Chapter Three

I waved any time I walked by. Just in case he was inside, or could see through the windows. Work had slowed down. Maybe just the cleanup had. I usually saw one or two trucks outside. I could never be sure, however, if they were just always parking there overnight because suddenly the lot was more open. If one was his, I couldn’t be sure which one. And they both looked like they did heavy work. I couldn’t be sure he did anything. For a man to buy a piece of property apparently on a whim, it seemed unlikely he’d have a ‘workman’s’ truck. 

I was getting ready for work one morning. The sky looked a little threatening through my half-open window, so I decided to check if there was a call for rain. I hated having to haul my umbrella and raincoat for no reason. No rain but there was a heat advisory. I suppose that answered the heavy-hanging clouds outside. Nearly up to a hundred– not normal for our state. 

Getting together my lunch and bag for the day, I paused. Looking at the two tall jars in my refrigerator– one iced green tea, the other lemonade. Tapping my fingers on them and wondering how forward and silly I was being. I grabbed the lemonade– I made my tea with barely any sweetener and based on no evidence at all, Zevi seemed like he’d like sweet things. 

My ears were perked and my eyes were up as I walked by the lot. Same trucks as before. I lingered for a second. Feeling the lemonade clanking heavily in my purse. Cursing my stupid crush. Cursing the weight of screw-top jars. Panicking and wondering if I’d actually screwed it tight enough or if it was slowly leaking all over my two phones and the laptop in my bag.  

As I dug through my things to check if that was the case, I heard the side door open with a cheap, aluminum thwap. Looking up, hoping it would be him and not some other worker. It was him. But it took me a moment to realize it was him. Not in his work clothes, not in his cap. Slacks, a button-up, dress shoes with those little slipcovers on them. Peering down at a clipboard.

“Hey,” I called hoarsely from the sidewalk.

He looked up. Realized it was me and smiled.

“Hey, good morning!” he called back. I started walking toward him, one hand still buried in my bag.

“This is, like, so stupid,” I said, feeling even stupider than I sounded, no doubt. “But I saw that the heat was going to be like… Well, you know, really hot so–”

I finally managed to unearth the jar of lemonade from my bag and thrust it toward him.

“Although,” I said, trying to draw it back. “It doesn’t look like you’re working today, so–”

“Sure would like a drink for the road though,” he said, reaching out to grab it from me.

Feeling his warm fingers around the cool condensation that had grown almost from the instant I’d taken it from the fridge. I hated myself for my dumb obsession. Noticing how broad his fingers were, and how wide his palm was. 

“‘Kay,” I said dumbly, letting it go. 

“How kind of you to think of me,” he said, flashing his teeth at me once more. 

Was there a little extra something in the smile though? Something that hadn’t been there previously? Something more like the wolf about him than before. God, I’d been obvious. That was why. 

“Well, see you around,” I said.

“I’d ‘bettah’!” he yelled as I continued down the sidewalk. My own face, now that I was getting away from him, cycling between gritting my teeth and grinning.

By the time I got to the office I was sweating through my blouse, my face felt shiny, and even my ears felt warm. From the lot to the office was only about a six-minute walk, and still, I felt damp with sweat. It was going to be a gross day. 

The good thing about it just being Rachel and me in the office was that we set our temperature. I used to always think I got summer colds that seemed to linger for two months, but the symptoms always used to spike at work. It turned out I just couldn’t handle going from high-heat to corporate conditioning. 

We’d make sure the place was much cooler if we had in-person appointments, but aside from that, we usually didn’t bother. Today, at least, I turned on the overhead fan in my office.

Rachel’s office had been a two-story home at one point. The upper floor was an apartment, the lower floor had been a hair salon, previously. Rachel had been renting the apartment, and living over the salon. When the salon closed, Rachel bought the whole building and began working out of the first floor.

I’d helped her convert and clean up. It had been a very old-fashioned salon. It still had the dome-style dryers in it. And had allowed customers to smoke inside. We spent a lot of time just deep cleaning the place. Scrubbing down walls and ceilings, ripping out the floors. We’d kept most of the overhead fans though. 

She still lived above the office. Which made me occasionally concerned that she let herself become overly-wrapped up in her work. She enjoyed it, and took it seriously, without letting the seriousness overwhelm her or make her impatient. She had been a corporate lawyer for a large firm downtown. When the building she lived in went up for sale, she decided to put out her own shingle and shift into business law. And she really cared about building up independent and small business owners in our area. I admired and appreciated her for how much she cared about that since she wasn’t even from here. At least I’d grown up here. I had parents who owned a business. Of course, I cared. But the fact that she did made it seem like a real and plausible goal to bring up the whole neighborhood. 

