High Plains Hearts (53 page)

The three of them sat in the boat, none of them speaking. The soft sighing of the poplars along the edge of the lake and the buzz of mosquitoes were a gentle backdrop to the quiet lap of the waves against the side of the wooden boat. In the distance, a bird called to an unseen companion, and a squirrel chattered angrily in protest of the interruption.

He loved this time, drifting idly in the boat on the little lake, thinking about the Creator and wondering why He would populate such a paradise with something as nasty as mosquitoes.

He slapped one that had managed to penetrate the DEET barrier, but he wasn’t fast enough. He knew that within a short time, he’d be sporting a lump.

Eventually he’d have to start the motor again if Livvy was going to catch her fish. He hadn’t had the heart to tell her that a lure didn’t really work unless the boat was in motion, or if she wanted to cast and recast the line. He just wasn’t ready to interrupt the mood with the sound of a motor. She’d understand.

He leaned back against the torn vinyl of the seat. Many summers ago he and Gramps had taken some of the dining room chairs that Gran had determined were too shabby for the public, and they’d cut the legs off and installed them in the boat. As Gramps had said, they weren’t pretty but they were comfortable, especially if they wadded up the rain tarps and used them as pillows, and rested their feet on the rubber waders.

This was a little piece of paradise, Sunshine was. He’d often thought that if anyone didn’t believe in a Creator, he’d just bring them out here on a boat on a summer afternoon. Nothing could quite compare to it.

He looked over at Livvy. Gramp’s old hat had slid down on one side, and she made no attempt to straighten it over her still wildly curly hair. Instead, she smiled at the sun-speckled water.

Her fingers loosened their grip on the pole, and he caught back a smile. He’d watch it to make sure it didn’t slip free.

If he watched closely enough, he was sure that he could see the stresses of city life falling from her, shed into the calm of the lake and absorbed by the water.

The pole slid a bit but she tightened her hold on it. Her manicure, he noticed, was still flawless. Within a short time, he suspected that would be a thing of the past.

Was she going to be able to do it? He had absolutely no doubt in his mind that she didn’t have any idea what she was tackling here, but for some odd reason he was comfortable with that.

He thought back to the moment at the café when she’d pulled the hood off and her hair was tousled. She had looked real then, he’d said—real, natural, not citified.

Last night he had prayed about selling Sunshine to her, prayed long and hard. More than anything, he needed to be sure that what was about to happen was the right thing to do. There were precious few times in life that he’d wished to have the gift of seeing the future—usually it had seemed like a dreadful burden that no one would wish for—and he still didn’t, but just some way of knowing selling Sunshine to Livvy was the right thing would have been so comforting.

But there were no answers, and he had to rely upon the feeling he’d gotten, that sense of prayer offered and answered. It was enough.

Sunshine would be in Livvy’s hands and, most importantly, God’s hands.

He turned and motioned to Gramps to hand him a root beer. It was part of their fishing tradition, having a root beer out on the lake.

There was something about being on the lake that made his grandfather seem less confused. He occasionally got a bit befuddled, but overall, sitting in the boat was good for Gramps. His mind rarely wandered when they were out on the water. Perhaps it was the calm, repetitive slap of the waves against the boat, and the gentle rocking motion. It certainly soothed him.

Gramps opened the cooler, took out a bottle, and tossed it to him. He twisted off the cap and was about to ask Livvy if she wanted one, when a sound stopped him.

It was ever so slight.

Livvy’s eyes were closed, and she was faintly snoring.

Gramps grinned and nodded. “She’ll be good for Sunshine,” the old man said in a low voice. “Anyone who can fall asleep with a fishing pole in her hands has the heart it’ll take.”

“She won’t catch anything with a lure,” Hayden said. “She’ll have to learn all that.”

His grandfather studied him, his eyes bright with insight. “I think she’s already caught something, Grub.”

Hayden frowned and checked her line. “Nope, nothing.”

Gramps just chuckled.

