Saint Maybe - Anne Tyler [127]
She slammed the cabinet door shut. “I’ve seen houses so full you couldn’t walk through them. I’ve seen closets totally lost—I mean crammed to the gills and closed off, with new stuff piled in front of them so you didn’t know they existed.”
“Your own apartment must be neat as a pin,” Daphne said.
“Not really,” Rita told her. “That Nick saves everything. I would end up with a pack rat!” She laughed. She hooked a kitchen chair with the toe of her boot, pulled it out from the table, and sat down. “Now,” she said, drawing a pencil and a note pad from her breast pocket. The pencil was roughly the size of a cartridge. She licked its tip and started writing. “Six rooms plus basement plus finished attic. Your attic’s in pretty good shape, but that basement …”
Ian appeared at the back door, lugging a large cardboard box. “Open up!” he called through the glass, and when Daphne obeyed he practically fell inside. Whatever he was carrying must weigh a ton. “Genuine ceramic tiles,” he told Daphne, setting the box on the floor. “We’re replacing an antique mantel at a house in Fells Point and these were just being thrown out, so—”
“Will you be putting them to use within the next ten days?” Rita asked.
He straightened and said, “Pardon?”
“Ian, this is Rita diCarlo,” Daphne said. “My uncle Ian. Rita’s here to organize us.”
“Oh, yes,” Ian said.
“Do you have a specific bathroom in mind that’s in need of those tiles within the next ten days?” Rita asked him.
“Well, not exactly, but—”
“Then I suggest you walk them straight back out to the trash can,” she said, “or else I’ll have to tack them onto my estimate here.”
“But these are from Spain,” Ian told her. He bent to lift one from the box—a geometric design of turquoise and royal blue. “How could I put something like this in the trash?”
Rita considered him. She didn’t give the tile so much as a glance, but Ian continued holding it hopefully in front of his chest like someone displaying his number for a mug shot.
“You see what I have to deal with,” Daphne told Rita.
“Yes, I see,” Rita said.
Oddly enough, though, Daphne just then noticed how beautiful that tile really was. The design looked kaleidoscopic—almost capable of movement. She couldn’t remember now why stripping the house had seemed like such a good idea.
Rita did do an excellent job, as it turned out, but Daphne hardly had time to notice before something new came along for her to think about: Friday afternoon, she was fired.
It wasn’t entirely unexpected. Ever since she’d got her raise, she seemed to have lost interest in her work. She had shown up late, left early, and mislaid several orders. The messages people sent with their flowers had begun to depress her. “Well, I think I’ll say … well, let me see,” they would tell her, frowning into space. “Why don’t we put … Okay! I’ve got it! ‘Congratulations and best wishes.’ ” Then Daphne would slash CBW across the order form. “To the girl of my dreams” was G/dms. “Thanks for last night,” Tx/nite. She felt injured on their behalf—that their most heartfelt sentiments could be considered so routine. And when they were not routine, it was worse: I am more sorry than I can tell you and you’re right not to want to see me again but I’ll never forget you as long as I live and I hope you have a wonderful marriage. “With delivery that comes to twenty-seven eighty,” she would say in her blandest tone.
The way Mr. Potoski put it was, she could either leave now or stay on for her two weeks’ notice, but she could see he was eager to get rid of her. He already had a new girl lined up. “I’ll leave now,” Daphne told him, and so at closing time she gathered her few possessions and stuffed them into a paper sack. Then she slipped her jacket on and ducked quietly out the door, avoiding an awkward farewell scene. On the way to the bus stop she found herself composing messages to Mr. Potoski. Tx/fun: Thanks, it’s been fun. TK: Take care. Not that she had anything against Mr. Potoski personally. She knew this was all her own fault.
Her bus was undergoing some heater problems, and