A Mile in My Flip-Flops (7 page)

T
here’s trouble in Paradise,” Dad informs me over the phone Friday as I leave school for the day. It’s been four days and four Dumpsters since my dad’s cleanup crew started emptying the house of all the trash and debris. And yesterday I started to feel really hopeful. Not only was that nasty carpeting and all the linoleum totally removed, but the smell had decreased significantly as well. I had commended the crew for doing such a great job, and in my best Spanish, which is admittedly lame, I presented them with a case of cold Sierra Mist and a box of cleaning supplies and asked them to scrub down the surprisingly sturdy kitchen cabinets. There appeared to be at least a decade’s worth of grease and grime coating the wood, which Dad says is probably alder. After doing a patch test, I could see that the wood has a rather nice grain. With some refinishing and new nickel hardware, along with sleek granite countertops, I think the cabinets will look great. Plus reusing the cabinets will save us enough money to nearly cover the expense of a new roof.

“What do you mean?” I ask Dad as I walk to my car.

“Come on over, and we’ll discuss it when you get here,” he says stiffly.

“Let me pick up Riley first, and I’ll be right over.” I want to tell Dad that I don’t expect him to be at the house every single day and
that he better not be doing any of the actual labor, but I’ve said it so many times that I’m starting to get sick of hearing it myself. As I drive home, I wonder what’s gone wrong now. Hopefully it’s nothing too big. I’ve already noticed how Dad can overblow things when it comes to this house. Like it’s a personal vendetta—him against the house. Or maybe it’s simply his way to remind me that he was opposed to this project from the start … and that he expects it to turn out badly.

I hurry up to my apartment, change into my “renovation” outfit: a T-shirt, overalls, and Havaianas rubber flip-flops. Then after I leash up Riley and allow him a quick pit stop in the park, we’re on our way to the house.

Dad meets me in the driveway with an impossible-to-read expression. When I ask him what’s up, he simply says, “Come and see for yourself.”

“No hug or anything,” I tease him. “Must be pretty bad.

“You can be the judge of that.” Then he offers me a halfhearted side hug, nudging me up the driveway.

I glance up at the house now. It looks much like it did yesterday. Nothing appears fallen or crumbled…no huge catastrophe that I can see.

We go inside, and I let Riley off his leash to explore. Then Dad leads me to the kitchen, and I notice the room looks strangely spacious. Like something has changed.

“The cabinets!” I suddenly exclaim. “Where are the cabinets?”

“The cleanup crew demoed them.”

“Demoed? As in totally destroyed?”

He nods with a somber expression.

“But why?”

“They said you gave instructions to remove them.”

“I gave them cleaning stuff and told them to clean them.”

“In English?”

“No, I’ve been trying to use what little Spanish I know.” I dig in my bag, pulling out the little English to Spanish dictionary that I’ve been relying on.

“Tell me exactly what you told them,” says Dad.

So I repeat, as best I can, what I think I said, and he just nods.

“What did I say?” I ask.

“To remove the cabinets.”

“Oh…”

“That was an expensive mistake, Gretchen.”

“Oh my goodness. What do we do now?”

“We order new cabinets. Fortunately one of the guys on the crew has a brother-in-law who’s a cabinetmaker. They won’t be top-of-the-line, but they should be okay.”

“I’m sorry, Dad.” I’m on the verge of tears. I can’t believe I blew it so badly. From now on I will keep my mouth shut or make sure my dad translates for me.

He forces a smile now. “Maybe it’s for the best, sweetie. They say kitchens are the most important selling feature in homes these days.”

“And bathrooms,” I add.

He frowns now. “Well, don’t get me started on that. Those bathrooms are a disaster.”

“A disaster that you don’t need to worry about,” I remind him for the thousandth time.

“Then who are you going to get to replace those floor joists?”

I consider this. “Well, I don’t know right now … but it won’t be you.” I put my face close to his and look into his eyes. “Okay?”

