South of Superior - Ellen Airgood [91]
“They bring it with them I guess. You’re sure not going to make it once you get here.” They smiled at each other.
“Going to stay awhile, then?”
“I—don’t know. Maybe. I’m thinking of buying a place, a hotel, to run it again as a business. But there’ve been some—complications.”
“Ah. Well. Sounds like an Undertaking. Good luck to you.”
“Thanks. I think I’m going to need it.”
When he’d eaten a brownie and finished his coffee (he paused to inhale the aroma steaming off the surface before he took a sip, and Madeline remembered that about him, how appreciative of small things he always was), she showed him the house and yard. “Are you really thinking of buying something here?” she asked when they’d finished and were outside beside his car.
“Yes.” He drew a voluminous handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his nose. “Life hasn’t been the same without Eunice. I expect you Understand.”
“I think so. After Emmy died, nothing was right.”
“The two of Us, we always said we’d maybe retire Up here one day. It was mostly a daydream. But she did love it here, we both did. Ever since I fixed Up your car I’ve been thinking, why not come see it again? So I told my son I was taking two weeks—the shop’s his now really anyway—and put my toothbrush in a bag, and here I am.”
“Nice.”
“Yup.” Pete surveyed Arbutus’s yard and house with a considering gaze. “Eunice would have loved this. I like it too. It suits me. Not too big, not too fancy, just about the right size for one.”
“Are you really serious about it?”
“Maybe. It may just be that I am.”
Apartments in Crosscut weren’t just depressing. They were wrist-slittingly bleak, and not quite as cheap as Madeline had imagined. Three hundred a month before heat and Utilities seemed like a lot once she saw how bad they were. Small, dark, and grungy, most of them haphazard collections of rooms carved out of old rickety houses that would be frigid in the winter and boiling in the summer. “I’ll let you know,” she said to the landlords she’d made appointments with after Pete Kinney had left the other day, trying to keep the dismay out of her voice. She’d take Mary Up on her offer to stay in her old camper before she’d live in any of these places. She’d give Up and go back to Chicago.
She went to the prison to fill out an application—at least that job would let her rent a decent place—and the human resources person told her there would be no decisions made for at least three weeks. Okay, she said, feeling crestfallen.
Next she went to 512 Pine Street. She did this almost every time she came to Crosscut. The house held a horrible fascination. It was so grim. She could not imagine having grown Up here; something about it made Jackie Stone real in a way she never had been before. Madeline could never bring herself to knock on the door and draw the shrieking woman from within the depths and say, Did you happen to know my grandfather? Do you mind if I look around? She came, she looked, she left.
She went and visited with Walter after that but before long she took herself and her burgeoning headache back Up the highway.
She ran into Randi hitchhiking a few miles out of Crosscut. Randi appeared to have set out on a thirty-mile walk in her party clothes—a gauzy top, velveteen miniskirt, strappy sandals. Madeline let off on the accelerator.
“Hey!” Randi said, trotting Up to the window. “How cool, nobody’s been by at all, not going north anyway.”
“You have to get in the back and climb over the seat if you want to sit Up front, the passenger-side door doesn’t open.”
Randi slid in and climbed over into the front. Her skirt rode Up as she swung her long legs over the seat. She tugged the skirt down, heeled off a sandal, and propped her bare foot Up on the dash, wiggling her toes. The nails were painted pink, and she wore a narrow silver toe ring that had cut into her skin. She sighed and lifted her river of tiny braids Up off the back of her neck. “It’s hot. Am I glad you came by, I