Moving out of his apartment and into Jim’s house took a lot less time than Nate expected, largely because he took so little of his own stuff with him. So little that he was able to fit it all in the Silverado’s cargo bed and the compact U-Haul trailer he hitched to the back. He chose to donate most of his furniture to Habitat for Humanity and just live with Jim’s old pieces which, even if they were hardly in mint condition, had a sentimental value that Nate’s IKEA collection (plus a few entries from Pottery Barn and Wayfair) decidedly did not. His clothes, books, an LG flat screen, year-old Dreamcloud mattress (the memory foam was killer), Cody’s worldly possessions (the mutt had three huge beds), a few items that were Jim’s to begin with—a cool mid-century wall clock, a hammered brass coffee table, an impressively framed Miró print—and Nate’s pride: a rangy quartet of thriving potted plants, all made their way to Escarpa Drive.
Jennifer had called the night before to see if Nate needed any help moving; they hadn’t spoken since Jim’s memorial gathering the previous week. He was happy to hear her voice and appreciated her offer but told her Danny was going to help him with the heavier pieces and that the rest would be a snap. Both of those things were a lie—Danny had, in fact, offered to help, but Nate needed him on their current landscaping job, which was running behind—and little about moving was ever a “snap.” But seeing Jennifer last time was painful and, as much as Nate missed what they once had, he thought some time apart would be best. Apparently, so did she.
“Nate, I’m going to start dating again,” she said after they got past the moving day talk. “I need to get on with things.”
All things considered, Nate should have felt relieved, a little anyway, but he didn’t. He clearly didn’t know what the fuck he wanted. “Good. That’s good,” he answered. What was one more lie?
“I can’t wait for you anymore,” she continued. “Not if we’re not going somewhere.” Her voice sounded clear, maybe practiced. Nate respected her resolve.
“I understand. I do,” he said as he packed the last of his linens in a Hefty bag.
Jennifer was silent, perhaps expecting a different answer, maybe some fight. “What are you so afraid of?” she finally asked. Nate could tell she was still in the dance studio, probably after teaching class; there was a familiar hollowness on the line.
He sealed the linens bag with a plastic tie and set it aside. “I’m not afraid of anything. But Jen, we’ve been through this. I’m just not there.”
“Just don’t resent me because I am. Okay?”
There was a catch in Nate’s throat. “I could never resent you.” He sat on the dusty floor and leaned against the wall. The seconds ticked by.
“Look, I’ll call you,” she said with sudden finality. “Good luck with the move.”
Nate wanted to tell her how if she could just wait, just give him time, he’d come around, and they could be together. Forever. But he knew that wasn’t fair to her and that he couldn’t promise that—or much of anything right now. This was Jennifer’s call and Nate was making a conscious (some might say ridiculous) choice.
He thought about this last conversation with Jennifer throughout the day that he moved into Jim’s house and wondered what it would have been like to share the place with her, share a life with her. And yet, as Nate took the first steps in the long and arduous process of making his old home his new home, while still keeping the spirit of his father alive, he found himself embracing his independence in a way he hadn’t in the past. He was starting over.
Nate decided, as part of the “new him,” he would give as much attention to the inside of the Escarpa house as he was planning for the outside, or at least as much as his time and his budget would allow. It turned out that, despite years of regular gainful employment, Jim did not, as he’d told Nate that day on the bench looking out at L.A., have much money put away. There were always clothes on Jim’s back, food in his refrigerator, and a roof—leaky though it may have been—over his head, so he never pried about his dad’s financial state. It was enough that Nate was trying to keep his own propped up as he grew his landscaping business. Still, he decided to use the small chunk of savings Jim had left behind in a zero-interest checking account to fix up the old house. And if he eventually had to dip into his own funds, so be it.
Nate reserved Sundays for re-landscaping his house (his house: that still blew him away), paying Danny and the crew above their usual rate—plus breakfast, lunch, and four o’clock beer—for their help. Danny hadn’t wanted to take money for something so personal, but Nate insisted, pulling whatever rank still existed between them. “You think I’m gonna take you away from the fam on your day off for free?” he asked rhetorically.
“Who says you’re not doing me a favor?” Danny shot back with a grin, but Nate knew he was full of shit: Danny was crazy about Alicia and Raffi.
