Finding Home (14 page)

“I'll
work on him.” She said the words cheerfully, as if ignorant of the animosity thriving between father and son. She hoped it would eventually be a thing of the past.

The steely look in Jim's eyes told her that day had yet to come.

“Don't bother.” And then he smiled at her. “Just as long as you can come.” Jim glanced at his watch. His languid manner disappeared. “Wow, it's later than I thought. I've got to jet, Mom. I'll see you later.”

Later.

The word hung between them, a vague promise without form or structure. But she knew better than to try to pin him down to a time or date.

“Later,” she echoed. As he began to leave, she put her hand on his arm. Jim raised his brow, waiting. “How are you fixed for money?”

The shrug was careless. “I have it.”

She knew what that meant. That his cash flow had turned into a dribble. “Want to have more?”

It wasn't really a question. She reached into her purse and took several twenties out of her wallet.

Jim took a step back. “Mom, it's not necessary.” The protest was without conviction.

Stacey folded the bills in half and stuffed them into his shirt pocket. He wouldn't ask her for money outright, but she wouldn't sleep if she knew he needed it.

“When you get to be rich and famous, you can buy me a summerhouse,” she teased. “Right now, that part-time job you have probably doesn't give you enough after taxes to pay for your food.”

He shrugged again, his thin shoulders moving beneath his baggy T-shirt. “I don't eat that much.”

“Yes, I know.” He'd been what was politely referred to as husky until he'd hit his teens and the opinion of his peers became his god. Suddenly, fast food was out, as was anything with sugar, salt or fat. That left very little to choose from. “You can stop by for a meal or two, you know. There's no cover charge.”

He laughed. “I'll keep that in mind.” He put his hand over his pocket, his eyes smiling at her. “Thanks for the loan.”

He was still her boy, no matter how many candles were on his cake. She saw no reason not to slip him a little something extra until he got to his artistic feet. “Consider it a gift for coming by.”

Crossing the threshold, Jim turned around and frowned. “You don't have to pay me for stopping by.”

She nodded, as if taking his words to heart. Her expression was completely innocent as she told him, “It's just until I find a way to tie you up and keep you in the basement.”

“You don't have a basement,” he pointed out, trying hard
not to show her how much he missed the banter, the warmth that she represented.

“It's on the remodeling list,” she deadpanned.

He laughed, shaking his head. For a second, leaning forward, he almost forgot himself and kissed her. But he stopped at the last minute, moving back. There were images to uphold and independence to hang on to.

“See you, Mom.”

“See you,” she echoed, closing the door. She needed to attend to one more thing. Already she was running late, a few more minutes wouldn't matter.

“That your son?”

The question came from behind her. Stacey stifled a gasp as she swung around, ready to swing.

Alex caught her wrist before she could make contact. “Hey,” he cautioned with a laugh. “Sorry. Didn't mean to startle you.”

Her adrenaline slipped down to a more manageable level. She took a breath to steady her pulse. It didn't help. “I thought you'd left.”

“I did.” He released her wrist. “But I came back. The side gate's unlocked. Just like your patio door. I forgot my book,” Alex explained, holding up the thin blue binder in his other hand. “It's like leaving a chunk of my life behind.”

Alex struck her as being very up on everything. She was surprised that he was still using pencil and paper rather than the latest electronic technology. “Most people feel that way about their PDAs.”

He made a dismissive gesture. “I keep all the records on a computer at the office, but when I'm out in the field, nothing
beats the feel of paper. I like seeing things right in front of me without trying to remember what ‘folder' it might be in, or worrying that the hard drive might crash.”

She'd never had that happen to her personally, but she'd heard enough horror stories to make her take the proper precautions. “You could always back up.”

“I could,” he allowed. His eyes were smiling at her. “Maybe someday.” His voice was significantly lower than the one he used when he was instructing one of his crews about the day's schedule.