But it was also why I’d been so concerned about what Zevi was going to do with the lot. The nominal “investment” people seemed to be willing to do here were flipping houses, or perhaps opening yet another vape store. We didn’t need that. We were a neighborhood that had no nearby grocery store– but at least four fast food “restaurants” in a square mile and a half or so. We also had far more empty buildings than open ones. 

I had met Rachel’s ex, just the once. They’d previously worked together. And I knew he thought what we were doing was small potatoes. Working with the small business administration to get loans for single owners. Helping new businesses create contracts and employee handbooks. The inevitable tax disputes with someone wandering in with a paper sack of receipts and the oft-repeated, “I didn’t know.”

He’d been shiny and plated and derisive. And I watched Rachel just shrug and smile. I was so impressed by that. I started imitating it for myself. I knew I was right– I knew I liked what I did, and I knew it mattered. And everything else could just fall away. 

And that was true of everything. For years I’d let men– especially men I was interested in or had history with– use their out-loud judgment of me to curb me. Or quiet me. Or turn me aside entirely. And I watched how easily she threw his disapproval away and took that for myself. A lot of the time it was an act. But it didn’t matter– if the effect was the same, then the fact that I didn’t feel it all the way was all right.  

And I didn’t think our work was unimportant in the least. To me, it was rebuilding the community. To me, it was helping my neighbors. And helping to create the kind of neighborhood I remembered, and wanted to have again. 

When Rachel came down a couple of hours later, she flicked on the switch for the air conditioning.

“It is hot today,” I called to her from my office.

“Oh, yep,” she agreed, setting an apple on my desk for me as she came in. “But I have somebody coming in.”

I scrambled on my desk for her appointment book, flipping it open. Usually when she had an early morning appointment I’d turn on the air, tidy up her office, get tea or coffee brewing, but I hadn’t seen anything. But maybe I’d missed it.

“No, you don’t,” I said, feeling if not sounding a little frantic. I usually didn’t slip up like that. I wanted so badly to take things off her plate so when I couldn’t, or made a mistake, I beat myself up.

“Oh, nothing major,” she said. “I probably didn’t even tell you. It’s an acquaintance of a cousin who recently moved into the area who referred me, and we’re just having a little ‘how you doin’ today. Nothing to worry about.” 

“Oh,” I said. 

Even so.

I got up, turning on the electric kettle. Doing a quick round through her office as she clicked away. Picking up the mangled pen caps and paperclips scattered on her desk. Brushing away muffin crumbs as she tried to swat me away like a fly. 

While we were laughing and fighting, I heard the little bell over the front door go. We’d kept the tinkling little doorbell from the salon. 

“Got it,” I said, grabbing up a handful of stray notes she had crumbled on her desk. 

“Oh,” I gulped, seeing who it was at the door. “Zevi?”

“‘Bettah’ believe it,” he chirped. Still in his ‘office’ outfit from this morning. So that was why no jeans-and-tee combo. “But what’s a pretty little thing like you doing in a place like this?”

“I work for Ms. Berg,” I said.

“Ah-ha. Thus, it all comes together. For I myself am here for Ms. Berg. She knows my cousin,” he said by way of explanation. 

“Oh. So you’re her morning… Um, coffee or tea?” I asked, finally getting back into a more usual groove.

“No, thank you,” he said. “I just had several gulps of lemonade and am feeling quite refreshed.”

Rachel suddenly exited her office. Usually she’d wait until I escorted someone in, but I guessed we were taking longer than usual.

“Mr. Diamond,” she said, hand outstretched.

“Ah, just Zevi,” he said, ducking his head and taking her hand. 

I waited to see if he’d use both hands like he did with me. Feeling an uncomfortable and childish electric zap of envy. He didn’t, and I still wished I could toss myself off a cliff for even bothering to notice.

They went off into her office and I slumped into mine. Red with embarrassment and immaturity.  

I heard frequent bursts of laughter from her office for the next half hour, or maybe a little less. Smiling to myself because of course he could make her laugh. They both liked to laugh. And he was fun. Oh god, I said to myself, grow up, are you really developing a crush on the new boy?

