Bayou My Love: A Novel Page 3

  “Most of her stuff is still here,” he said. “She rented it furnished, and I travel light.”

  I felt a pang of guilt. How could I not know she was living some place other than her home?

  “So you’re Martine’s daughter, then?” he asked.

  I stopped. “How do you know my mother?”

  He turned toward me, biting his lip like he wished he could take those words back, then said, “Just from Vergie talking about her sometimes.”

  The thought of him knowing about my mother left me dumbstruck. I followed him through the house in a trance, sorting out what was real and what was not.

  He led me through the living room, the back bedroom and the sitting room, and I tried to remember the last time I talked to Vergie. The few times I’d prodded my father to explain why I couldn’t see her any more, he had quickly changed the subject. After my mother left, the summer visits had stopped. Why had I cut all ties simply because my father had? At sixteen, I could have called her. I could have written letters. I could have stood up to my father.

  Why had I never stood up for what I wanted?

  The dog was at my heels, her eyes fixed on me.

  “Don’t mind Bella,” Jack said. “She’s just trying to herd us.”

  “What?”

  “It’s what old swamp dogs do. Stop you from getting lost forever.”

  Her bobbed tail wagged.

  I followed Jack as he climbed the stairs, distracted by the sway in his shoulders and his hips. He had an easy way about him, but he seemed as solid as the earth beneath us. His hands were solid too—those of a man who knew exactly what he was capable of, exactly how he could mold bare materials into what he wanted.

  I loved feeling hands like those on my skin.

  “There’s a good bit to be done here, I guess,” he said, pausing in the upstairs hallway. “I helped her with small things, like the cabinets and floors, but I didn’t get into any big projects.”

  The banister was cool under my fingers. It was as big around as my thigh, carved in a Victorian style with simple lines. The spindles were square, not those dainty round ones that most people went for.

  “I could probably be done in a couple of weeks,” I said, peeking into the first upstairs bedroom. The bed was made up with a patchwork quilt, an antique desk and chair by the window. The curtains rippled like water in the breeze. It looked like it had been empty for years.

  He laughed, shaking his head. “A couple of weeks? You won’t find people around here who’ll work that fast.”

  “No people. Just me.”

  He stopped cold. “You’re going to fix all of this by yourself?”

  “Sure.” I wandered through the next room, a makeshift study and library. When I turned back to him, he was slack-jawed.

  “What, you’ve never seen a woman fix a house?” I get a kick out of watching people’s reactions when I tell them what I do. It was like the idea of a woman wielding a hammer and paintbrush for purposes that didn’t include hanging pictures or painting with watercolor was too much to fathom. “I do this for a living,” I said.

  His mouth curled into a crooked smile that must have broken half the hearts in the parish. “Guess they don’t make many like you any more, either,” he said.

  “I was sort of a tomboy growing up.”

  “Could have fooled me.” His eyes drifted down to my feet, then back up to meet mine.

  That look made me more aware of how my clothes stuck to me in this relentless heat. Not expecting to meet a soul today, I’d thrown on a thin camp-style shirt and an old pair of jeans with holes in the knees. Clothes were one of those details Dad claimed I overlooked. I rolled the sleeves up higher and placed my hands on my hips, staring him down.

  “I wouldn’t have taken you for the manual labor type,” he said.

  “I still like to get dirty. Some things never change.”

  He smiled and motioned for me to follow him down the hall. I noted the cracks in the plaster, the ancient light fixtures with their painted glass, the way Jack’s broad shoulders strained the seams of his shirt.

  His playfulness was disarming. He was so good-natured, even when he was about to be evicted. It felt easy to be with him, and for me that was rare.

  “I think I have the answer,” he said, leading me toward the back bedrooms. “It’s win-win. You’ll like it.”

  “Go on.” One of the remaining bedrooms had a bed and dresser, an antique highboy with ball-and-claw feet. The last room was empty of furniture but full of boxes.