Something unexpected rippled through her. Stacey felt a blush creep along her neck. It came out of nowhere and seemed bent on embarrassing her.

Flustered, feeling as if the contractor was hinting at something entirely different, something light years away from a discussion about backing up computer data, she glanced away, desperate for a way to shift the focus onto another topic.

Her eyes came to rest on the gaping hole that had once been her sink.

“Um, the sink still isn't here.”

“Actually, it is,” he told her, his voice reverting a little to its business-like timbre. “The granite for the counter isn't. We have to mount that before we can install the sink.”

“But we picked out the slab two weeks ago,” she protested.

It had been a hard-won victory, getting Brad to come out with her again. Looking back, she wasn't even sure just how she managed it, only that he came. Grudgingly, but he came. And they had gone from one granite showroom to another. Five in all.

The only problem they'd encountered was finding a color
they both liked. Brad tended toward dark hues and she liked things light. They wound up compromising on Blue Pearl. And one showroom had the perfect piece.

Brad had found it, actually, pointing it out to her as she'd gone wandering up and down the various rows in the warehouse. The triumphant expression on Brad's face was one she was going to remember for a long time.

“Yes, I know,” Alex was saying. “But they cut it backward at the store.”

“Backward?” She shook her head. “I don't understand.”

“Somehow, they got their hands on the wrong measurements. They cut it to the old specs. The hole was where your old sink used to be.”

They had agreed that it was more aesthetically pleasing, not to mention more symmetrical, if the existing window was moved six inches over to the right. The sink's position had to be moved as well. The result was more counter space on the left and less on the right, but she found it more functional that way.

“Don't worry,” Alex said, reacting to the dismay on her face. “We still have the major portion of the granite and that's going to be put in tomorrow morning,” he promised.

“And the other piece?” she asked.

“It'll be here as soon as they finish cutting it. I've got one of my people overseeing it this time, so there'll be no mistakes. They won't charge you for the new piece, seeing as how it's their fault.”

That would make Brad happy, but she wasn't thinking of the cost right now. “The two pieces won't match.” She'd seen how different the same stone could be. It all depended
on which part of the quarry it was taken from. Blue Pearl could vary as much as by five shades.

“They'll match. I give you my word.” He looked so intense, she felt he actually meant it. “I'm having them bring in more slabs from their warehouse in Phoenix. And I don't intend to back off until I'm satisfied.”

God help her, she envisioned a completely different scenario when he said that. One that had nothing to do with granite slabs. Swallowing didn't help. She had nothing to swallow with. Stacey abruptly turned on her heel and went to the refrigerator. After yanking the door open, she took out a bottle of water. She'd never been the type to walk around with a bottle of designer water in her hand, but without an accessible sink in the kitchen, she'd given in to the luxury she'd heretofore viewed as pretentious.

Right now, she was grateful that she'd stocked several of those little bottles in her refrigerator because her throat had gone utterly dry. And her tongue was sticking to the roof of her mouth. She almost drained the whole bottle before she felt she could talk.

“All right, then,” she said hoarsely, screwing the top back on the almost empty bottle. The next sound out of her mouth came like a croak. She cleared her throat. “I'll leave it in your hands.”

The grin on his lips made a beeline for her middle. “Good idea. I won't let you down,” he promised. And then he winked. “You look like you're in a hurry. I'll let myself out.”

She barely remembered nodding her head in response. What she was aware of was that her stomach had flipped over. Twice.

Grabbing her purse, Stacey hurried to the front of the house and then out the door. As she shut it behind her, she took in a deep gulp of air.

And all the while, she silently repeated a refrain in her head.

I love my husband, I love my husband.

The
front door opened and then closed. Her back to him as she finished preparing dinner, Stacey was aware of Brad's displeasure before he ever said a word. The sigh she heard was akin to a tropical storm.

Now what?

Forcing a smile to her lips, she turned around. “Hi, honey.”

He didn't seem to hear the greeting as he glared at the sink that wasn't, and the half-missing counter that still hadn't been delivered.

