Beginner's Luck. Kate Clayborn
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with victory. Instead, I text her back that I’ll be there.
That’ll be okay, she writes, with your dad and everything?
It’s a kindness, I think, that she checks about this, and I feel a strange gratitude for it and for her, for the distraction of these last couple of hours, immersing myself first in her world and then in this conversation. I’ll make it work, I type back. I stand from my bed, stretch my arms over my head. I need to get out there and get Dad ready for bed. I need to get some rest myself, especially since I’m going to spend a good portion of tomorrow dealing with a sulky teenager. I’m tucking my phone into my back pocket when it chimes one more time.
I know what you’re doing, Tucker, it says. I just like showing people my microscope.
I’m grinning, staring down at my phone, but I don’t respond. For the first time since I’ve met her, I think maybe I’ve got her on the ropes.
Chapter 5
Kit
In the days since I sent Ben a text inviting him to my office, I’ve alternated between barely acknowledged anticipation and loudly proclaimed dread. When I meet Zoe and Greer for breakfast on Sunday morning, I blurt out the whole story—the fact that I called him about knobs, the visit to the salvage yard, the very fetching way he looks when in pursuit of a young criminal.
“You’re screwed,” says Zoe, stuffing a huge bite of whipped-cream-topped waffle in her mouth.
We’re at the Outcast Diner, one of our favorite spots in the brick-streeted historic district that’s adjacent to my neighborhood. Unlike at Betty’s, hipsters haven’t really caught on here, and other than the three of us, the clientele is mostly of the golden years variety, especially since we come early. We sit on mismatched wood chairs around a small table that Zoe’s stabilized with a stack of sugar packets. All around us, on the brightly painted yellow walls, are framed paper placemats that customers have drawn on over years. It’s a bit run down, the Outcast, but the coffee is hot and the maple syrup is real.
“I’m not,” I say, taking a bite of my oatmeal.
“But you wish you were,” says Greer, and Zoe cracks a laugh, so impressed by Greer’s unexpected dirty joke that she gives her a high-five. Greer blushes, because she’s adorable.
“You guys aren’t helpful. Why did I do that? Now I’m going to have to talk to him again, and this time about his stupid job offer.”
“Who cares?” asks Zoe. “You’re not going to take it, so let him say his piece, and move on.” She leans forward and raises her eyebrows. “And by ‘move on,’ I mean let him touch your…”
“Oh my God,” I say, and put my forehead on the table. “It’s not like that,” I mumble, but it is completely like that, in my mind, at least. What was an annoying attraction before became a full-blown crush on Thursday when I’d seen Ben at the salvage yard. There’s this—sweetness to him, which I’d noticed not only in his interaction with his dad, but also in the way he’d watched that kid he’d chased down, this leashed protectiveness he’d had for a vulnerable boy who had done him wrong.
And then he texted me about crystal structure.
Zoe is right, of course—not that I’ll say that to her—but I know that this really comes down to letting Ben give me his pitch under less tense circumstances than we were in during our first meeting, and politely declining. It’s not as if he’s the first person I’ve had to speak to about work. I’d fielded offers from private firms before—nothing as big or prestigious as Beaumont, but still. I’m as sure now as I was then that I’m in the right place, professionally and personally, and so it shouldn’t bother me to say that to Ben when the time comes.
And yet it does, somehow—or at least it bothers me to have to confront the idea at all. I went to therapy for long enough to know at least part of what this is about. I don’t like change. I don’t like the idea of change, and however convinced I am about my life now, it’s easy for me to feel threatened by any alteration to it. Even the last night I spent in my shitty apartment, I’d cried myself to sleep, thinking of the years I’d spent there, the longest stretch I’d ever had in a single place. I was almost grateful that I woke up with a dead stink bug on my pillow. At least that eliminated most of the nostalgia.
“Sweetie,” Greer says, patting my forearm. “You’re getting oatmeal in your hair.”
I raise my head with a sigh, grab my napkin to clean up. Greer has mercy on me and changes the subject. She’s not sure about the classes she’s picked for the fall semester, and pretty soon Zoe and I are both wrapped up in talking it through with her. When we stand and gather our things an hour later, I’m lighter, more at ease—it’s what we do for each other. It’s what I’d never give up about these women. “What’s on for the rest of the day, Kit?” asks Zoe, slinging her purse over her shoulder.
“I’m going to try and do some work outside,” I say. “Weeding. Either of you two want to help?”
Greer’s got a family event, and Zoe bluntly says, “You must be crazy. I just had my nails done.” She leans in to give me a hug. “Send us before and after pictures, though.”
I spend the rest of the morning in the small backyard, which is weedy and overgrown. But unlike most of the house, there’s nothing so bad about it that I can’t tackle it myself, and it feels good to be out in the sun, slathered as I am with SPF 50, digging out the worst of the weeds that have grown up around the small garden shed that, same as everything else on this property, has potential to be great, but right now falls somewhere between vaguely shabby and completely dilapidated. Once I’ve cleared an entire side, I can picture the bed I’ll dig out along the edge, the lavender or maybe salvia I’ll plant, the cream paint I’ll do the shed in. Maybe I’ll add small shutters on the windows on either side, add window boxes too. Less haunted house, more dollhouse.
But this dollhouse isn’t getting built in a day, and I’m starting to feel a bit like a wilted flower in this heat. Still, I feel good, the accomplishment helping to wear off more of the Ben tension I’d felt this morning. Tomorrow will be fine, piece-of-cake fine.
I get myself a glass of ice water and take it out to the front stoop, plopping onto the top step in exhaustion. I try to be out here a bit every couple of days, to wave at my new neighbors as they pass by, getting a sense of who’s who on the street. Betty was my neighbor when I lived above the bar, so there was an easy camaraderie. I want that here—the kind of neighbors who’ll watch out for your place but who also might invite you over for a cookout. Things are a bit uneven on my street, sure, with some houses fully renovated and some in grim disrepair, but since my place is on the grim side of things right now, I don’t judge.
So far I’d met three different homeowners, including Jeff and Eric, across the way, whose house looks as if it was redone for one of those HGTV shows. It’s both perfectly current and perfectly historical. When their front door opens and Jeff steps out onto his porch, he gives me a friendly wave and I smile back, warmed by even this small cordiality, this growing sense of my place here. But the feeling cools when I see a tall, broad figure step out from behind Jeff, who turns back to shake the man’s hand.
Ben Tucker’s hand.
Well, shit, I think, standing too fast from where I’m sitting, my water sloshing a bit over the top of the glass to land on my feet. My street is narrow, so my abruptness is enough to catch his eye, and when he looks across the way at me, there’s a few seconds where we’re just staring at each other, that weirdness that happens when you see someone out of context, like running into a teacher at the movies. But then I see a broad smile spread across his face, and my stomach flutters in answer.
He and Jeff exchange a few more brief words, Jeff giving Ben a firm pat on the shoulder before Ben heads down the steps. I think for a minute that he might get into the truck that’s parked out front, but instead, he tucks his hands into his pockets, glancing quickly down the one-way street before crossing to me. He stays on the sidewalk, though, looking up at me, a sheepish quirk to his mouth. “Fancy