THE SMELL IN Nana’s house was wretched, even if Brett had cleaned up most of the trash. I could see that I’d have to wash dried egg off the floor, and maybe even clean the area rug in the living room. The animal had left a trail of milk there, like it was dragging the carton around. Stupid raccoon. Or whatever it was. “If I ever find the raccoon that did this, I will turn it into a pelt with my bare hands.”
Brett chuckled. “I’d like to see you do that.”
“Are you suggesting I wouldn’t?” But I laughed a little, too.
Nana’s house was exactly as I remembered it. The couches were white and spotless, the glass coffee table practically sparkled in the late-morning sunlight, and the hardwood floors gleamed in the areas not occupied by trash. How long had it been since I’d visited Nana in her house? Years, probably. I spent holidays at Mom and Dad’s, and they picked up Nana for those. Looking around the living room, being there again, made my heart hurt. There were so many memories in these walls. Happy ones, with Nana and Grandpa and Michael. We used to play Monopoly in the kitchen. Nana made me be the iron, and when I asked her why, her response was always the same: “You really think you’re a thimble?” A smile broke out across my face.
Brett swept a finger across the surface of one of the glass end tables. “Clean. Did you come over here to dust, or is your grandmother so neat that she scares the dust away?”
“One hundred percent the latter.”
He shook his head. “Incredible.”
He’s so great. The thought popped quickly into my head, but I didn’t know what to do with it. Yes, Brett was a nice guy. He was pretty hot, too. And reliable and funny and a great listener. Nice guy. But he didn’t even have a real job. Oh my gosh, I could imagine the look on my parents’ faces if I ever brought Brett home. Yes, we’re dating now. What’s that, Dad? Did you ask what he does? He takes walks with tourists. Dad’s an engineer who designed space shuttle parts for NASA. He would literally die.
A pang of guilt hit me. I shouldn’t be snotty. Brett was grieving, and maybe he made a good income as a people walker. I mean, who knows? I had nothing to compare him to. He wasn’t homeless, so that was good. But he wasn’t Chase. Ambition was so damn sexy. Brett was a nice guy.
I opened the windows in the living room. Between the trash and the stale, hot air, the house was less than pleasant to be inside. “Come on. I know exactly where she keeps the lease agreement.”
I led Brett through a hallway lined with family photos. Of course he had to stop and study them. “Wait. Is that you?”
“Yeah, that’s me.” I stopped beside him. “I haven’t looked at these in a while. That’s my nana and my grandpa.” I pointed to a photo of a rather serious-looking couple standing side by side on the beach. “They look angry, don’t they? Like someone kicked sand in their picnic basket.”
He drew closer to the photo. “You look a lot like your grandmother in that photo. Is that when they owned the inn?”
“No. That’s a photo of my biological grandfather. He died before I was even born. Then Nana fell in love with him”—I pointed at another photo—“and they bought the inn together. His name was Elliott, but to me and Michael he was ‘Grandpa.’ He was Irish and very charming. Guests assumed Nana was the maid.”
“And she didn’t take their heads off? I’m impressed.” He stepped closer to examine the photo I’d pointed to. In it, Nana was standing beside a handsome man with a military posture—my grandpa Elliott.
“She was comfortable setting them straight.”
The photos made me sad again. Everything about this house made me feel sad, or something like it. Guilty. Nana had kept these photos up for decades, while I’d gone to high school, then to college, then to work. I’d outgrown my own grandmother, but she kept these photos hanging. “Everyone left her,” I said quietly. “Her two husbands, and her grandchildren, and even her son. She’s been all alone.” My throat tightened painfully. I’d let so much time go by.
“Mindy.” Brett’s face tightened with concern.
“No, it’s okay. I’m fine. Sorry.” I nodded my head toward the end of the hallway. “The contract should be in the office, back here.”
We walked into a room that was furnished entirely with neatly stacked boxes and metal filing cabinets. I set my hands on my hips as I surveyed the area. “So much paperwork,” I muttered. “Nana keeps everything.”
But it didn’t take me long to narrow my search, thanks to my grandmother’s meticulous filing system. The rental documents were in the top drawer of a tall gray filing cabinet. “Got it!” I waved the lease in the air. “Now all we have to do is figure out how to evict Vaughan. There’s probably a clause or something.”