“You said five weeks,” Brad reminded her tersely. “It's been more than six. And they're not anywhere near finished.”

Sometimes she wondered if he retained anything but surgical procedures in his head. “I also said ‘or so,'” she reminded him not for the first time.

Brad sighed again. He didn't like things that were beyond his control. Dissatisfaction flowed through him.

He wanted his home back. He'd never been as domestic as Stacey obviously was. He hadn't entertained the feeling that some men enjoyed, that his home was his castle. It was just wood and stucco, but it was
his
wood and stucco and he wanted his privacy back.

He wanted to come in at night and not have to anticipate
strangers in his house, tearing out fixtures or running power tools at the maximum noise level.

If all this
had
to take place, why not during the daytime while he was out? That was why he made sure he was gone each morning before seven. This chaos wasn't supposed to dribble into the evening. Evening was for peace and quiet, not hammering, drilling and God only knew what all else.

More than peace and quiet, Brad wanted his wife back.

Half the time Stacey was gone when he came home. She was still back at the office, working in order to make up for being here in the morning to admit the first wave of workers. The other half of the time, when she
was
home by the time he arrived, she was busy talking to those same invasive workers, or to that lumpy graduate of Gold's Gym, the contractor.

The bottom line: she wasn't his anymore. She was this woman he hardly recognized.

The corners of his mouth turned down as he continued staring at the hole where the sink was supposed to be installed. It reminded him of the shape his life was in. Used to be he'd put in a grueling, soul-sapping day at the hospital and his office, and then he'd come home. To a haven of sorts. He hadn't realized at the time that it was a haven, but now he could see that was exactly what it was. And he wanted it back. He wanted his life back the way it had been a few weeks ago. Quiet. Simple. Organized and dependable. Just the way Stacey had been. She wasn't predictable anymore.

And he, well, he felt inadequate now. More than that, he felt like an outsider in his own home, in his own life. He'd never felt that way before.

And it was all because of the remodeling. Damn her hippie uncle for dying, anyway.

“Or so,” he repeated with a healthy dose of contempt. “That could mean forever.”

He always saw the down side to everything. There were times Stacey wondered how Brad had ever become a doctor. Doctors were supposed to deal in hope, not constant despair.

“More than likely,” she began evenly as she took the casserole she'd made in the Crock-Pot and transferred it into a serving dish. “What it means is that it's going to take just a few more weeks.” She did her damnedest to smile at him. “Look on the bright side. At least we have the family room back.”

She gestured in the general direction of the room. The area no longer looked like a storage place for a pack rat suffering from an advanced case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. The family room, thanks to her intense efforts, now looked the way it once had: pleasantly disarrayed with everything readily accessible.

The only noticeable difference in the room was one that she found very gratifying. Where once there'd been a wet bar, something that dated the house back to the seventies when it was first built, now finely crafted maple cabinets, stained with an eye-appealing honeyed hue, ran along the same wall. A mirrored backdrop broke up the straight line that went from top to bottom. It reflected a granite countertop. The same type of granite they would use for the kitchen counter.

The cabinets had just been installed today and she kept walking by to admire them. Granted, the doors still needed to have the hardware put in, just like the kitchen cabinets,
but it didn't matter. She loved every new piece, loved the rooms taking shape.

Brad obviously didn't share her feelings. His hands clasped behind him like an overly tall Napoléon, he went from section to section, scrutinizing each carefully.

Looking for flaws.

Stacey held her breath, waiting. “Dinner's ready,” she finally told him.

She might as well have been reciting the opening lines of a nursery rhyme. He didn't appear to hear her.

“At these prices,” he complained, waving a hand at the empty cabinets, “they should be perfect.”

She actually thought they were. Or close enough to it to satisfy her, at least. In her mind, she'd already staked out a section for the family photographs—a large section because the moments of a family's life needed to be commemorated. Another section was for tapes of family events, such as Christmases and birthdays. The tapes she had dated back to the Christmas before Julie turned two, when they could first afford a secondhand camcorder.