L
ivvy wiped her forehead with her arm and tried the wrench again. Tug as she might, the joint on the plumbing would not release. The basement of the house at Sunshine was cool, but she was frustrated. She’d been working on this leaking pipe for an hour with no luck.

That day of fishing seemed like three months ago rather than three weeks. So much had happened since her time with Hayden and Gramps on the lake. Now Sunshine was hers.

The men were still living there while she dog-sat Leonard. It was a nice arrangement. She was even beginning to appreciate having a dog around, although she wasn’t sure that Martha Washington shared her feelings when they came to Sunshine.

Leonard would leap out of the truck and bound across the yard to the porch, his ears flopping crazily, as the resident chicken flapped back to the safety of the coop and Martha Washington stood and puffed into her formidable angry-cat shape. Leonard, having once met the wrath of the cat’s claws, would temporarily abandon the overture of friendship and retire to the dirt next to the porch.

Sometimes that seemed like the best thing, soaking up the sun, and Livvy had done her share of it, but now she was determined to get busy with fixing up Sunshine.

She climbed down from the stepladder and consulted
The Complete Guide to Home Construction and Repair
once again. The photographs were clear and would have been extremely helpful if the plumbing in this house had looked anything like the plumbing in the book.

Plus the man with the wrench in the illustration, who smiled happily as the pipes cooperated and came apart with ease, had apparently never met the plumbing at this place.

“How’s it going?” Hayden asked as he came down the stairs. “Gramps said there was a leak down here and you were fixing it. You sure you don’t want to call in a plumber?”

She pressed her lips together to stop the retort that arose almost immediately. “I can do it.”

She wasn’t about to tell him that she had been stuck on “Step One: Freeing the Pipe” the entire time.

He nodded. “Do you need any help?”

“No, but thanks. I have an idea though that will revolutionize the construction industry.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

“Putting the pipes on the floor. Hanging them from the ceiling makes this a horrendously uncomfortable task.” She glared at the offending plumbing.

“I don’t know if that would actually be much help,” he said, walking toward her with caution. Tools and plumbing parts were spread across the cement floor. “But it’s an intriguing idea.”

“I went to Cooter’s this morning,” she explained. “Got my own toolbox and the parts I needed.”

“I see that.”

“There was a leak down here so I thought I’d start with something simple and fix it.”

His mouth twitched with amusement. “Something simple. That’s a good idea. Are you finding plumbing to be simple?”

“How hard can it be? I mean, honestly. One pipe is connected to another pipe, which is connected to another pipe, and all I have to do is make sure that the water stays in the pipes and not on the floor, which is why I’m down here.”

“That’s about the best description of plumbing I’ve ever heard.”

“Apparently though, whoever put these pipes up here stuck them together with some kind of super-powered glue.” She glared at the maze of pipes overhead.

He shrugged. “Possibly.”

“Anyway, I found out it was this one”—she tapped one with the wrench—“and sure enough, there was water coming from it.”

She smiled at the book, which had given good advice on identifying the leak. “I turned on the water, came down here, and watched to see where it was dripping. And voilà!”

He nodded. “That’s good. You remembered to turn off the water first, I hope, before trying to take the fitting off.”

She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Of course I remembered. There’s a diagram in here, on page sixty-four, of how to do that.”

He nodded again, this time a bit slower. “It sure sounds like that book has it all. Do you mind if I take a look at it?”

“Go right ahead.” Livvy made a face as a drop splashed on her shoulder. “Take a look at page sixty-four and tell me that’s not wonderful. Meanwhile, I’ll keep working on this—”

It happened all at once.

Hayden said, “Uh, Livvy,” just as the coupling on the pipe gave way at last.

Water poured onto the floor.

“Pail! A bucket! Get me something!” she yelled as she retrieved
The Complete Guide
from the encroaching deluge.

Hayden ducked behind the furnace and returned with a large plastic trash bin that had earlier held a collection of unused pieces of drywall, bits of wood left over from a recent window replacement, and tiles that Hayden had pulled out of the old bathroom. “Remind me to clean that up later. I had to empty it onto the floor,” he said as he moved it into place. “I’ll be right back.”

