“I really can’t.” I smiled, trying to keep my eyebrows from flying right up into my hairline. Too late.
“Well, when it’s right, it’s right. Right?” James said, and Krissy’s answering laughter was like tiny silver bells. He grinned at her and reached over and patted her belly. Which I now noticed was noticeably round. She laced her fingers through his and they held her perfect little round belly together. Krissy was on the nest. James smiled smugly at me.
“How do you know Jimmy?” she asked.
“Jimmy?” I asked. Eyebrows were officially a lost cause; they were on the back of my head at this point.
“Caroline and I used to date when I was in law school, and then we reconnected when she decorated my apartment last year. How’s that going, by the way?”
“Fine, Jimmy. Great actually,” I said through my teeth.
“Oh, you’re a decorator! I love decorating. I took a class last year all about it. I love that tile you’ve got there. Are you decorating something for a client?” Krissy asked, referring to the black and neon-green geoprint tile I’d inadvertently picked up and was clutching so tightly my knuckles were turning white.
“This? No, just browsing. Actually, I’m looking for myself today. Just bought a house over in Sausalito, so yep. Tile. For my new house.”
“Oh, I love Sausalito! Jimmy and I go there all the time. He takes me over for pancakes sometimes on Sunday mornings.” Krissy giggled.
James looked at me more closely. “You bought a house? In Sausalito? With who?”
I love that he just assumed that it would have to be with someone, that I couldn’t have bought something on my own. The fact that I was years away from being able to afford a house in Sausalito on my own was my own damn business.
“Yes, I bought a house. With Simon, actually. You remember him, don’t you, Jimmy?”
“That neighbor guy?”
“Yes, that neighbor guy.”
“Wow. That’s great, Caroline, really great.”
“Yes.” I nodded firmly. “It is.”
“I’m surprised, though. Not what I expected.”
“What? Why?”
Krissy had stepped away by now; she’d found a shiny tile.
“You used to tell me no way were you going to live in the suburbs. Never going to settle down,” he said.
“I’m not settling down, and for God’s sake, Sausalito isn’t the suburbs,” I snapped, and his eyes danced. He always liked to stir me up. “I’ll have you know I’m not settling at all—it’s an amazing house. I love it; it’s exactly what I always wanted.”
“I didn’t say settling; you did. I said settling down. And really, all I’m saying is you used to say you never wanted—”
“James, shut up!” I said, my face boiling hot at this point. Krissy was prancing back over, and I needed to get out of here. “Congratulations on getting married and everything, and good luck with your tile.” I whirled around and ran right into a sales guy.
Throwing back my shoulders, I apologized, then said in a clear voice, “My boyfriend likes to f**k my brains out on our kitchen island. Which tile would you recommend for that?”
God bless him, the guy actually showed me some.
• • •
Turns out I was glad for the convertible, because the trail I blazed back over the bridge to non-fucking-suburban Sausalito was infinitely better in a high-performance automobile. Barreling across the bay in a clunky delivery van wouldn’t have cut nearly as dramatic a silhouette on the Golden Gate Bridge. Revving the engine as I cut down the tiny streets, I whizzed up onto our street and peeled into the driveway. I got out and slammed the door.
“Caroline?” Simon called out, and I turned. He was standing at the edge of the yard, chatting with Ruth from next door. The neighbor who gave us the keys when we first saw the house.
“Oh, hey there, Simon. Evening, Ruth,” I called out in my most neighborly voice. I click-clacked across the driveway, dodging sawhorses and plastic sheeting.
Simon said, “Ruth, you’ll be amazed when you see how much progress we’ve made in that upstairs bedroom. The one you said used to be the sewing room?” He reached out for me and tucked me into his side. “Hey, babe, how was your day?”
“Oh, tip-top.” My voice must have sounded off, because he looked down at me questioningly. “Sewing room?” I asked.
“Oh my, yes. Simon was showing me around last week; I can’t believe how different it looks already!” Ruth exclaimed.
“It’s amazing what you can do when you have a big work crew. So, sewing room?”
“Well, he was showing me the upstairs, and I was marveling over that sweet little room on the second floor—the one that’s tucked under the eaves? I told your Simon that even though Evelyn used it as her sewing room, I always thought it would be perfect as a nursery. Don’t you think?”
My grin froze as I looked back and forth between them. Simon was sheepishly looking down at the ground. But he was also blushing. And smiling. Big.
“Nursery?” I asked through the frozen grin.
“Of course! A cute young couple like you two, I’m sure it’s something you’re thinking about. I know you career girls these days like to wait, but you can’t wait too long, you know. I know it’s not for me to say, and heaven knows I sometimes stick my nose in where it doesn’t belong, but I—”
I must have made the sucking-on-a-sour-pickle face, because somewhere around “heaven knows” and “stick my nose in,” Ruth began to look at me strangely.
I turned without a word and walked toward the house, hearing Simon apologizing to Ruth over the noise that was filling my ears. A chain saw? Tile saw? Tiles—ha!
Inside, I looked around at the chaos. At the three painters on ladders on the first floor. At the two carpenters carpenting in the kitchen. And at the random guy who was sitting on my window seat with his feet up on my dining room table (tarp-covered box), reading a newspaper.
“Excuse me? Can I help you?” I asked over the din.
“You Caroline?”
“I am.”
Just then I heard the front door slam and an angry Simon stood in the doorway. “I can’t believe how rude you just were to Ruth!”
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
“What the hell, Caroline. Have you lost your mind?”
“You seriously want to do this now?” I asked, gesturing to the obviously listening workmen and the guy with his feet up. “Who are you, anyway?” I asked.