Page 13 of The Lighthouse Sisters
“Everything!” Katrina said, a tear slipping from her eyes. She cried when she was angry.
What could she possibly be angry about?Raelynn asked herself. She got her answer soon enough.
“I feel bamboozled!”
“What? Why? What happened?”
Katrina marched away while yelling. “It doesn’t matter. Grab your bags. Don’t bother to unpack. We’re not staying here another second.”
EIGHT
“Wait! Wait, Wait!” Raelynn found herself yelling as she rushed behind Katrina. Katrina was fast.She must have started working out,Raelynn thought to herself.Gosh, maybe I should do the same.
She finally caught up with her and Katrina ignored her. “What’s going on? Talk to me. What’s wrong?”
“Everything,” she said again. “Did you see the condition the house and lighthouse are in? Both buildings are practically falling apart. Why would grandpappy leave me rubble?!” She was yelling now.
Raelynn was taken aback. It wasn’t like her friend to get worked up about much of anything.
“What exactly is wrong?”
“I told you; everything is wrong! Did you not see the random old mattresses around the lighthouse? Did a squatter live there or something? It’s like nothing has been fixed in ages. That’s what I was talking to Laura about. It’s a hot mess, Raelynn!”
“I’m sure we could get it all fixed…”
“It’s a money pit! Even if we could fix it all, by the time we finished, we would be so far in debt that it wouldn’t even be worth keeping at that point.”
“I don’t know,” Raelynn said, trying to calm her friend down. “It seems like most of the issues were pretty superficial.”
“That’s because you didn’t get the whole tour.”
Raelynn was puzzled. Katrina sighed and started to pace. She was clearly too frustrated and upset to stay still.
“When I say everything is wrong with the place, I mean everything. And especially this house. We might as well tear it down and start all over again.”
“You don’t mean that,” Raelynn said. “Your grandfather built it.”
“Yes, he did, but he might as well have built it out of straw, for goodness’ sake.”
Raelynn held back a giggle, but the image was funny. She didn’t think her friend was in the mood for laughter right now.
It seemed that Katrina was only getting warmed up. “I’m sure it violates every building code known to man.” She tossed her arms in the air in frustration. Raelynn didn’t dare interrupt her. She’d never seen Katrina so irate. “Just in case you haven’t noticed, there’s no hot water in the house, and Laura told me they have an issue with broken pipes. And if that weren’t enough, the floorboards are rotten in some places. And the icing on the cake is that no one has actually renovated the house since the 70s. The 70s, Raelynn! Do you know how long ago the 70s was?”
Raelynn felt an irrational urge to giggle again, but controlled it. What Katrina saw as a disaster, Raelynn saw as an opportunity. And she knew as she stared at her friend, who looked ready to explode, that she just needed to show her the possibilities.
“Come with me,” she told her.
“What?”
“Come on, let’s go.” This time it was Raelynn who walked ahead, and Katrina struggled to keep up.
“Where are we going?”
“Back up the steps. I need to show you something.”
“I’ve already been up there with you, remember?”
Raelynn ignored her and power walked up every single stair, not stopping as she had earlier. She was a woman on a mission and her mission was to save her dream and the dream of her friends. She wasn’t going to let this minor bump in the room end the future that they had been so set on creating.