He grumbles something I can’t hear, then asks if he can borrow my phone. I hand it to him and start walking around to inspect my house. Most of the hardwood floors seem to be fairly solid but, as Dad pointed out, are in need of serious refinishing. At least I didn’t ask the work crew to “clean” them too.

“I asked Noah Campbell to stop by today,” Dad tells me as he hands me my phone.

“Why?”

“Because we need some help, Gretchen.”

“But why Noah?” I persist. It’s not that I don’t like Noah Campbell, but last Christmas my dad tried to fix us up at his annual Christmas party, and I guess I just wasn’t ready for it. Then Dad seemed offended when I gave Noah the cold shoulder. Later he asked me what was wrong with the guy. Well, obviously, there was nothing wrong with Noah. I mean, not only is he a perfectly nice guy, but he’s also gorgeous. In fact, that might’ve been part of the problem. Gorgeous guys tend to scare me. So as Dad continued to pester me about Noah, the only thing I could come up with was to say it bothered me that he is divorced.

And, okay, I know lots of divorced people. And, really, it’s nothing personal, but the truth is that I have absolutely no desire to get involved with a guy who’s been divorced. Call me stubborn or judgmental or narrow minded, but I’ve always imagined myself marrying someone who’s never been married. It’s just an expectation I’ve carried with me since childhood. And to make matters more complicated, Noah has a child that he and his ex share custody for. Because
I teach kindergarten, I’ve seen what that does to kids and parents and exes and everyone. And, I’m sorry, but that is just too much baggage for me. Especially considering I have my own baggage to deal with. As much as I like to think that time heals all wounds, I know I still have some scars. And that’s basically what I told Dad. Without going into all the details, I told him I was not interested. Fortunately, it shut him up and got him off my case about Noah. Until now.

“Noah is an excellent carpenter … and he’s not busy.”

“If he’s such an excellent carpenter, why isn’t he busy?”

Dad shrugs. “I’m not sure. But I was chatting with him a couple of weeks ago, and he mentioned that he was trying to slow things down.”

“Why is he slowing things down?” I ask, knowing that it’s none of my business and that I’m acting like a very wet blanket. “He seems a little young to retire, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know, Gretchen.” Dad’s voice sounds irritated now. “Just be thankful he’s available.”

“But shouldn’t I have some say in who we hire to help us?”

“Sure. Who did you have in mind?”

I shrug now. “No one. But maybe I’d like to take a shot at doing some of these things myself, Dad.”

Now he actually laughs. “I have to admire your courage, Gretchen Girl, but you need to know exactly what you’re doing when you replace something as structural as floor joists.” He scratches his head now. “I didn’t think we needed a building permit when we started this project. We weren’t going to change the footprint or anything structural … just basic renovations. Now I’m not so sure.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning I’ll look into it.”

I point to the wall that separates the living room from the dining and kitchen area. “Like what if I want this wall removed?”

“You want that wall removed?”

I’m sure I’ve mentioned this several times to Dad, but he keeps acting like it’s a big surprise. “I want to open up the place,” I say. “One big great room. Remember?”

“Well, this happens to be a load-bearing wall.”

“And?”

“The roof might collapse if you remove it.”

“Really?”

“We’d have to set up some posts and a beam to support the ceiling.”

“That’s fine.”

“And there’s electrical here too,” he points out. “We’ll have to hire an electrician.”

“So…”

“Well, I agree that it would be an improvement for this house. And it would probably help the salability of the place if we open it up a bit. But that means I’ll have to go file for a building permit.” He glances at his watch now. “I can just make it before they close.”

“What about Noah?” I ask.

“You’re calling the shots,” he says. “You deal with it.”

“But I don’t know what to—”

“Just let him in the door, Gretchen. I already gave him a quick lowdown on our situation. He’ll probably want to walk around and check things out. Hopefully, he won’t turn around and walk straight out once he sees it.”

“Where did the cleanup crew go?” I ask as I put on a pair of yellow rubber gloves and reach for a bottle of cleaner.

