Page 9 of Heart Strings & Hotlines
With a groan that relieves none of my irritation, I exit the car and ignore my friend, knowing all he wants to do is talk. But I’ve been driving for ten hours, listening to Kara’s poor musical decisions, and I have nothing left to say.
“Hello, Rafe,” he mocks. “How are you, Rafe? How was your trip, Rafe?”
“Why are you talking to yourself?” I pull out Kara’s overnight bag that must weigh close to fifty pounds.
“Thane, look at my face.”
I lift my head and do as he asked. If I don’t, he’ll never drop it. He does some weird shake of his head, and I go back to unpacking.
“This is an expression of annoyance, Thane. Remember that word? It’s an emotion we covered ad nauseam in college.”
“Annoyance is speaking things out loud that no one needs to hear.”
“But you do, my friend. That’s why I’m here. We’re going to do an intensive deep dive into all the emotions for the next few weeks, and you’re going to love it. But first, why this place? It’s not anything I would have ever chosen for you. It’s… How do I say this nicely? Quaint but old. The, uh, outside is definitely the best part of the place, and it appears the former owners left in a hurry. They didn’t even take some of their stuff.”
“I paid extra for them to vacate immediately, and I paid well. I hired a junk removal company to clear it out. Did they not come?” Rafe arrived a few hours ago to accept the furniture delivery.
“No, they did. But they’re coming back in case you want to rethink some of the more…valuable items. Their words, not mine. They left those in the garage.”
“I do not wish to sort through someone else’s garbage. Just throw it all away. The sooner the better because I will be parking in the garage. That’s what it’s for.”
“Thane, this place is…dirty,” Kara says from the front door. The closer I get, the more I want to run away. Why the hell is she crying now?
“Now, Bubbles.” Rafe uses his nickname for her that’s so stupid, I wish I could blow out my eardrums for approximately seven minutes. He’s used it since the first time he met her when she was five and she had some infatuation with a bubble machine that made the marble floors all soapy and almost caused Ophelia to break her neck.
“It’s not dirty, it’s just old. A cleaning crew was in here yesterday.” I push past them and set Kara’s bag on the only available floor space by the door. Jesus Christ, she’s right. This place feels filthy even with the lingering stench of bleach. “What’s going on in here?”
“Who ordered the furniture?” Rafe asks. When I peer at him over my shoulder, he’s laughing and encouraging Kara to do the same while pointing at the furniture that’s too large for the room.
“I did. And I ordered it to the exact measurements of the blueprints.” I move sideways to get by the boxes and coffee table that are taking up the entire room.
“Thought so.” Rafe laughs like a sneezing dog. What he finds so funny, I can’t begin to fathom. “One of the movers was kind enough to inform me that the previous owners did some ‘off the books’ remodels to fit a hot tub in the enclosed porch, leaving the downstairs space half of what it was.”
“You didn’t even look at the place before you bought it?” Kara’s voice is far too high-pitched, but since she’s not swearing, I move on.
“I purchased it for the address. The layout doesn’t matter…much. We can get someone in here to transform it to our needs.”
“Thane, all the rooms are like this. You can’t move in here.” Rafe doesn’t know the real reason I chose this place, at least not yet, but we aren’t moving.
I’ve spent the last month building a rapport with Lottie via email and the occasional text with updates about Kara. Now I need to up the ante.
Lifting a box that says window treatments, a rust-colored carpet comes into view. My nose twitches as a musty scent wafts up from the flooring. The dirty smell of the place makes more sense now, and I drop the box onto the corner of the new sofa.
Spinning in place, I find eight more boxes labeled everything from ‘ottoman’ to ‘hardware’ and ‘throw blankets.’ Seeing the room in person, I suppose I can see why they didn’t unpack everything—there’s just no room, yet.
This house is simply a logistical problem, and this is where I thrive. It’s like Tetris as I begin moving pieces around. By the time I’m done in the family room, we can walk through the space.
“What is this?” Kara points to my Tetris win. “The coffee table is turned on its end, blocking the window, and that side of the couch is covering the fireplace. You’ll start a fire.”
“The fireplace doesn’t work.” I move through the house to where the kitchen should be, but find it blocked by a ten-person hot tub. “Where’s the kitchen?”
“You have to come back this way and walk through the closet to get to it now.” I hear both Rafe and Kara snickering, presumably at my expense—it usually is, but I’m not finding anything funny about this situation.
“We have a problem. Problems have solutions,” I mutter on my way by. For some reason, they both laugh even harder.
“This is more than a problem, Thane. Just…look around.” Kara spins in place and shudders.
“I know we’re laughing,” Rafe says. “But Kara has a point. This place is a mess, so while you work on the solution, I’ll take Kara to the grocery store.”
