Jen Lancaster - If You Were Here

Nick looks down at his wide, capable hands. I wonder whether, when he reads descriptions of how small and delicate Miriam’s tiny zombie fingers look resting in Amos’s broad, wide palm, he pictures his own calluses and scarred knuckles.

I wonder whether, when I talk about the pain and melodrama associated with coming of age, he sees his own teen years, and if he can find peace with the decisions he made long ago. And I’m curious whether somehow these stories help him make sense of his own life. Knowing that my words have an impact on an entirely unintended audience really touches me and I can’t help but smile.

Nick is apparently emboldened by my encouraging grin. “Also, I need to find out if Amos and Miriam ever get it on, and if so, will you please be describing their union in graphic detail with anatomically correct terms?”

As it stands, I can live in a squalid house or I can hire someone completely repugnant to fix it.

Talk about your Sophie’s choice.

“Hi, Chronic. It’s Mia MacNamara!. .Yes, the lady with the sugar cubes. .You’re welcome. I’m glad you liked them. . The grocery store, I guess. .Yes, probably any grocer will have them. . I can’t really say; I’ve never checked for them at the 7-Eleven. Anyway, I’m calling because we’d like to hire you to do our renovations. . Oh, no, really?. . Well, I guess that’s great for you guys. . Shoot. Okay, if anything changes and the band breaks up again, please let us know.”

“Hi, this is Mia MacNamara; may I speak with Lucky?. . No, I didn’t realize. . Do you know how long he’ll be gone?. . Yeah, our renovations probably can’t wait eight years. . No, not even with good behavior. . I agree, racketeering is a bitch. Thanks, anyway.”

“Hi, this is Mia MacNamara. . Right, right, the nosy woman with all the questions. Listen, I’m calling to find out about your availability. . You’re kidding. Booked solid? All summer?. . Okay, then good luck with your new business, and please let us know if your schedule opens up.”

“I don’t know, Mac. I don’t understand why, either.”

Between the two of us, Mac and I have called every general contractor/builder/carpenter/handyman/plumber/electrician in a hundred-mile radius, and we can’t even get anyone to give us an estimate, let alone commit to taking on our project. I wonder whether the folks who write newscasts and newspapers have talked to builders in our area, because it sounds like the housing boom is back.

“What are we going to do? I can’t keep living like this,” I say, surveying the wreckage of my kitchen, which is adjacent to the dining room with the crumbled wall, across from the library with all the ceiling holes, across from the living room with the aggressively ugly monkey wallpaper. Plumbing issues have crippled two more bathrooms and we’re down to one functioning toilet and shower. We’ve yet to get the smell of rotting carpenter ants out of the master, the mustiness emanating from the covered hot tub is almost unbearable, and there’s something alive and well in the wall of my writing room.

“We have no choice,” Mac says in a determined tone.

“You realize I’ll go to jail if the dogfighter steps into this house,” I remind him. People who are cruel to animals bring out my inner Swayze. I’ll show him exactly how not nice I can be, and I’ll probably still be more humane than those barbarians are with sweet, innocent doggies.

“That’s not who I meant.”

That’s when I feel my heart drop into my stomach.

“Mac, noooo! Nick was way too creepy! I seriously don’t want to be alone in the house all day with my number one fan!” I plead.

“I have plenty more vacation time,” Mac reasons. “I can take it now so you won’t be alone with him initially.”

“I can’t.” I curl into myself just imagining having that weirdo in my house.

Mac is firm. “You can.”

“I won’t.”

Mac stares me down. “You won’t what? Imagine how nice it might be to have the capacity to wash dishes? Use a toilet other than in the basement? Breathe in air that’s not full of drywall dust? Walk across a floor without shoes or with the confidence that it won’t give way at any time?”

I cross my arms in front of me and rock slightly back and forth in my chair. I don’t know what to do. Do I agree to have someone in my home who makes me unbearably uncomfortable, or do I suck it up and keep trying to find someone — anyone — else?

I need a sign.

As I rock forward, the leg of my chair punches through the hardwood and I topple out of my seat and onto the floor.

Okay, universe, I hear you loud and clear.

With great resignation, I say, “Fine. Call the pervert.” I’m too immobilized by the general feeling of ickiness 128to bother sitting upright. The dogs rush over to lie beside me.

“Good dog,” I whisper into the rough of Duckie’s neck while I glower at Mac. “You’d never make me hang out with a perv-o-potamus.”

Mac whips out his cell phone and retrieves Nick’s number. He dials quickly and walks into the dining room as the call goes through. “Nick, John MacNamara here. How are you?. . Good, glad to hear it. Hey, Mia and I wanted to see if you’re still available to spearhead our project. . What’s that?. . You’re joking. . You’re serious? Are you sure?. . Everyone?. . Is there any way to—. . Shit. . Well, yes, this is obviously going to affect her work. . Yes, we have been encountering—. . Fucking hell. . Nope, wasn’t aware of that, either. .”

I sit up, trying to hear more of the conversation, but Mac’s since paced into the living room. I get up to follow and the dogs trail along behind me.

“. . and that’s what it would take?. . There’s no other way?. . You’re sure? I don’t want her to have to—. . No, you don’t need to swear on your love of It’s Raining Mennonites. . Okay. Let me run it up the flagpole and I’ll get back to you.”

Mac walks over to where I’m standing in the doorway. “So, how badly do you want the house fixed?”

“On a scale of one to a hundred? At least ninety-eight.” 129

“Are you willing to make a sacrifice?”

“Like what? Going down two and a half flights of stairs in the night to go to the bathroom? Washing dishes in the bathtub? Already been there, thanks.”

“No, I mean a different kind of sacrifice. One that could temporarily compromise your principles.”

“I don’t follow you.”

“How much are you willing to give in order to get this ball rolling?”

Mac looks as cagey as he did the time he tried to keep the oven fire a secret. 130“You’re talking in circles. Out with it.”

Mac puts his hand on my shoulder. “So, remember when TMZ said Vienna was out for revenge?”

“Yeah, what of it? That was, like, two months and one cover of People with the headline Eat, Pray, Shove ago.”

“Then I guess revenge is a dish best served cold. She got her revenge; we just weren’t aware of it. You know how no one will work on our house? There’s a reason for that. Mia, we’ve been blackballed.”

Blackballed? Like a sorority pledge who made out with someone else’s date, then barfed in a fountain, lost her shoe, wiped out six active members while she tumbled down the stairs, and didn’t have Ann Marie pleading her case? “What does that mean?”

“Vienna’s family issued a moratorium on any contractor who works with us or on this property. No one can take the job.”

“Oh, come on,” I protest. “They can’t legally do that.”

“No,” he agrees, “but they’re huge real estate developers — the biggest in the country, actually. They can’t legally stop their subs from doing work with us, but they can make sure they don’t get any more family business. At least, that’s what Nick was told.”