Page 41 of The Fix-Up
“He’s quiet, kind of stern, keeps to himself. Doesn’t smile much. But he’s not awful, or anything. I don’t think I like him.”
Sunny hummed. “Really? That’s surprising.”
“Why?”
“You tend to like everyone. Why not him?”
I leaned my head on the back of the love seat and stared up at the ceiling. “He has no interest in keeping the house or the café. At the end of the six months, he wants to sell. It’s been in his family for years and he doesn’t seem to care at all.”
“Has he told you why?”
“He said Ollie abandoned his grandmother and mother and he doesn’t want anything to do with him.” I bit the inside of my cheek. “I can’t see Ollie being like that though. Wouldn’t a normal person be at least curious to learn more about his family history, about this town and the café and Ollie? But nope, he’s set on selling.”
Sunny frowned. “But why would he want to keep it?”
“Because…” My mouth snapped shut. She had a point. I hated it when she had a point. He didn’t have any emotional attachment to Ollie or the house or Two Harts. I sighed and hugged the pillow closer. “I guess when I say it out loud, it doesn’t make much sense.”
“How does that make you feel?”
The dreaded feelings question. “Horrible. Angry. Sad. Frustrated. That’s the only home Oliver knows. We’ve been so happy there the last three years. Gil doesn’t get that. He missed out on knowing Ollie.” But there’s another feeling, too. I was almost embarrassed to say it out loud. “A little selfish, too.”
Sunny hummed. “Why’s that?”
“I guess all I’ve been thinking about is how my life is changed by all this.” But Gil had to be feeling some kind of way about gaining a grandfather and a chunk of property in the middle of Texas. He’d picked up his whole life and plunked it down in small-town Texas. In a tent. “I haven’t thought about how this is all new to him.”
Sunny arched one elegant, dark eyebrow. “That’s good work, Ellie.”
“Thanks,” I muttered.
“What does Gil think about living in the backyard?”
“He…actually, he hasn’t really complained at all.” Thinking back, he’d agreed without much of an argument. “Why do you think that is?”
Sunny picked up her notebook. “Why doyouthink that is?”
“I hate it when you make me answer my own questions.”
She grinned.
“I don’t know. Maybe because of Oliver?”
“How so?”
“When he found out I had a kid, he agreed to the arrangement without even an argument.”
Sunny wrote something else on her notepad. I liked to think it was a grocery shopping list and not one more thing wrong with me. “That’s rather respectful of him, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, it is. He fixed the bathtub faucet, too.”
“That’s good, right?” Sunny asked.
“Sure, yes, of course. It needed to be fixed.” I’d discovered it last night when Oliver was about to take a bath. That shiny new handle turned so easily. I hadn’t realized how not-fun it was to wrestle with the pliers every day.
Sunny’s gaze moved from her notepad to my face. Another moment of waiting me out. Ugh.
“The thing is…I think he hates me,” I blurted out.
“Why do you think that?”
