Fifteen minutes had passed and Jameson was starting to wonder. The wave of fatigue he’d felt earlier had been replaced by adrenaline, and as he paced the yard and rooms on the first floor, an awareness evolved, a wider disarray coming into view than the one he’d noticed thirty minutes before. He shuffled and scrambled and shoved tools and clothes and takeout boxes from the counter.
And then he waited, leaning into his workbench from the side opposite where he normally stood, gaining leverage while yanking nails from a piece of trim, a little busywork to bide his time. Standing on this side of the bench offered a clear view of the debris along the edge of the yard, and he was thinking about the call he’d have to put in to Van Hicks. Someone needed to haul away all this busted wood and rusted wiring and the gutter pieces and crumbled drywall that Jameson had raked into four separate mounds. It was getting out of hand.
When he woke this morning his right hip and shoulder had ached tender as a bruise, and it was only after three cups of coffee and a slice of banana bread that the soreness had finally disappeared, and he was sure now that he had slept well, because when he’d first walked outside, his right cheek reflected in the windowpanes of the double doors, he saw the lines carved in his face where he must have lain for hours without moving his head from the pillow, lines deep and varied as a map of deltas.
The air suddenly shifted at his back. Jameson turned to find June several yards away, holding a Polaroid camera in one hand and a coffee cup in the other. She took a sip and then lowered the cup, leisurely, to her chest, her face slowly coming into view. Her eyes were large and dark and unblinking. Her cheeks were bright from the sun, and the whole of her seemed as strangely natured and beautiful as he now realized he’d feared. She was a perfect match for the lilting, airy voice on the phone.
Jameson rushed to the other side of his bench like a fool running a store, a man caught slacking on the job.
June stepped forward and lifted her hand with the cup as if to touch his arm, though she was too far away to reach him. She was dressed in a thin blue tunic that billowed in the faint breeze, out and around and in between her ankle-length jeans. She seemed to be holding back laughter. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
The blood pounded in his ears and his pulse was so loud he feared he wouldn’t hear whatever it was she’d come to say.
“I hope you don’t mind the intrusion,” she said.
He shook his head. “Of course not.”
“It’s my birthday.” She glanced toward her yard and back. “Sorry, that must sound strange.”
“No,” he said, though it did.
She lifted the camera to her eye, aimed at Jameson, and clicked the red button without a word. The photo spit out the front with a zipping sound he had not heard since he was a child. June plucked it from the camera with the fingers she’d looped through the handle of the coffee cup, and the coffee sloshed over the side.
Jameson stood dumbfounded.
“Well,” she said, fanning the air with the photograph. “Anyway . . .” She turned toward the piles of junk, then peered in the direction of the open double doors into the dining room, where his rolled-up sleeping bag and duffel were stacked against the far wall. She nodded with a sense of propriety, as if to say she approved of everything, and then the cup was at her lips, and Jameson saw how much she resembled her grandmother.
He ought to come around and shake her hand. But the distance between him and any kind of protocol was like a widening river, and besides, she did not have a free hand to shake.
“Oh, I’m June,” she said, “as you may have guessed.”
“Nice to finally meet you.” The piece of trim was still in his hands, and he tore at the nails without looking down. “I suppose it’s pretty clear who I am.”
Did that sound sarcastic? Clarity was a slow train coming, and willing it faster did nothing to help. He looked down at his hands; they might as well have belonged to another man for all the sense they made. He looked up and blinked, then found he couldn’t stop blinking. “Sawdust,” he said, wiping his lids with the back of his hand.
“I meant to say, I’m Jameson.” He yanked a little harder at the nails, and when he looked down, he saw he’d busted several off at the base. When he looked up, the sun had lit the outline of June’s shape through the fabric, the contour of her hips and the sides of her breasts now well defined. Her skin was deeply tanned, and her long hair, a coppery brown, was swept into a twist at the back of her head. Loose strands fell from her temples and others curled at the back of her neck. She was barefoot, but he did not tell her to be mindful of splinters and nails. She had watchful eyes of her own.
“The piles are filling up,” she said.
“Yeah . . .”
“You seem to be making a lot of progress in a short amount of time.”
“It’s not as bad as it might have been. You were right. Your grandfather knew how to look after the place.”
June nodded at the ground. “I’ll give your friend Van Hicks a call.”
“He’s not my friend.”
“Oh?”
“I mean, we worked together in the past, that’s it.”
“All right.”
“I’ll call him.” Jameson’s face burned with heat.