“Better call HGTV,” Danny said as they began work on the needy front yard. “We’re talking ‘before and after’ to the max!”
“I begged my dad to let me spruce the place up, but he liked it just the way it was: low-maintenance,” said Nate.
“I think you mean no-maintenance,” Danny joked as he dug out a tall pyracantha bush that had turned wraith-like. “Did your pops, like, not know you’re actually supposed to water a yard?” He stopped himself. “All due respect.”
“Oh, he knew,” answered Nate as he unearthed another crumbled shrub that was, by all rights, unkillable. “But watering was like a game between us: Whenever I’d stop by I’d set the sprinkler timer and then as soon as I’d leave he’d turn it off. He was always convinced it was going to rain.”
“In L.A.? Dude was an optimist.”
“Super laid-back was more like it. But not about his classes—or his books. About those, the guy was laser-focused.” Nate stood back and surveyed the sad-looking planters that flanked the short driveway. At least the few jade plants in them were still alive; they were tough little buggers.
Danny started hacking back what was once a lush lantana bush, hoping to revive the normally hearty plant. “Must be weird, living in the same house you grew up in all over again.”
“It was for the first week or so, but I’m getting used to it. There’s something kinda … healing about it, I guess,” Nate explained. “Even if my dad is still everywhere.”
“But that’s a good thing, yeah?” Danny grunted between hacks. “Gone, but not forgotten. It’s like when my grandma passed last year. Thought about her every day—dreamed about her at night.” He put down the pruning saw and recalled, “And you know what? She was always happy and healthy in those dreams, wanted to know why I hadn’t called her in so long. I could never tell her the truth: ‘Because you’re dead, Abuela. No phones where you are!’” Danny flashed a faraway smile. It unnerved Nate.
“Okay, that’s enough therapy for one day,” said Nate, forcing an upbeat tone. “Pretty soon you’ll be charging me shrink fees!”
“On the house, dude,” Danny said with a wink and went back to work on the pyracantha.
A few Sundays into the front yard renovation—Nate planned to replant the back too, but curb appeal took priority—he and Danny were digging a hole for a gorgeous Japanese maple Nate had splurged on, when a small white sedan stopped diagonally across from the house. Nate looked up from his shovel and spotted the driver, an attractive brunette, gazing at the garden in progress. He didn’t think much of it; people were always driving past, checking out his work, and sometimes copying his phone number off the “Nathaniel Cronin Landscape Design” placard he proudly displayed at his jobs. (He wondered if sticking one in his own front yard was tacky until Danny said “Bro, that’s why it’s called ‘your house.’”)
But this woman seemed to be staring right at Nate—not the work, not the sign—as if she were trying to place him. Nate wondered if he wasn’t just being paranoid or self-conscious and went back to digging. A few moments later, the white car glided past them and down the road. Nate looked up again as it disappeared and found Danny eyeballing him.
“What?” Nate asked, a tad defensively.
“That pretty lady was scoping you out, son.” Danny’s grin was wider than usual.
“How do you know? Maybe she’s a potential client.”
“Yeah, sex client. ‘Ooh, Nate, plant your big, fat hoe right here.’” Danny made a lewd gesture with his own, actual hoe, which was conveniently at hand.
Nate couldn’t help but laugh at his good-natured sidekick, even if there was something a bit unsettling about that driver’s gaze. He thought it best to change the subject. “Hey, so I’m also thinking of widening the path and lining it with lavender,” Nate said, pointing at the trail of slate slabs leading to the front door. “What do you think?”
“I think you haven’t had a bad idea since I’ve been working for you,” said Danny. “At least about landscaping.”
Nate leaned on his shovel, staring at Danny, who couldn’t hold back a grin if it killed him. “Want to finish that thought, D.?” Nate asked, though he could have finished it for him.
“Well, dropping Jen wasn’t exactly the move of the century.” Danny stopped what he was doing, fixed his deep brown eyes on Nate. All traces of a smile were gone—he meant business.
“She dropped me, remember?”
“Yeah, okay,” Danny said flatly. “Do me a favor, though, bro, never say never, okay?”
“I never do,” Nate answered unconvincingly and went back to work.