Second Time Around (21 page)

I
hate
this house.” Brooke set aside her hammer and chisel and swiped at her sweat-drenched forehead with the clean washcloth Anna offered. “I wish I’d never bought it.”

“No, you don’t.” Anna crouched down on the tile bathroom floor next to her.

“Oh yes, I do. Paradise Found, my foot. This”—Brooke peered down into the jagged black hole where the toilet used to be—“is the ninth circle of hell.”

“That does look pretty hellacious,” Anna admitted. “Why are you messing with the toilet down here, anyway?”

Brooke sighed. “Because I have to replace it with one that doesn’t leak.”

“So now you’re a master plumber in addition to an expert electrician?” Anna whistled. “I’m impressed.”

“All I wanted was chintz and scones,” Brooke said. “Mints on pillows and a leather-bound guest registry. I never planned to round out my education in the practical sciences.”

“This will all be over soon,” Anna said. “And then you can surround yourself with patchwork and popovers and never look back.” She paused, eyeing the contents of the toolbox strewn across the floor. “I’ve never replaced a toilet, but I was not aware that the job required a hammer and chisel.”

“It doesn’t, usually.” Brooke grimaced. “Unless, of course, the toilet in question happens to be bolted to a cracked flange.”

Anna regarded her blankly. “What’s a flange?”

“This thing right here.” Brooke pointed with her chisel to the blackened metal ring encircling the hole in the floor. “It’s cracked, so it has to be replaced. And it’s cast iron, which makes it practically impossible to remove. Hence the hammer and chisel. And the obscenities.”

“But it looks like you’re almost done,” Anna said hopefully.

“I’m almost done with the flange. But see that?” Brooke ran her fingers along the web of hairline cracks spreading out across the floor. “All that pounding on the flange took its toll. Now I have to replace this old tile, which I’ll have to pry off with a putty knife. And I have no idea what’s underneath the tile, but if it was installed wrong—and
everything
in this house was installed wrong—I’ll end up with a gaping hole in the floor. It never ends. I’m like Sisyphus with a sewer line.
I’ve spent my entire weekend literally staring down the toilet and inuring myself to the stench.” She sat back against the shower door. “Makes me long for the good old days when all I had to worry about was the prospect of knob-and-tube wiring spontaneously combusting.”

“I still can’t believe how quickly you rewired this place. What was that, three and a half weeks?”

“Twenty-seven days,” Brooke said. “But who’s counting?”

“I thought you’d be done after that.”

“Look at this bathroom. I’ll never be done.”

“Take a break,” Anna urged. “A warm brownie and a cold glass of milk will do you a world of good.”

“No time for brownies. I have to drive all the way to the Home Depot in Glens Falls before it closes.”

“There’s always time for brownies. I just took them out of the oven. Double chocolate, with walnuts. Smell them?”

“My olfactory system stopped functioning a few hours ago. Thank heavens.” Brooke wadded up a fistful of paper towels to plug the hole. She got to her feet, straightened her back, and gingerly stretched her arms over her head. “Ow.” She winced as her joints popped. “Ow, ow, ow.”

“What was
that
?” Anna asked.

“My knees, wrists, and spine.”

“I better lace the next batch of brownies with Percocet.”

“Please do.” Brooke gimped out to the hallway and called up the staircase. “I’m off to Glens Falls. Anyone need anything?” She sniffed, narrowing her eyes. “Jamie, I know you’re smoking up there. Knock it off.”

Anna raised one eyebrow. “I thought your olfactory system stopped functioning.”

“I can always smell trouble brewing.” As Brooke buttoned up her coat, she noticed the grime embedded underneath her
fingernails, grime that no amount of soap and scrubbing could eradicate. “This house is my albatross. Remember
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
? Samuel Coleridge probably wrote that while he was chiseling away at a corroded old toilet flange.”

“You’re just frustrated.” Anna nodded up toward Mr. Wonderful perched on the newel post. “Deep down, you love this place.”

Brooke shook her head. “I loved the
idea
of it, before I knew what horrors lurked beneath the drywall and the floorboards and the toilets. This house is not as advertised.”

Anna abandoned her pep talk, plunked down on the steps, and rested her chin in her hands. “That’s exactly how I feel about my marriage right now.”

But Brooke was on a roll. She started gesturing and pacing the carpet. “All I ask for is a cute little hideaway that hasn’t sustained decades of internal structural damage. I don’t want a fixer-upper; I don’t want to spend all my free time fixing the previous owners’ mistakes; I just want to move in and unpack. Is that really so much to ask?”

“Yes,” Anna said. “Both with houses and with men.”

Brooke stopped ranting and focused on her friend. “Don’t say that. Jonas is such a nice guy.”

Anna shrugged one shoulder. “If Jonas had an MLS listing, that’s exactly what it would say:
such a nice guy, move-in condition
. It’s not that simple, though. It’s never that simple.”

“Oh, Anna.”

“Oh, Brookie.”

“What are we going to do?”

“Just keep chipping away at our respective toilet holes, I guess.” Anna exhaled slowly. “But for now, how about a brownie for the road?”

F
or the past few years, Brooke had been holding out for a nice guy. She’d never understood Jamie’s penchant for baggage-laden bad boys or Cait’s weakness for authority figures with superiority complexes. Her idea of male perfection was steeped in Southern nostalgia: a gentleman, in every sense of the word.