  “How about I stay here while you do whatever work you need to do, and then you can turn me out into the cold, gator-infested bayou. While I’m here, I’ll help you with the repairs. I’m pretty good with hammers and miter saws and whatnot.”

  “What makes you think I need any more hands?” Especially those hands, which I too easily envisioned gripping my hips instead of a hammer.

  He led me back down the stairs. “Simple math. If, instead of you doing all this by yourself, you have me, then the work gets done twice as fast.”

  “Assuming you can take orders. And assuming your work is top-notch.”

  “Well, of course. And I figure you’re going to need somebody who knows all the locals—what if you need a plumber or an electrician? You need a sub-contractor who can tell you who’s reliable and who’s gonna rip you off.”

  “Good point, but there’s still one problem. I was going to stay here while I worked.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “I can’t stay here if you’re here. And hotels will cost a fortune. That’s not in the budget.”

  He nodded toward the upstairs. “You can stay here. It’s not like we’re short on rooms.”

  I laughed. “Stay here with you? Not a chance.”

  “What? I won’t bite you, cher.” He walked back onto the porch, pulled a cigarette from his pocket and lit it with a match. “Miss Vergie trusted me. You can trust me too.”

  “Bless her heart, but Grandma Vergie was a little bit nuts,” I said.

  She used to take in strays too—hell, that’s probably where I got my inclination. She was one of those kind souls who never locked her doors and always trusted everybody to do right. I was slower to trust people and let them get close. I’d learned over and over that when you let people get close, they hurt you. They leave you. Friends said I was guarded, but to me that was just watching out for yourself. It made life less painful.

  He shook the match, and the scent of sulfur and cloves filled the air between us. “I’ll make you a deal,” he said, holding his hand up in a Boy Scout salute. “If I misbehave, you can banish me to the couch at the firehouse. That’s incentive enough to be good, believe me.”

  “The firehouse?”

  He nodded. “Engine Six. On the other side of the canal.”

  “I wouldn’t have taken you for a firefighter.”

  He stroked his chin. “Why, because of my squeaky-clean exterior?”

  I tried to picture him in a fire truck. He seemed too laid back to squeeze himself into a state-regulated uniform.

  “Can’t a guy look a little rough around the edges on his day off?”

  When I didn’t reply, he said, “I get it. You think I’m just another hooligan trying to pull a fast one. You want to see my shield?”

  “Actually, I do.”

  He pulled his wallet from his back pocket and flipped it open. A flash of brass caught my eye.

  “Still, I don’t even know you,” I said, leaning against the porch rail. “I’m not in the habit of moving in with strange men.”

  “Well, I’m not accustomed to taking in strange women,” he said. “But I’m willing to concede in order to help both of us out of a sticky situation. This way, you get to do your job, and I keep a roof over my head.”

  “Can’t you stay at the firehouse for a few weeks?”

  His eyebrows rose as he took a long drag on the cigarette. “It’s kind of crowded right now,” he said. “Got a few guys in the
dog house and such. Happens about this time every year.”

  “In June?”

  “I don’t understand it, either.”

  “You have a copy of the lease?” I asked.

  “Sure,” he said. “It’s around here somewhere.”

  “I’d like to see it.”

  He nodded, crushing the cigarette into the step. In the kitchen, he rooted through a drawer by the stove.

  “I can’t do this if I don’t know anything about you,” I said.

  “OK,” he said, thumbing through the papers. “Fair enough.”

  “I have questions.”

  He smiled. “I have answers.”

  I poured myself another glass of water. He stepped away from the drawer just long enough to pull a chair out from the table for me, like it was a reflex. The gesture struck me as tender, and then I realized why he seemed familiar.

  “You were at the funeral,” I said. Even though I’d banished the details from my mind, at unexpected moments, they would come pouring back.

  He glanced up from the stack of papers and fixed his dark blue eyes on me. I remembered those eyes.