He took the stairs two at a time as she stood, watching in dismay as the container filled with water from the pipe.

How could this have happened? She opened the book and looked again at page sixty-four. She had done everything right. She’d turned off the water to the bathroom, hadn’t she?

She opened her book and again scanned the section on plumbing repairs. There was no mention of anything like this. Nothing.

Oh.

There was one tiny line, almost lost in the diagrams.
“Turn off the water to the house. ”

Well, why on earth did it tell her how to disconnect the water to the bathroom if she was going to turn it off to the entire house?

She wanted to sink to the floor and cry, but all that would do would get her pants wet.

She’d taken on way more than she—and
The Complete Guide to Home Construction and Repair
—could handle. Renovating a house was way beyond her capabilities. She couldn’t even manage a simple plumbing repair without bringing on a flood.

On television it was so simple. Leaky faucet? A few twists of a wrench and it was fixed. But maybe North Dakota had exotic plumbing—judging from the tangle of metal and plastic tubing in the ceiling joists, it had been put together by monkeys using leftover bits and pieces of plumbing. The whole thing should probably be taken out and redone.

But not by her.

It seemed like forever, standing in the basement and waiting for Hayden to come back. Maybe he’d left. After all, they’d signed the papers, she’d written the check, the title had cleared, and he had every right in the world to walk out of the house, get in his truck, and drive back to Obsidian, whistling the entire way. He and his grandfather were still living in the house until the housing for Gramps was set up, but there was nothing to hold them to being responsible for the antique plumbing woes that she was facing. She’d magnanimously taken that part out of the contract before signing it, telling herself that she could handle it herself.

The thought took root. Hayden was already out of the yard and headed down the county road, his grandfather beside him, and they were both delighted that he didn’t have to deal with Sunshine’s pipes.

Meanwhile she stood in a basement that was soon going to be filled with water unless she figured out something very quickly.

She scurried to the bottom of the stairs and called up, “Hayden? Hayden? Are you still there?” When she got no answer, she tried again, “Gramps? Gramps, did Hayden leave?”

Only silence answered.

She took a few tentative steps up. “Hayden? Gramps?” she tried again.

The house was silent. Even Leonard, who had come out from the house in Obsidian to Sunshine with her, didn’t bark in response. That was not a good sign. Leonard barked at everything from a cricket to an airplane.

She bolted the rest of the way up to the main floor and quickly looked around. No one was there.

She’d have to call a plumber.

Her cell phone was in her purse, which was on the table upstairs. She bolted up the stairs and dug through her bag until she found the list she’d meticulously prepared using the phone directory that Jeannie had lent her before she left on her mission trip.

With nervous fingers, she unfolded the sheet of paper and found the listing for plumbers. She tapped the numbers onto her cell phone’s keypad and heard … nothing. Silence.

She pulled the phone from her ear and glared at it. No wonder she couldn’t get through—there weren’t any bars on the display. There was no signal.

Hayden had mentioned that, and she’d forgotten it. She hadn’t tried her cell phone at Sunshine before, and she put it on her list of things to get to: work out the telephone situation.

There was a telephone in the living room. She shook her head.
Way to be calm, Livvy
, she scolded herself. She’d totally spaced that out.

That telephone worked, wired nicely into the wall, and she picked up the receiver. How weird it felt to use this phone. It must be decades old. The handset was heavy and black, with a ridge along the top.

She dialed the first plumber on her list, and got a recording with the hours—they were not open on Saturdays or Sundays.

And this was a Saturday.

She tried the second number, and this time got someone. “Sunshine? You want me to come to Sunshine to turn off the water? Do you know how far I’ll have to drive? Lady, that’s going to cost you about $300 just to do that. You want it fixed, too? You’re looking at $500, easy.”

Leonard barked, a long series of happy sounds, and she sighed in relief. That meant that Hayden must not have left.

Silly her. Of course he wouldn’t have gone off without telling her. She was just letting her imagination run away with her. She’d better nip that in the bud if she was going to stay out here all year round.