There was only one problem. After years of false starts and disappointing dates, she was starting to doubt that gentle men existed anymore. Or, if they did, they seemed drawn to wild, troubled beauties like Jamie, who was forever bemoaning how many of her male “buddies” had blurted out their undying love for her and ruined the friendship. “He’s like my brother,” Jamie would say. “I just don’t like him that way. I need a challenge, you know?”

Brooke didn’t see the appeal in trying to tame a man or bend him to her will. She wanted to get married and stay married and share a functional, healthy relationship with someone who took pride in being a husband and father. The right man would arrive at the right time, or so she had always told herself.

She was starting to have her doubts.

Brooke turned her car onto Pine Street and braked for a red light. The sweet aftertaste of brownie turned sour in her mouth. When the light turned green, she U-turned and headed back toward the quiet faculty neighborhood near campus.

I
need answers,” Brooke blurted out when Professor Rutkin opened the door.

Cassandra didn’t seem surprised to find a frazzled former student pacing her front porch on a school night. She simply took a moment to adjust the collar of her black merino robe and sipped her mug of tea. “Miss Asplind. Lovely to see you.”

“Hi, sorry, I know it’s abominably rude to drop by without calling, but I was on my way to Home Depot, and—” Brooke shook her head in a vain bid for clarity. “I need help.”

“Come in.” This was more of a command than a request. The older woman ushered Brooke through the living room, which was furnished in sleek Danish furniture and exotic-looking pottery pieces, and into a small, utilitarian kitchen. She prepared a mug of chamomile tea from the kettle of water cooling on the stove burner and pressed the mug into Brooke’s hand. “Now, what can I help you with?”

Brooke tried to decide where to begin. “Well, I suppose it’s a crisis of confidence, or a crisis of faith. I’ve started to question some of the fundamental tenets of my personal belief system.”

A tiny smile played on Dr. Rutkin’s lips. “That sounds like a lot to take on in one evening.”

“I’ll say. My guest room toilet is ruining my life and I need to fix it. Oh, and I asked out this guy and he turned me down flat.”

“Well, you’ve come to the wrong place, I’m afraid. I have little to no experience with plumbing, and as for men—you’re better off asking someone else for advice.”

Brooke nodded. “I suppose you’re too sensible to waste your time with dating.”

“What on earth would give you that idea?” Cassandra squinted back at her. “I’m a physicist, not a vestal virgin.
Don’t buy into all those hackneyed white lab coat stereotypes. I have stories from the trenches that would peel the polish right off your toenails.”

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean—”

Cassandra’s smile returned. “Don’t think you literary types have a monopoly on romance. I just don’t kiss and tell. Especially when the kissing may or may not involve other faculty members at this college.”

Brooke sized her up for a moment. “You’ve got some really good dirt, don’t you?”

Cassandra winked. “That’s immaterial.”

“Okay, but can you just tell me if you’ve heard anything scandalous about Professor Clayburn in the English department?”

Cassandra didn’t respond, but Brooke thought she detected a split-second flinch. “What?” Brooke pressed. “Is he a player? An addict? A secret back-alley internal-organs dealer? Give me a hint. I won’t reveal my source, I promise!”

“Miss Asplind.” The brusque, professorial air was back. “I believe you said you wanted to discuss plumbing.”

“I do, but I really need to know if Professor Clayburn is, you know, a shiftless libertine. Because one of my best friends is getting involved with him way quicker than she should, and I’m concerned that—”

Cassandra stared her down.

“Fine.” Brooke sighed. “Just give me the lowdown on plumbing.”

“Unfortunately, that’s not my area of expertise,” Cassandra admitted. “Wiring is much more my thing. But, actually, if you’d care to experiment in the spirit of scientific inquiry, I could use some help clearing out my bathroom sink. It’s been draining slowly and making gurgling sounds. My neighbor
recommended a handyman to repair it, but I found his attitude appalling.”

Brooke’s head snapped up. “Was his name Hank Bexton, by any chance?”

“Why, yes, I believe it was.”

Brooke devolved into a frothy-mouthed, semicoherent diatribe punctuated by liberal use of the phrases “blonde jokes,” “Samuel Coleridge,” and “crescent wrench chauvinism.”

Cassandra waited patiently, sipping her tea, until Brooke wound down. “Feel better?”

“Much.” Brooke rolled up her sleeves. “Now lead the way to the sink. I’m sure I can tackle this. Let’s see, I’m going to need a drain snake, a wrench set, and some leather work gloves.”

The professor’s expression barely changed, but she granted Brooke a quick, approving nod. “The student has become the teacher.”

“I feel like the Karate Kid of physics.” Brooke couldn’t have felt prouder if she’d aced a midterm on the laws of thermodynamics. “Wax on, wax off.”

A
nna shifted her shopping basket from one hand to the other and stared up at the grocery shelf. Brooke had been right about Thurwell’s only supermarket branching out over the past decade; in addition to organic produce and dairy products, it now stocked a small selection of gourmet European cocoa and exotic spices. Usually, Anna loved selecting ingredients almost as much as she loved baking, but today the sweet, rich scent of chocolate made her eyes sting and her heart ache.

She studied the fine print on the bright red chocolate wrapper:
Product of Belgium
. Which made her think of Brussels,
which made her think of Jonas, which made her want to scarf down an entire bag of chocolate chips.

Maybe she should go with a French chocolate. Maybe Dutch. Or maybe not. The supermarket hadn’t branched out
that
much; her choice seemed limited to rich Belgian decadence or the traditional American standbys.