that’s why I took over this end of the house. My new bedroom doesn’t have a closet, but I make it work.”
A door stood ajar on the far side of the room, tempting me. “Can I take a peek?”
Probably too bold and a bad idea all the way around, but I wanted to see it.
“Sure. It’s just a bedroom.”
She led us over, pushed the door open, and waved me inside.
“Just a bedroom?” Should have known by now Callie would undersell it.
Her bedroom seemed a microcosm of everything she’d described to me out in the orchards. Bright color, bold patterns, absolutely nothing gray or beige in here. The bed had been laid out with blankets and pillows in florals, stripes, and geometric markings that should have looked terrible together, but their colors worked somehow. Two metal clothes racks stood against one wall, next to a vintage dresser that had been painted moss green.
Most striking of all, the walls boasted twenty or thirty colorful embroidery hoops like the one she’d given Eden and Booker. Color blocks, garden scenes, carefully stitched lettering—I couldn’t even take in everything she had on the walls. The familiarity here stole the air from my lungs.
“Did you make all these?” I said once I’d caught my breath again.
“Yeah. They’ve been my obsession lately. It’s sort of meditative to just stitch, you know? I guess you probably don’t know. But I like it, so I keep making them, even if I don’t know what to do with them. Eliza keeps saying I should open a booth at the farmers’ market and sell them.”
“I bet you’d make a killing, too.” I moved closer to look at the ones nearest us. She’d made a stylized little cabin in one, surrounded by wildflowers like something out of a children’s book. Next to it hung a…well, a flaming trash bin. She’d stitched‘I’m not a hot mess, I’m a spicy disaster’around it. “Yeah, these would definitely sell out.”
I moved around the room, soaking up this glimpse into her private life, this secret, vibrant world nobody saw. A stack of brightly-colored books sat on her nightstand, most of them with the word ‘love’ in the title. A few pieces of children’s artwork mingled with the embroideries on the wall, undoubtedly gifts from her students. A picture of her as a teenager and a woman who must have been her mother sat on the dresser. A white lacy bit of something peeked out of the top drawer, waving hello.