“Are you interested in doing any of the landscape work?” she asked. “I keep forgetting to ask.”
“Depends on what you need.”
“Not much. The hazel tree could use pruning. But I’d like it to remain a bit rascally, as Granddad used to say.”
Jameson let go a small laugh.
“And once the house is done, I’d like a row of cypress planted between the properties for privacy.”
“I can do both of those things if you like.”
His thoughts shifted to Sarah Anne and Ernest, the extra days being tacked on at the end.
“I’ll pay you fairly.”
“I believe you will. Thank you for the check. You didn’t need to pay so much up front.”
“For your trouble,” she said, and he did not contradict her. “I also wanted to mention something about the chimney.”
He let go of the trim and the hammer, wiped his hands down his thighs, and made every attempt to focus on what she was saying.
“The stonework around the mantel is vulnerable in places not visible to the eye. My grandfather made a note of it before he died.”
“I gathered, after poking around.”
“Well.” She took another sip. “It’s just that we really need to take good care.”
“Of course we will. I will.”
“I was thinking we might need to call for backup.”
“How so?”
“I mean, if we end up needing help. Probably not best to wait until the last minute to find someone. I know you like to work alone, and I got so lucky with you on short notice, but I don’t expect that to happen again. How do you feel about working with Van Hicks again?”
Jameson’s jaw tightened. “He’ll do if I need someone, but I don’t think I’ll be needing anyone.” He felt a tightness in his neck. He didn’t know what to make of her request.
“There’s something I need to show you,” he said, as if someone else had stepped up and come to the rescue. “Do you have a minute?”
June swallowed her coffee. “I do.”
She followed him through the dining room, and he turned in time to see her looking down at his belongings.
“You didn’t bring very many things with you,” she said.
He didn’t turn when he spoke. “I don’t need a whole lot.”
“Hmm,” she said, and followed him up the stairs and down the hall.
When they reached the master bedroom, Jameson walked to the far wall and opened the west-facing window all the way, and then he did the same to the one facing east, though barely a crosswind stirred. June stood just inside the doorway. The room was about eleven by fifteen feet and echoey.
June kept the camera at her side, her cup to her chest, and Jameson could see that the coffee was nearly gone. She went over to the window facing the ocean, her movements a kind of graceful, injured elegance. She looked out and drank the last of her coffee, and he could see the shape of the photo she had taken in the front square pocket of her tunic.
“I don’t remember it ever being this warm,” she said. The depth of her sigh was audible.
“That’s because it’s never been.” Jameson slipped on his work gloves and picked up the pry bar in the corner of the room. The gloves were hot on his hands, and his clean shirt was already sweat-spotted. He crouched near a row of planks at the center of the room. “This,” he said, not looking up, but in that moment he was studying the imprints her bare feet made across the dusty floor, and then her toes.
He glanced up. She had the camera raised to her eye. “You don’t mind, do you?”
“No,” he said, but he was feeling strange, pulled into something he didn’t quite understand.
He shifted his weight into the pry bar and yanked hard, popping the rotten wood loose. “This is what I wanted you to see.” He told her the flooring would have to be replaced, and he talked about the leaky roof and the termites, and how he’d expected much worse after seeing the outside.
June clicked the camera and the film zipped free.
Jameson wedged the pry bar deeper and yanked again. This time the dry wood snapped with a violent crack that caught him off balance.
He stood, favoring his left leg in a way he did only in winter. He let the pry bar slip to the floor as if he were alone, and it made a clattering crash that startled them both.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Not to worry,” she said, lowering the camera and fanning the photograph dry.
When he walked over to set the pry bar upright in the corner, he realized he was walking with a limp.
“Everything all right?”
“Yes,” he said, and removed his gloves and covered his mouth. Then he dropped his hand and shook his head at the floor before meeting her eyes. “But the chimney,” he said, “I don’t want you to worry about that. It’s a simple fix.”
She started to speak, then stopped.
“Don’t worry about any of this.” He spoke with a kindness he hadn’t expected or even intended, he didn’t think he did, but that was how he said it, and he saw in her face that she’d received it that way, too. The corners of her mouth and eyes lit with a spark of understanding, and Jameson wondered what it would be like if things were turned around. When was the last time, if ever there had been a time, when he’d been told not to worry about any of this? When had he not felt responsible for every last thing in his life and for every last thing in the lives of those closest to him?
A moment of quiet, then June nodded and lowered the mug and thanked him. “There’s that tile around the hearth,” she said. “Are you able to find a match for the broken piece?”
