Jeannie Watt - Molly's Mr. Wrong

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“THIS IS A CUTE HOUSE and all, Molly, but what’s with these closets?”

Molly Adamson’s younger sister, Georgina, stood in front of the pint-size closet, holding a fistful of hangers and looking perplexed. At nineteen, she was a year older than Molly had been when the family moved from Eagle Valley, Montana, to Darby, Illinois, where her father had been tasked with reviving yet another failing store. Moving every year or two, depending on how long it took her father to work his magic or declare the store a bust, had been a fact of Adamson family life. But Molly had been lucky that the family had stayed in the Eagle Valley for three whole years, allowing her to finish high school there. It’d been the longest she’d ever lived in one place and probably the reason she was back. Eagle Valley was the closest thing to a hometown that she had.

Georgina set the hangers on the dresser and propped a hand on her hip as she regarded the space. “Didn’t people hang up clothing in the 1940s?”

“They probably didn’t own as much clothing as you do.”

“Point taken, but seriously, look at the size of this thing.”

Molly had to agree it was small, but other than the tiny closets, the house was perfect. Situated on the edge of town with a creek on the other side of the backyard fence and beyond that fields and mountains... It was more than she’d hoped for after making the decision to return. Housing options were limited in the Eagle Valley, unless you were rolling in money, which Molly definitely was not. Thank you, Blake. Her ill-fated relationship with an almost-pro ballplayer had played hell with both her finances and later her self-esteem, but it had also helped her to grow a backbone.

“I would have loved this closet when I was eight,” Georgina said. “Kid-size.” She tapped a finger on her chin. “Maybe I could build something. You know, shelving and stuff.”

Molly had seen that light in her sister’s eyes before. “Uh...give me a heads-up before you start knocking out walls, okay?”

Georgina flashed a smile. “I’ll probably be too busy with classes to do any serious renovation, but at semester break...don’t worry,” she said with a laugh. “I’ll have a plan in place.”

“Yes, I’d appreciate a plan.” Then it wouldn’t be like the time her sister had taken it upon herself to join her room to Molly’s by knocking out a space between wall studs with a hammer. Both girls had gotten a lesson in drywall installation and repair shortly thereafter, with Molly handling the brunt of the work, since she was sixteen and Georgina had been six. Their brother, David, who perfectly split their age span, being five years older than Georgina and five years younger than Molly, had enjoyed himself immensely, since for once he wasn’t the Adamson in deep trouble.

Molly walked down the hall to the kitchen, which was crammed with unopened boxes. She leaned against the door frame, letting her glasses slide down her nose as she regarded the room. Yes, she would make order of chaos, but she didn’t have much time, because her new job started in less than a week. Feeling a surge of adrenaline at the thought, she pushed off the door frame and opened the box closest to her and starting unwrapping her grandmother’s china and loading it carefully into the cupboards. Rain beat on the roof as she worked, a sound she hadn’t heard all that often in Phoenix, where she’d recently finished up her degree. Now it was a sound she’d been hearing for the past twelve hours.

“Need some help?” Georgina, apparently having given up on closet plans for the time being, drifted into the room. She opened a box without waiting for an answer and began unpacking kitchen utensils.

Finally, at nine o’clock, Georgina straightened from where she’d been kneeling next to the linen drawer and pushed her long dark hair away from her face. “Maybe I should go get us some takeout or something.”

“I don’t know how much takeout you’re going to find here. Maybe we should hit a grocery store instead.”

“Are you sure they’re open this late?” Georgina asked with a tiny smirk. “And that the sidewalks are still down, for that matter?”

“Hey, you’re the one who wanted to move with me to a small town,” Molly said as she looked around for her purse. Although Eagle Valley was bigger than it had been when she left a decade ago.

“I’m all over this small-town thing.” Georgina lifted a piece of packing material and handed Molly her simple brown leather purse. “But I was eight when we moved. There’s a lot I don’t remember.” And a lot that she did. She’d talked about it on the drive from Arizona to Montana, wondering what had changed and who still lived there.

Molly had been surprised when newly graduated Georgina had decided to move back to Montana with her and start postsecondary at Eagle Valley Community College. She’d also been glad for the company. She’d spent a lot of solitary hours while Blake had been on the road, blithely unaware that he wasn’t as alone as she was, so being alone felt different now. It reminded her of how stupid she’d been.

Georgina rolled up the rickety metal garage door, putting up her hand as a blast of water blew in. “You know, I used to like the rain.”

Half an hour later they were back with a carload of groceries. Georgina rolled down the garage door while Molly gathered as many bags as she could carry in one trip. She was starving, and the sooner the frozen pizza was in the oven, the better. She started for the steps leading up to the kitchen door only to stop dead as she came around the front of the car.

“What?” Georgina asked as she almost ran into her from behind.

“That.” Molly pointed to the far wall where water was starting to seep across the garage from under the edge of the door that opened to the yard.

Her cute house had a problem more pressing than closet space. Her cute house was flooding.

“Did the creek overflow?” Georgina asked.

“I don’t think so. It seemed pretty low yesterday.” Molly quickly climbed the steps and unlocked the kitchen door, set down the groceries and headed out to the back deck. The creek was still in its banks, but something was making the garage flood.

Using the small flashlight on her key chain, Molly walked around the edge of the house and shone the light on the concrete garage entryway, which was lower than the surrounding landscape and created the perfect place for runoff to flow. Water lapped against the bottom of the door.

“Damn. That’s at least three inches deep.”

“Poor design for sure,” Georgina muttered. “What do we do?”

Molly pushed her wet hair back. “We get out of the rain and cook our pizza.”

“Seriously?”

Molly shrugged as she led the way back to the deck. “We have nothing in the garage other than the car. The house sits a couple feet higher than the garage, so we ignore it until morning.”

When she and the real estate agent were going to have a chat.

But it turned out that the agent was on vacation for the next week and a half.

“I have half an inch of water in my garage from the storm last night and I want something done about it.”

“We’re a real estate office,” the woman on the other end said irritably. “You need a plumber.”

No. She needed to know why this situation wasn’t mentioned when she specifically asked about flooding and plumbing problems and was told there were none. “Have Mr. Hettle call me when he gets back, please.”

There was a hearty sigh on the other end of the line and Molly forced herself to stay silent. Not to apologize. It was hard to break that habit, but hitting her breaking point with Blake had changed her, helped her find her backbone, and people with backbones didn’t apologize so that other people would play nice with them.