Bracing herself for another sparring match in which she had to defend the contractor, his crew, their work, and her decision to have this done in the first place, she asked, “What's wrong?”

He looked at her incredulously, as if she'd checked her brain at the door. “Can't you see it?”

Today had not been a good day at work. She'd almost lost her temper with the new girl, a temp who had been hired to take Andrea's place while the latter was still on maternity leave. By day's end, she'd seriously given thought to telling
Andrea to bring her baby in and hire the temp to be a baby-sitter. That appeared to be more in keeping with the temp's meager mental abilities.

Doing her best not to let the mood that had been created at work spill out into her home, she answered evenly, “I wouldn't ask if I did.”

“There.” Brad indicated the extreme left side where the cabinets had been fitted against the wall. The wood surpassed the wall by a little more than an inch.

“And there,” he said, pointing to the extreme right where the cabinet came in contact with the opposite wall. There, halfway down the wall, the wood began to edge out the plaster. By the time it reached the carpet, the cabinet had almost a two-inch advantage over the wall.

He glanced at her expectantly. Her expression remained the same. “Don't you see it?”

Stacey moved her head from side to side, still staring at the cabinets. “No.”

“Good thing you have me here.”

“Good thing,” she echoed. She was still clueless as to what he was talking about.

“The cabinet,” Brad finally told her, his voice controlled, his expression indicating the disdain he felt. He enunciated every syllable as if she were more than a little mentally challenged.

“Yes?”

“It juts out further than the wall.”

She already knew that. She wasn't blind. And she wasn't obsessed, either, she thought. “So?”

“So,” he repeated impatiently, “the sides—the cabinet,” he
emphasized, “is supposed to be flush with the walls. Both ends are supposed to be flush,” he insisted. “Tell them that, those guys with the tool belts. Tell them that I want the cabinet to be flush with the walls. Like the old cabinets were.”

“Right. Flush.” And then, because she wasn't thinking clearly, because she forgot that this was Brad, who could transform nit-picking into an art form, she made a fatal mistake, she asked, “Anything else?”

She'd fully expected him to tell her that he had no time for this and to finally sit down and eat his dinner. But he didn't sit. He didn't eat. Instead, he unbuttoned his jacket and said, “Now that you mention it…” He eyed the kitchen. The next moment, he was walking into it. “You might want to get a pad to write all this down so you don't forget.”

It was either willingly be present at the start of the Third World War, or do as he asked. Stacey chose the latter. She picked up a pad from the newly returned kitchen table and prepared to write.

 

Ten minutes later, she had her very own list of picayune flaws. Most of Brad's complaints had to do with the cabinet doors. There were an abundance of them in the kitchen, none of which met properly, according to Brad. Some were too high, some were too low, and a couple of sets stuck, rubbing against one another when opened.

The latter really seemed to annoy Brad. “Hell, I could do a better job.”

God forbid,
she thought. Alex would charge her double to undo what Brad did. When it came to being handy, Brad had a very special place in line. Right behind earthworms and
snails. The man hadn't a clue as to which tool was for what. It had always been that way.

Stacey was quick to render the excuse she always used whenever she wanted to call in a professional to do a job that Brad debated tackling himself.

“You know that your hands are too precious to risk injuring. Anyone can handle a band saw. Very few people have it in them to be a skilled neurosurgeon. You get hurt, you might never be able to operate. It's too big a risk,” she told him with finality, adding just the right note of pleading. “I can't let you take it.”

Brad sighed. And then he tapped the list she still held in her hand. “Then make sure you give Mr. Tool Belt my list.”

She'd always hated nit-picking, but she knew that Brad would give her no peace until he saw that his complaints were being addressed.

“As soon as he comes in tomorrow,” she promised.

Only then did Brad walk back into the dining room. To his by-now-cold dinner.