Page 19 of The Hampton Beach Café
“Well...” he said, “…we have worked out a little plan of action that should result in a good return for Frances at the end of the summer.”
“Oh, have you?” Lucinda said sharply. “Are you a property specialist?”
He shrugged. “Kind of, yes.”
“Oh, well, good,” Lucinda said, turning back to Frances. “Tell me.”
Frances swallowed hard. “The idea is I come up here for the next six months. Spend this month working my backside off to get it ready for June, run the business up through summer, generate interest and some good financials, then Clarkson will help sell it around October to someone looking for a long-term cross-season tourism investment.”
She studied her friend's face. Her full lips, painted a startling shade of orange, were pressed into a line, and her meticulously plucked eyebrows were knotted together in a frown.
“Okay…” she said, “…but I want to stay until it's ready to open.”
“What?” Frances replied. “Okay? Why?”
She shook her head. “Because you need a friend here, renovations are hard, and I need a break from LA. Like I said before––I don't need an office to do my work, just a laptop, and an Internet connection.”
The sparkler had fizzed out several minutes ago, and Lucinda took her first sip of the cocktail, wincing.
Hah,Frances thought,I knew I wasn't wrong about the cocktails here.
Clarkson raised his second beer. “A toast, then? To Frances and her project!”
The way Lucinda made eye contact with Frances as they clinked glasses worried her slightly. The look meant that Lucinda didn't like Clarkson, which could be a problem. Living with Lucinda for a month could be a problem as well. They were close and saw each other almost every day but had never spent more than a week on holiday together...Thinking about it now, it seemed like she had spent more time with Lucinda in the last few months than she had before––and now they'd be sharing a house. Frances smiled and sipped the sparkling wine, sending a quiet prayer that it would all work out and she'd still be friends with Lucinda after it was all done and dusted.
ELEVEN
Frances had never really thought about what it would be like to receive the keys to a property she solely owned. Any real estate daydreaming she had done all featured Malcolm. She stood here now, in the dilapidated back garden with Clarkson on one side and Lucinda on the other, staring up at the place in silence.
“Well…” Lucinda said, “…it's all wrapped up now. Shall we start planning?”
Clarkson's phone rang, and he stepped away, but Frances smiled and nodded at Lucinda. “Yes, I want to do a full run-through and assess what needs to be done. Can you check out the upstairs? Then before Vincent gets here, I want to go through the extant licenses and registrations to make sure we don't need to apply for anything else in order to open.”
A bark of laughter escaped Lucinda and made Frances jump at its volume.
“You literally just went through it all with the liquidation agent, a local council clerk, and the bank lawyer, and you want to go through it again…but you let that random guy keep your purse for three days while he popped out of town?”
Typical of Lucinda to point out something like that.
“Yes, I do,” she replied. “And I did lock my cards just in case, but, I dunno, I trust him. He's nice.”
A second skeptical laugh from Lucinda, though less loud this time.
“Oh shut up,” Frances said. “Let's start.”
“Sorry ladies,” Clarkson said. “I have to head off, I have a networking event later, and I need to get ready. Text me if anything interesting happens.”
Frances deliberately ignored the eye-roll this triggered in Lucinda and said goodbye to them both, it was time to get into it, and she could not be bothered dealing with whatever the animosity was between Lucinda and Clarkson.
***
The hours that passed felt like minutes, with so many things to check and go over, and exceptionally organized notes from Lucinda about the shabby state of affairs upstairs.
Thankfully, there were four bedrooms––two of which were usable––but the upstairs bathroom no longer had plumbing, and it seemed like the previous owners had used all the rooms as haphazard storage. They would have to sort through and decide if any of it was actually useful.
Lucinda had found a desk and a few chairs on the landing and brought them down earlier in the day so Frances could stop sitting on the dusty floor. They sat there together and looked over the stacks of papers.
“Okay. Run me through it. What have we got?” Lucinda asked.
