I can already see Lennox sitting on the couch reading her book, and me serving her breakfast in the morning at the little bar.
I want this.
The price is still more than I have in my savings account, which means I won’t be able to pay for it outright, but the loan for the rest of it will be doable.
I jump off the bed and haul my computer down to the house office. Mr. Bentley knows a lot about real estate. He’ll know if this house is a good deal, and talk me out of it if it's not.
But he’s not there.
“Oh, Grant!” Ms. Bentley says as I walk past the living room. “I need help pulling the tree out of the attic. Mark promised me he’d get it out last week, but as you can see, that hasn’t happened.”
I set my laptop on an end table. “Of course. I’ll go get it,” I tell her, already heading up the stairs. It’s the least I can do while staying here rent-free.
Ms. Bentley is a pro at decorating. She’s already decorated the rest of the house in red and gold, but their giant tree is still missing from the family room.
I locate the tree in the back of the attic and weave through the boxes to get to it. Getting it out of the attic isn’t the hard part. Getting it down the stairs is. The tree and I get wedged in the middle where the stairs turn and it’s not budging.
“Hey, Ms. B!” I holler. “The tree is stuck. How does Mark get it down?”
“Oh no.” Ms. B comes running up the stairs. “I don’t know how he does it. Did you try getting behind it to push?”
I eye the small gap the tree is offering. “I don’t think I can get through there.”
“Shoot. Let me see if Lennox is here. I bet she’d fit.”
“Oh. No. I can totally get it. Don’t bother her.” I hurry to persuade Ms. B that I’m fine. I’m a man. I can move a fake tree. But the tree isn’t being so cooperative. It’s as stubborn as it is stuck.
“Hey. My mom said you need help.”
Lennox.
I sigh and accept defeat. “The tree is stuck.”
“Ah.” She nods and flexes her biceps. “You need the big muscles.”
A grin creeps onto my face. “Wow, weapons like that should come with a warning label.”
She flexes again. “I could destroy you with my pinky.”
My grin fades. She could destroy me with even less than that.
“Alright.” She hikes up her pants and pats her biceps. “Let’s see what we’re working with here.” She looks all around the staircase, folding her arms while rubbing her chin.
“What are you doing?” I laugh.
“Being a man. I thought it was obvious.” She looks at me with a hint of challenge in her eyes.
“Because all men hike up their pants before getting to work?” I ask, amused.
“Clearly.” She makes a show of pulling her pants up again. “I think my dad usually brings it down bottom first so the branches don’t get stuck.”
Hmm. I move cabinets for a living. I’m paid to get things from point A to point B safely. But a synthetic tree stumped me. “Yeah, that would have been much smarter.”
“I’ll give you a pass this once.” She winks then gets on her hands and knees. “I’ll crawl through that hole and push from the other end. Get ready to catch it when it goes flying.”
“Will do, muscles.” I laugh and very purposely do not watch her crawl up the stairs.
“Um,” she says a moment later.
