Jen Lancaster - If You Were Here

“Of course you couldn’t,” Kara confirms.

“Chef ’s kitchen?”Tracey asks.

“The kitchen alone was a thousand square feet, with furnituregrade cabinets, and they weren’t messing around with some rinkydink Wolf stove. Oh, no, they had a freaking AGA cooker. And there was a TV in the fridge door.”

“How many bathrooms?” Tracey prompts.

“Five full, three half. And one of them had an onyx countertop. Ridiculous.”

Tracey toys with her spoon before placing it by the side of her plate. “Did it have a wet bar?”

“One on the main level, a full bar in the walkout basement, and a bar area with the outdoor kitchen by the pool’s waterfall.”

“Oh, yeah.” Tracey smirks. “You made the right choice.” She doesn’t gloat and exclaim, “Team City!” like she normally does. She doesn’t have to.

“My point is, we need to find something soon before I shoot Vienna in her hair extensions,” I say.

“Accidentally, of course,” Kara adds.

“Yeah.” I snort. “ Accidentally . Get this — she’s aware of the problems we have with gangs in the neighborhood. And she realizes we trend a tiny bit militia and we’re always on high alert, right?”

“Is it just exhausting to be you sometimes?” Tracey asks.

I glance over at Tracey and answer her honestly. “Sometimes. Anyway, Mac’s fairly serious about hitting the gym before work ever since he saw himself in that three-way mirror at Bloomingdale’s. So last week, it’s about four thirty a.m., and he’s just about to go out the back door when he hears noises up front. Right as he gets to the front door, it swings open and Vienna staggers in wearing this ridiculous pink chinchilla bolero. Mac is all,‘Can I help you?’ And she slurs, ‘I’m here to show the house,’ and then he notices a drunken guy in tow. I guess she met him at a club and he wanted to see the house she had for sale. When Mac yelled at her — and believe me, there was yelling — she was all, ‘It’s my house and I’m allowed to be here!’ The whole situation kind of devolved from there, and when Vienna finally left, Mac honestly couldn’t figure out whether she was that stupid or that arrogant.”

Tracey quips, “Can’t it be both?”

“Ooh,” Kara squeals. “I saw her in that exact coat in OK! when I was at the nail salon last month. Wow, times must be tough for her if she’s recycling her outfits.”

“Really?” I ask. “ That’s your takeaway from this situation?”

Kara’s suddenly sheepish. “Oops, sorry. What are you gonna do?”

I shrug. “We keep searching. I don’t care if we have to look at every house in the AC; we are moving there.”

“Thanks for coming with us. These places are starting to blur together and we’re at the point where we’re having trouble keeping them straight,” Mac says. Tracey’s accompanying us to a house we saw earlier this week. We feel like it has potential because of a couple of key features, but want a second opinion from a trusted adviser. She’s up front with him, as we both hope to gauge her first reaction of the house when we drive up.

“Here’s the thing, Trace,” I begin. “When Liz showed us this place, she said, ‘A house like this takes a specific buyer.’ ”

Tracey’s mom is a Realtor, so she knows all the code words, like how “cozy” means “microscopic” and “conveniently located” means “freeway-adjacent.” “So you want me there to help you determine whether the home’s tackiness is superficial or goes all the way down to the bone.”

“Bingo. I guess because my taste trends a bit juvenile when it comes to decorating I can’t get a bead on this place. I’m not sure if the house is over-the-top or really elegant,” I reply. Tracey has exquisite taste in antiques, 44so I will absolutely do as she advises.

Because I grew up in a house that was so austere, I have trouble determining what’s stylish in terms of interiors. I’ve seen tons of television shows where designers demonstrate how to replicate a high-end piece with a low-cost improvisation, and I almost always prefer the inexpensive knockoff. So I figure if we’re going to make the biggest investment of our lives, I don’t want to discount a place for being gaudy when it’s actually gilded.

After we get off the highway, we wind down a couple of wooded lanes on the way to our potential street.

“Great neighborhood so far,” Tracey tells us, as we pass a couple of lovely Arts and Crafts — style homes with stunning river-rock stone supports, exposed roof rafters, and wide triangular eaves. One of them has the most gorgeous stained-glass windows I’ve ever seen, all done up in brown and gold florals. Tracey amends her approval with, “I mean, if you have to move to the suburbs.”

We pass a number of houses running the gamut from cute to spectacular. “I like that one a lot,” I say, pointing out the Prairie-style place with tons of symmetrical clerestory windows as we round the corner to the listing. “It’s so, like, Frank Lloyd Wright.”

“You ought to research that address — Wright built many homes up here. That may be one of his actual designs,” Tracey tells me.

Mac replies, “Cool,” and slows as we approach the circular stone driveway. Tracey’s not looking at what might be our house, because her attention has been drawn to the massive Shingle-style home across the street.

“How fabulous is that?”Tracey crows about the home’s elegant, understated simplicity. “It’s like a perfect beach house all tucked away here back in the woods. This is my favorite kind of home. Did you know Shingle style was the backlash to all those fussy Victorianstyle places at the turn of the century? I bet those shingles are made of white cedar, because—” And that’s when Tracey realizes we’ve parked.

“We’re here,” Mac tells her. He and I both hold our breath while we anticipate her initial reaction.

Tracey leans forward to peer through the windshield.

“Oh, sweet mother of Jesus.”

Mac and I exchange glances in the rearview mirror. I was bracing myself for that reaction, as this house definitely doesn’t look like anything else in the neighborhood, with its modern twist on French Provincial architecture. The house is massive gray stucco with a high hip roof, lots of balustrades, and matching twin chimneys. The windows are tall and paned, cutting into the cornices, and their shape is outlined by continual lines of raised molding. The whole house is balanced and symmetrical and. . a tad dramatic. 45

“Is the entry over-the-top?” I ask. Part of me already knows it is, and yet the part of me from a crappy Indiana ranch house can’t help but being impressed.

“Just a little,” Tracey agrees; then she points to the oversize cement urns flanking either side of the door. “Also, the owners need to get Sabrina Soto on the phone stat to talk about staging. Because nothing says ‘million-dollar home’ more than four dollars’ worth of plastic plants spray-painted green.”

We knock and then let ourselves in, where Liz awaits.

Last time we were here it was overcast and gray and we didn’t get a great look at some of the rooms because it was so dark. We struggled unsuccessfully with the lights in the foyer, so we didn’t experience the fully lit impact of it until now.

“Hey, you figured out the switches,” Mac comments.

“Okay, Tracey, here’s where I need your expertise. All of this crown molding — is it rich and expensive or is it too much?” The painted woodwork crisscrosses all over the foyer, running up and down the walls and across the ceilings, following the flow of a staircase that first curves in one direction and then the other. The banister’s wound with an ivy swag that trails up the stairs and across the Juliet balcony. An ornate chandelier hangs low over the entryway, draped in string after string of beads and crystals, branching off into hundreds of little light-topped arms, which make the foyer as bright as an operating room.