Then I knew it wasn't even in development, it was full-blown. 

He exited eventually. Leaning around my door frame.

“So, I guess I’ll see you around plenty, neighbor,” he said. 

“Guess so,” I agreed.

“Didja bring your umbrella today?” he asked.

“No-o,” I said slowly, surprised by the question.

“Hm, bad luck for you,” he said. “I was going to do some work outside today, but I don’t think that’s going to happen for us. I can just feel it. Maybe I’ll try to do more indoor work. We’ll see how lazy I’m feeling. I’ve had such a tiring morning of wandering around in offices and banks today.” 

I laughed, I couldn’t help myself. Wondering about that self-deprecating humor he always used– playing that he was indecisive, lazy, silly or dumb. He didn’t look like any of those things. I took myself so seriously, and he didn’t take anything about himself seriously. But I felt his calluses. I’d seen the dust on his skin. I saw his late nights and early mornings. Today I saw his starched button-up and shined shoes. All of those things appeared to be true.

“There wasn’t any call for rain,” I said. “I think you’re just being lazy.”

“Mmm, maybe,” he said. “But I don’t think so. I can smell it.” 

“Oh, ahuh,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“Mm, I’m getting thirsty,” he said. “Best return to my jug of lemonade. See you, neighbor.” 

I dropped my face into my hands after he left, waving over his shoulder once more as the bell clanged.

“Well, he likes you,” Rachel called from her office.

I didn’t know she’d been eavesdropping.

“You sounded pretty chummy yourself!” I yelled back.

“No, he told me as much. Liked your ‘bad attitude’ and your ‘vociferous championing’ of the neighborhood,” she said.

I blinked, got up and wandered to her. Leaning on her door frame, arms crossed. 

“He said you ‘barked at him’ like a ‘particularly defensive chihuahua’ on the subject of public health,” she said. “And what was that about lemonade?” 

“Um,” I said.

She wiggled in her seat, looking up at me more carefully and swiveling her chair away from the screen in front of her.

“He was making me laugh about you,” she said, leaning forward and resting her chin on her hands. “So cough it up; what was that about lemonade?”

“Oh god,” I groaned. “I see him sometimes on my way to and from work. I knew it was going to be hot today, so I grabbed a jar of lemonade to give to him because I don’t know… He seems like the kind of guy who would give himself heat exhaustion and dehydration working in an attic on a day like today, and I just don’t believe in letting people die–” 

She leaned back again, her chair rocking dangerously back toward the wall, and laughed aloud. Then pointed at me.

“Hah! Little bitch has a big ol’ crush,” she crowed. “Didn’t know that your type was ‘cheerful beardo.’”

“Hush,” I said, stomping back to my office on her laughter. 

We both ended up staying a little late that evening. We’d gotten on a good roll on a proposal and sort of forgot ourselves. We were sitting in the “conference room”– what used to be the shampoo space for the salon. That only had high casement windows of glass block. Because of that, I hadn’t realized how threatening it got outside until I stepped back into the front room. The sky was that eerie gray-green it would sometimes get before very rough storms. The ornamental grass of our front lawn was whipped flat to the ground under the onslaught of the wind pushing the storm in. 

“Oh,” I said.

“Crap,” Rachel said. “Rush home, sorry.” 

“See you tomorrow,” I said, hitching my bag up on my shoulder.

It was pre-thunderstorm weird outside. Now, of course, even I could smell the impending rain. I was pretty sure, or at least pretty hopeful, I could make it home. Even if it did rain it wasn’t the worst thing. As soon as I got in, I could strip off my wet clothes and take a shower and be back to rights. I had decided against the rain jacket and umbrella this morning. Big whoop– wet hair, wet blouse, I’d live.

But of course it wasn’t just rain and the eventual storm was scarily punishing. I was fighting the wind when I came abreast of the lot. Everything on me soaked, hair pounded flat to my skull. All the lights were blazing on the bottom floor of the building on the lot. And I suddenly saw him in the display window on the corner of the building. Back in jeans and a tee shirt. His cap on backward. Looking sunshiney in the golden lights of his standing lamps. 

He looked up as I was going by. Stopped. Pounded the flat of his hand on the window and then jerked his head toward the side door. I started hurrying faster down the sidewalk. But he stood in the doorway of the side entrance. I could see him open his mouth but couldn’t hear him over the rain at first.

“Get the hell inside now, woman!” I finally heard him yell, even over the thunder and wind. 