  “You gave your seat to two little old ladies,” I said.

  He cocked his head and smiled. “You’re the one that ran out in the storm. I was talking to your friend before she went after you.”

  I cringed at the memory. I’d been overwhelmed thinking about my mom leaving, Vergie dying and the possibility of running into my mother there. I’d dashed out of the church into a thunderstorm and stood on the lawn in the pouring rain until my friend Kate came out and dragged me to the car.

  “You cut your hair,” I said. “I didn’t recognize you.”

  He shrugged. “It’s OK. I didn’t recognize you dry.”

  “I can’t believe it’s you,” I said.

  “I believe you had some questions for me.”

  It was easy to see why Vergie liked him. He was one of those guys who made you want to bake him a cake, who made you smile at bad pick-up lines. Some people just have a way about them that makes the world seem a little brighter. Vergie had also been one of those people.

  “So you’ve been working for Vergie since you were seventeen?” I asked.

  “Off and on.” As he leaned against the table, it squeaked under his weight. “Started out doing odd jobs, then did more repairs when I got older. I’d come by and check on her a couple times a week and do whatever she needed done.”

  I watched his eyes to determine if he was lying. I was a good judge of character, but I’d been wrong once or twice, and it had made me gun shy, particularly when it came to smooth-talking, good-looking men.

  “How long have you worked for the fire department?”

  “Six years.”

  “Why did you come check on Vergie every week?”

  “She looked out for me,” he said. “So I looked out for her. It’s what we do around here.” He handed me the lease. “Here you go.”

  I turned to the back page and found Vergie’s signature. Indeed, he had paid in advance. I searched for a clause that would void the lease upon the landlord’s death, but there was none.

  If what Jack said was true, how had I never seen him at the house all the summers I’d visited? He couldn’t have been more than a couple of years older than me, and I would have remembered a teenage guy hanging around the house—especially when I was so boy-crazy I could hardly see straight.

  According to the lease, he’d been renting six months. “What do you do besides fight fires?” I asked.

  His fingers traced the stubble on his neck, until they disappeared in the collar of his shirt. When he spoke, he stared right at me, as if he was reading me just as carefully. “For work or play?”

  I wondered if those terrible lines worked on women down here, or if they were reserved for out-of-towners who could be lulled into anything with a wink and a drawl.

  “Either,” I said.

  “Nothing that’s too embarrassing or impressive, cher.” He half-smiled and opened the kitchen door, leading me back to the porch. We sat down on the steps. “But listen,” he said, pulling a cigarette out, “you’ll be safe here with me. And believe me, if you weren’t, everybody in the parish would know about it, because everybody knows everybody’s business out here on the bayou.”

  “Think I could bum one of those?” I nodded toward his cigarette.

  “You’re in luck… My last pack and then I quit.”

  He tapped another out, then leaned close as he cupped his hands around the match and lit the clove. I glanced up and caught his eyes for a moment through the smoke.

  Clearly this had the potential for disaster—the kind that had nothing to do with the house. “Thanks,” I said. “You were making me want one.”

  “So do I pass?”

  I liked his quiet confidence. His eyes had a sleepy look about them, but there was a sharpness behind them as well—something that said I shouldn’t mistake his easygoing manner for ignorance.

  “Did you spend much time with her?” I asked him.

  He smiled. “When she started renting to me, she came by to see me every Sunday. She said she was checking on the house, but I knew she was checking up on me. Your grandmother made a mean chicken pot pie.”

  “You knew her better than I did in the end.” I wondered what they talked about, what he knew about her. If I let him stick around, I’d find out. That thought finally swayed me.

  “I don’t have much family of my own,” he said. “She adopted me, you might say.”

  I could have been the one hearing all of Vergie’s stories, instead of Jack Mayronne. If only I hadn’t been so scared of my father.