“I’ve got a guy in Portland. I ordered a few extras in case another one cracks.”
“Thank you.”
“Sure.”
“I have to get going,” she said. “Is it all right if I come back tomorrow?” She stepped into the doorway.
“You can come anytime.”
She began to turn away, hesitated, and gripped the doorframe. “Don’t take this the wrong way,” she said. “But I’m curious.” Her eyes narrowed. “If you don’t mind . . . I’m wondering how you live with the isolation.”
Jameson shifted his hip, leaned into his bad leg, and shifted back. He balled his fists into his front pockets like a boy, wondering what Van had told her about him. She knew. She had to know about his family. She could have been part of the blur of people who’d pitied him and Sarah Anne, that onslaught of sympathy coming at them in the form of hugs and marionberry pies and easy-to-reheat side dishes. Before their hunger had vanished, another stew arrived at the door.
“Are you sure we’ve never met?” he asked.
June drew a long breath. “It’s hot in here.”
“We can go downstairs.”
“No,” June said. “I mean about meeting. I’m not sure. We could have. My history. You know. It’s a little spotty.”
“Oh. Well. Actually, the thing is . . . so is mine. That’s why I’m not sure either.”
June appeared puzzled by his reply.
Jameson held up a hand. “Oh, I’m not a drinker. I mean, I drink, but it’s not a problem.”
June nodded slowly, and it was all he could do to wonder if this was what all drunks said, and he guessed it was. He had no idea how to make plain that he didn’t actually have a problem without sounding like he was protesting a little too much, so he let it go, and thought again of all those meals coming at them, until they’d run out of room in the fridge and freezer and began dumping everything in the trash, turning everyone’s good intentions into garbage.
“So . . .” he said.
“What I mean is,” June said, “what stops you from going mad inside all these rundown homes, year after year, with no one to keep you company?”
Jameson crossed his arms, realized it made him look defensive, and placed his hands on his hips, though he knew that was just a different look of defense. “I’ve worked this way ever since my wife and I were in college.” The mention of Sarah Anne felt pointed—no accidental slip. Some part of him felt the need to set something straight. He was not so isolated. He did not need her pity.
June nodded at the floor.
“The thing is . . .” he said.
“Oh, listen. Sometimes I just say things. I don’t know why I asked you that . . . I apologize. I’ve gotten so personal. And I’ve kept you long enough.”
Her accent thickened with what appeared to be nervousness.
“No. I’m happy to answer your question,” he said in a voice that seemed to come from elsewhere, from that bright blue desert sky back home for all he knew, because happy was most certainly not what he meant, and she seemed to know that, and it held her in place. “I piece together the lives of other people,” he said. “I guess that’s what saves me.” Saves me? It had already slipped from his mouth, and he didn’t want to come across like a man lacking confidence by stumbling to take it back. The truth was, no one had ever asked him such a thing before, and the answer he offered sounded eccentric to the world outside his ears.
June smiled, and faint lines appeared on both sides of her mouth, which he thought handsome. There was no other way to say it.
Jameson glanced at the floor, at her bare feet at the top of his vision. She crossed one foot over the other at the toes.
“That’s pretty much what Van told me,” she said.
He looked through the window at the ocean. “Is that right.”
“Do you ever wonder what they’d think of your work, the people who lived so many decades ago? Do you worry whether or not you’re doing justice to a place? I guess that’s what I mean, not in any awful way . . . not in the way it probably sounds.”
How was it that he felt a terrible, pleasurable pang for a woman he surely did not know? He wondered if he’d gone a little pale, the way her eyebrows drew together as she waited for an answer.
“Yes,” he said. “I do worry. All the time. In fact, I think it’s safe to say the dead inform my every move.”
June smiled openly, and it caught his breath. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then,” she said. “My birthday and all. Not that I’m going to celebrate or anything. It changes as we get older, doesn’t it? Forgetting, like that. Becoming just another day. Anyway, it’s back to work for us both.”
“Happy birthday,” he said, watching her go, listening as she took the stairs one by one, and then the soft creak of the dining room floor, which stalled for a moment, and he guessed she was standing not far from his things. And then the creak of the back porch planks, but not the final steps. She’d hesitated again.
He waited.
June called back through the house: “I’ve got a pail you can have!”
Jameson came to the top of the stairs, puzzled, smiling. “Do I need a pail?”
“For the bird. It won’t tip when he bathes in it.”
“Oh,” Jameson said, wondering why he had not thought of it himself. Then the click and zip of the camera, the groan of the steps, and she was gone.