I glanced around and then rushed to the door.

“I really don’t–” I panted out before he reached through, grabbing my wrist and pulling me inside. I halted, dripping in the weird almost-sun house style side of the ground floor. Tarps everywhere. Paint trays. Big industrial-sized garbage bags.

“Just–” he said, holding up his hand in a halt. 

I shook my hands, water flickering off my fingertips and catching the light. Considered squeezing out my hair but knew I’d just end up making my clothes even more wet and drenching his floor. I stood, arms akimbo, fingers still dripping, hearing the rain pattering off my skirt and the storm still raging behind me for forty seconds or less.

He returned with one of those pink rolls of disposable shop towels. Shrugging and grinning like he usually did.

“Sorry,” he said. “This is what I had.”

“I don’t even know why I bothered stopping,” I said.

“Hey, I’m sorry I didn’t have great, big fluffy bath sheets, but this is pretty good,” he groused. 

“Oh no,” I said. “That’s not what I meant, I just meant there’s no good way to clean up or dry up, and I might as well have kept on for home. I’m only a few minutes away now and–”

I shut up as he started to try and pat me dry with a handful of the towels. My face first, cupping the hair hanging against my cheek and squeezing it out.

“Well, you can at least wait until it slows down a bit,” he said, nudging.

He stopped patting me, hand pausing where my neck met my shoulder. 

“I keep finding myself cleaning you up,” he said, letting his hand drop. Maybe because I hadn’t said whether I would or wouldn’t wait out the storm.

I wished he’d bring his hands back to me. I also wished I could reach out to him, get my hands on him. But another part of me said the whole thing was absurd. Who was I and who was he? How was I to know whether he’d just be one more bad landlord around here? And he hadn’t really expressed any interest. He was just friendly and fun. And I was bored and didn’t know how to read people. 

“You keep dirtying me up,” I said. 

I was trying for flirtation and hoped he knew it was such. God, how did other people do it?

“You can hardly blame the storm on me,” he said.

“Seems as if you called it down this morning,” I shot back. 

He reached up, slicking back my hair then. Off my forehead and temples, so it wasn’t dripping into my face any more. I swayed backward but kept my feet. Not upset, just surprised. 

“Suppose you could say that,” he agreed mildly. 

Oh no, I thought, it was really all over for me. A very adolescent crush, that instantaneous lightning strike kind of thing. Sudden, sickening and overwhelming. All fluttering muscles, thundering hearts and churning guts. 

“If I was calling down a storm,” he said, when I finally stepped away from him. “It was only to assure you of a cozy night at home. I was picturing a cup of tea and… you a reader? Movies?”

I laughed. “Both. Or cooking.”

“Right!” he agreed, snapping his fingers as if knowing it was so. “Cup of tea, novel, warm dinner. If only you’d left the office on time, my plan would have been perfect. Instead, you lingered and now, here you are. On the brink of illness.”

“I’ll be fine,” I laughed again. “In fact– I should probably–”

“Can I at least run you home?” he asked.

“Uh…” I glanced out the display window. It wasn’t as violent a squall now, but still raining heavily. Weighing storms versus being in his car. 

“Come on, payback for lemonade. I’ll be on my best behavior,” he said, giving me ‘scout’s honor.’ 

“I’m going to soak the truck,” I said.

“It’s a working truck, it’ll survive,” he said, shrugging again. 

We ran out the door, toward his truck parked only a few feet away. He unlocked the passenger door for me first, and I dove in, tossing my bag into the foot well. 

“Whicha’ way?” he asked, once he got the engine going. 

I gave directions. He talked, for which I was thankful for. Praising Rachel, talking about work today, what he was still planning to do. I didn’t think I was capable of making anything but ‘uh-huh’s for the time being. I sat shivering in the seat, knowing it wasn’t about the wet or the wind but being in the stupid cab of his truck. 

By the time we got to my little duplex, it had calmed down to just spitting. I was about to toss myself back out of the truck when he stopped me with an upheld hand. Reaching behind us into the back seat, he handed me back my glass jar, empty.

“Bring me more,” he grinned.

“Then you’ll owe me another favor,” I said, tucking it into my bag.

“Oh no,” he said, playfully sarcastic. “I’d so hate to be beholden to you.”

We grinned at each other briefly and then I finally jumped out. Ran to my door but turned around to wave at him. He flashed his brights for a second and was gone.