  “Come on, Enza,” he said. “People here have boarders all the time. You’re just renting me a room like anybody else would do if they had a big old house like this to themselves.”

  I took a long drag on the cigarette, watching the line of smoke rise toward the white porch ceiling. If Vergie trusted him to help her around the house, then he must be a decent man. She was always looking for the good in people, but she could spot the bad as quick as she spotted potato beetles in her garden.

  I made a silent plea, hoping that wherever Vergie was, she could reach out and intervene if I was about to do something stupid. I waited for an instant, just in case a pipe burst or a vase went flying off the mantle as a kind of thump on the skull from the great hereafter. But there was nothing.

  “Here’s the deal, Mr. Mayronne. You help me with repairs, and I’ll give you six weeks to move out. If we finish before then, I’ll refund your rent for the remaining days.”

  “What if it takes longer?”

  “It won’t.”

  “I could help you if it does,” he said. “I owe a lot to Vergie. I’m not saying I can work for free, but I’ll do you a better deal than anybody else around here.”

  “Six weeks is all I need,” I said. “But if you like, we’ll leave that option on the table.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, extending his hand.

  When we shook, his fingers tightened around mine, and a ripple passed through my arms and chest, like when a pebble is dropped in a pond.

  He smiled. “This’ll all work out fine. You’ll see.”

  I almost believed him.

  Chapter 3

  After hauling my tool box and suitcases into the foyer, I paused at the bottom of the stairs to give the banister a shake. It was sturdy as a water oak. That was the thing about these old swamp houses: The plaster was cracking, and the walls weren’t straight any more, but the woodwork was solid. The floors were made of heart pine boards eight inches wide. The ten-foot ceilings downstairs had carved crown molding that made my heart flutter. The upstairs bath had a clawfoot tub and a stained glass window that I wanted to cut out and take home with me. If those details had registered with me as a teenager, they’d been lost in the ether of young adulthood. In my memory, this had been a quaint little farm-style house—cute, but nothing special. Now, seeing its pocket door
s and hand-carved moldings, I was smitten.

  Stop, I told myself. This has to be just another flip.

  Jack walked in behind me and grabbed my suitcases. “Let me give you a hand with that.”

  I followed him up to Vergie’s old bedroom. Of the rooms upstairs, this one was the most furnished. It had the dresser, the highboy and the four-poster bed. Framed pictures hung over a vanity by the closet door, and books were stacked on the shelf of the nightstand.

  Jack set the suitcases by the dresser and then opened two windows to get a cross-breeze. “Sorry it’s so stuffy in here,” he said. “I’ll put the extra window unit in here so you won’t melt.”

  “When I was a girl, I used to sneak in here to play,” I told him. “I don’t know why it seemed so magical at the time, but it was like Alice’s rabbit hole.”

  Back then, I’d rummage through the closet and pick through the dresser drawers, but Vergie didn’t mind. Her room had been a shrine to her travels, the shelves filled with trinkets from places I’d never heard of. Now, as I studied the dark wood and faded wallpaper, it looked like any old bedroom. The mystery had slipped away.

  “I left everything in this room alone,” Jack said.

  “How come?”

  “She told me to box everything up in here when I moved in, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.” He leaned against the post of the canopy bed, ran his fingers along the carved vines. “I didn’t need the space.”

  A collection of pictures sat by the lamp on the nightstand: a couple of me, and two black and white photos of my mother that I hadn’t seen before. To me, my mother was a ghost. It was as if she’d vanished—poof!—like a dove under a magician’s handkerchief. Dad refused to talk about her—ever.

  I didn’t forget about her, because how can you, really? But I tried.

  After she left, Dad found ways to keep me busy in the summer so I wouldn’t have time to think of those summers with Vergie. Jobs, college prep courses, internships. He scared me into thinking I needed all of those things to even dream of success, so I did what he told me. He said I was too old to do nothing in the summer, that if I didn’t start working toward a goal, I’d end up as lost as my mother.