“I paid them and told them we’d be in touch.” He looks slightly sheepish now. “I also took them to task for ripping out the kitchen cabinets. Now I’ll have to apologize.”

“I should probably be the one to apologize.”

He nods. “Yep, you should. Now I better head over to the city office for that permit.”

After Dad leaves, I go straight into scrubbing down a kitchen wall. Then I hear someone call out “hello” from the front door. I get there just in time to see Riley jump up and place both dirty paws on Noah Campbell’s clean white T-shirt.

“Riley!” I scold, grabbing him by the collar. “Down!”

Noah attempts to brush the brown marks off his shirt and then smiles. “It’s okay.”

“Sorry about that.” Once again I am struck with how incredibly good-looking this guy is. And, once again, it just bugs me. Almost every gorgeous guy I’ve met has turned out to be (1) slightly shallow, (2) somewhat full of himself, and (3) looking for an equally gorgeous woman so he can be part of a matched set. Sorry if I sound bitter, but that’s been my experience.

As I attempt to peel off a rubber glove, Noah bends down to scratch Riley behind the ears. “You’re a friendly one, aren’t you?”

“His name is Riley, and I guess I need to work with him on his social skills.”

“Chocolate Lab?”

“And part something else—probably some wild and crazy breed.”

Noah stands and looks at me now, and I’m aware that I must
look like a wreck. “It’s been a while. How have you been, Gretchen?”

I’m surprised that he actually remembers my name. “Okay, I guess … although my dad thinks I’ve bitten off more than I can chew with this house flip. Did he tell you much about it?”

“Just that it’s in need of help.”

“Yeah. And I don’t want Dad doing the physical labor himself. You know he’s had some serious health problems.”

He nods. “Yeah, I heard.”

“Of course, he thinks he’s much better now that he’s been on medication for a while. But I still don’t want him doing too much.”

“That’s understandable.” His dark brown eyes glance about, quickly taking it all in, and he doesn’t appear terribly impressed.

“And anyway this is really
my
house flip, not Dad’s. He’s only supposed to be my consultant. In fact, I wasn’t sure I needed outside help just yet. Dad didn’t even ask me before he called you. And when school gets out, just a week from now … well, I’d sort of hoped to tackle this myself.”

“Really?” I see the same skeptical look in his eyes that I saw in my dad’s earlier. But at least he’s not laughing at me.

“I know a little about carpentry. I mean, I grew up watching my dad.”

“I’m sure you know a lot.” I think I sense some sarcasm, but I ignore it.

“And when I’m not distracted with my teaching responsibilities, I can give this remodel my full attention.”

“Right…”

“So it might’ve been premature for Dad to call you.”

“Oh…”

“I mean, feel free to walk around and have a look, if you want. There’s not that much to see. We’ve been mostly trying to clean it out this week, getting it ready for paint and things. It had been a rental, and the renters were pretty bad. They must’ve had a lot of pets. I guess you can still sort of smell it.”

“It definitely looks like it’s seen better days.”

“But it does have potential,” I say in a slightly defensive tone. “And it’ll be great once I start doing the real improvements.” He’s followed me to the kitchen now. “I had hoped to reuse the existing cabinets; they weren’t too bad really. But we had a little communication problem with the cleanup crew.”

“They tore them out?”

“Yeah.” I sigh. “Things got a little out of control. I think that’s why I want to slow it down just now. Dad is all like ‘get ’er done,’ and I want to take more time and plan it a little better. I have lots of ideas… I know how I want it done. I’d like to take my time, you know?”

“I can understand that.” He nods politely, though he still doesn’t look convinced.

“And so I’m not sure I really want to hire anyone just yet.”

He glances around the gutted kitchen with a slight frown. “And I don’t want to force my services on anyone. I only came as a favor to your dad. He’s a good guy.”

“Of course. I just don’t want him to take over this house flip.” I press my lips together, thinking I’m saying way too much. Really, this is none of Noah Campbell’s business.