No.
Absolutely no.
When Caylen cut me out and Coert tore me down, I wasn’t going to turn tail and run back to Denver.
This, all of this, was mine.
And I was going to keep it.
I stopped, still in a tulip daze, staring at the display before me, wondering if it was a miracle. I knew a fair bit about gardening and would think that the wind and salty air would mean the plethora of this type of flora wouldn’t grow easily.
Obviously I was very wrong.
“Your first time?”
I looked to the man beside me who had a camera up on a tripod.
“Yes,” I replied.
He grinned. “Come up here from South Carolina every other year ’round ’bout this time because my wife likes the shops, I like the restaurants, we both love the sea, but this,” he swung an arm out to my soon-to-be new home, “is what really calls me. Seen it maybe five times over ten years. Never get sick of it.”
I looked back to my lighthouse.
He was correct. This was not something you’d ever get sick of.
“No, I can imagine one never would,” I murmured.
“The lavender hits around now at Lavender House and the bluebells hit about now at Cliff Blue but it isn’t easy to get to those places,” he shared. “They’re way more private. Still, I’ve driven by several times and they sure are beauties. But this is too beautiful to believe.”
He was correct about that too (though I hadn’t seen Lavender House or Cliff Blue, but I’d be doing drive-bys).
“Good news,” he stated. I turned my attention back to him and he kept speaking. “Talk in town, someone’s buying the place. It’s been vacant since forever. Word is, new owner is gonna restore the whole thing to its former glory. Can’t imagine what that’s gonna do to their pocketbook, but I’ll tell you what, if I ever thought I’d have that kind of money, I would drag the wife up here to do just that.” He looked to my lighthouse, its tulips and the sea beyond. “Not sure I’ve ever seen anything this beautiful and I’ve been places. But this, this right here, this is it.”
I trained my gaze where he was and thought he was again right.
This was it.
“So glad someone’s finally gonna take care of the old place,” he muttered.
“Me too,” I whispered.
“Gonna set up over there so best be moving. Enjoy,” he bid as he took up his camera and tripod and moved behind me to follow the fence north.
I kept my eyes on the beauty that was now all mine until I sensed movement at my side and looked right.
A man was out of a pickup that had a construction firm’s information on its door and people were moving their bikes out of his way as he opened the closed gate (Rob and I had forced it closed and Rob had come back with some oil to lubricate the hinges so it’d be relatively useful until I had it replaced).
I watched him open the gate, walk back to his truck, climb in and drive through.
The onlookers watched too.
When he parked and got out to close the gate behind him was when I moved, walking toward him and calling out to forestall him.
We shook hands at the gate.
He then closed it and together we walked to the old girl to talk about restoring her to her former glory.
Use the Girl
Eighteen years earlier . . .
IT HAD BEEN WORKING FOR me. Working perfectly. Just what I needed to forget Mom being so mean and controlling. Just what I needed to forget Caylen was such an asshole. Just what I needed to forget how my life had turned on a letter into a disaster.
It was a tried and true method to get me past the shit of life so I could deal and it was working.
I was drunk, trashed, totally blotto.
And that was good.
Lonnie, Maria and I were also at Wild Bill’s Rally.
This was mostly for bikers but other people could show, and we’d been showing for five years running. Pitching our tents. Dragging out our beer and vodka filled coolers. Making friends easily and hanging by their campfires at night downing shots, making out (or Maria and Lonnie did, Lonnie put a stop to such things for me and now I knew why). Forging through the hangovers by day only to perk back up with beer, shots, weed and the music Wild Bill provided on the big, makeshift stage in the middle of his just-worked fields, all of this providing a full weekend of fun.
I wasn’t supposed to be there.
Not that year.
I was now responsible. I was now an assistant manager. I had goals. I was on the right path.
Okay, so the raise I got was only a couple dollars more an hour, but for me, that was a lot.
And the benefits were better. Better insurance. They even matched a little bit to a retirement account. And I got another week’s vacation.
So I was giving it my all because people didn’t stay long at the Sip and Save. The last manager had bolted after being there less time than me. The new manager would bolt eventually because this one was the third one we’d had since I’d been there.
If I showed loyalty, learned as much as I could, I might actually be manager before I’d given it what I thought it appropriate to give to show better forms of employment that I had job loyalty—this being a year and a half. If I made manager, I’d make that term two years, just to show gratitude (and more loyalty to prospective future employers).
So yeah, I had been on the right path.
I also didn’t want to be at the rally because Lonnie and Maria were there.
After Tony pointed out some things that had not been sinking in, it sucked, but I was avoiding them. This wasn’t hard seeing as I was now assistant manager and they knew I went for overtime as much as I could (and got it), so they were cool about me doing my all to achieve my goals.
And anyway, they were both getting into their own things. They just weren’t, I feared, good things.
But they were there and I was there, and I didn’t need to be there when I did need to be at work at seven o’clock the next morning.
I still needed it, though. I needed Wild Bill’s Rally. I needed to get fucked up. I needed to let loose. And I didn’t care I was probably going to call off (or not call in at all) because I was still fucked up or passed out or whatever.
Because really, I was learning it didn’t matter how hard you worked, how loyal you were, how smart you were trying to be, life was just going to suck.
Life sucking for me in that moment was the fact that my car had broken down out of the blue the week before.
I needed my car, as people do, and even though I had some money in savings, it wasn’t near enough to buy a new one (that being a new used one, even a junker). It was enough (just barely) to fix the old one. So I did.
But it left me broke. No savings, wiping out even the little I had in checking.
And then, two days ago, I got a letter from my landlord that they were evicting all the tenants. They’d sold the building, it was going to be razed and a parking garage or something put there, so we all had thirty days to vacate.
My apartment wasn’t much but it wasn’t in the worst neighborhood imaginable and the rent didn’t cripple me (it just maimed me a little).
However, the listings I’d seen available at my rent were in the worst neighborhoods imaginable and they weren’t as clean or relatively okay as the one I had. They were gross and totally not okay.
Furthermore, I didn’t have any money for a security deposit. I’d used the money I got from graduation to get into the apartment I had, and to buy some yard sale stuff that I actually kinda liked to spruce it up, but they weren’t returning security deposits for thirty days after we vacated.
This meant I either had to crash with Lonnie and Maria (not a good option for obvious reasons). Or I had to ask Mom and Dad if I could move in with them for a few weeks (also not a good option). Or I had to ask them to float me money for a security deposit so I could move to a new place (not a fun option).
As much as I didn’t want to do it, what with Mom and Dad being clear about how they felt about Lonnie and Maria (since I first started hanging with Maria). And how they felt about me not going to college (I didn’t get a scholarship like Caylen did and they told me I had to pay my way myself—with no job or savings, how was I going to do that?). Also how they felt about my lifestyle, and how I spent my time, the list went on. Still the only real option I had was to go to them.