“Didn’t you help her to rent the inn?”
I rolled my eyes at that one. “Yes, but do you think I read the rental lease? We had a lawyer for that.”
I squinted at the tiny type. It figured it would be written in legalese. I ran one pink-polished fingernail down the first page and then flipped to the second. “I know there’s something in here. A clause prohibiting illegal activity, maybe.”
“Hmm.” Brett was reading over my shoulder. Normally that would’ve earned him an elbow to the chest, but I actually didn’t mind it. He smelled nice, like fresh air and clean laundry. “Is there something else we can use, I wonder? Is she keeping the property in good repair?”
“Vaughan? Are you kidding? There’s not a thread out of place.” I paused. “Except the grass was a little long, but that was my fault. I’ve been getting settled—”
“Of course.”
“I mowed it this morning.”
I found what I was looking for on page ten of the lease. “Here—eviction for illegal or illicit activity.”
We read the clause together, which provided that Vaughan could be removed if she was convicted of criminal activity. “That’s not ideal,” Brett said. “Vaughan would have to be convicted of a crime first.”
My shoulders slumped. “Right. And that’s not going to happen if she’s paying someone in the police department to look the other way and notify her of investigations.”
Brett tilted his head thoughtfully. “She must be paying someone a lot of money, don’t you think? Must be a lucrative business.”
“Have you seen the inn?” I gestured a bit too wildly with my hand and nearly threw the lease at the wall. “Business is booming. Who knew there were so many creeps in this town?”
I spat the word creeps, picturing husbands stepping out on their wives. But Brett apparently didn’t share my anger. He shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know about that. Two consenting adults. Or maybe more than two . . .”
I froze. “Brett. Come on.”
“Who’s getting hurt? The girls who work there seem happy, and the guests don’t seem to know any different.”
I tucked the lease under my arm. “I’m not going to allow my grandparents’ inn to be used in this way.”
Brett’s eyebrows twitched at that. “Those women have a choice. Vaughan isn’t trafficking.”
Oh my. How had I missed this insufferable streak? “Don’t tell me. You majored in feminist studies in college?”
“No, but my mom is a feminist scholar.”
“Of course she is. Why wouldn’t she be?”
I get sarcastic when I’m nearing an emotional meltdown, and the sarcasm doesn’t even have to make logical sense. My neck felt hot. This was a betrayal. Brett had said he’d help me and I’d thought that meant we both agreed that running a brothel in the inn was absolutely unacceptable. Brett casually pushed his hands into his pockets. This topic didn’t bother him at all, and it was all I could do to not burst into tears at that fact. “No offense, but you sound like a SWERF,” he said. “A sex worker exclusionary radical feminist.”
I didn’t even know what that meant, but I’d had about enough of this stinky house and its memories, and of Brett and his feminist bullshit. “How dare you call me a SWERF!” I poked my finger against his sternum. “I’m the one with the vagina!”
His gaze softened. “Mindy—”
“Do you know what it’s like to have people in town look at you like you’re the stereotypical Asian whore? Of course you don’t.” My voice rose, but I was good and furious. “A cashier at the general store hit on me. Another one practically ran in the other direction. That cop last night took one look at me and assumed I was for sale. It sucks.” My voice was trembling, so I paused to take a breath. “All of that aside, it’s my grandmother’s inn and she doesn’t want it to be used this way. My family celebrated holidays there. I spent summers there. And I don’t care about sex workers, I don’t. But I want them to take their sex work somewhere else.”
“Calm down—”
“You don’t understand. Just go,” I snapped. “If you’re not going to help me, then leave.”
“I want to help you. I’m just saying—”
“Leave.” When he opened his mouth to speak again, I actually stuck my fingers in my ears. I’m not proud of it.
This is why your relationships fail. You are a brat when someone disagrees with you.
Shut up, inner voice, I thought. Brett was defending Vaughan, who had set me up to almost be arrested the previous night. This was not a gray area. But I took a deep breath and dropped my hands, resolving to be a little bit of a grown-up. “Look. I think it’s better that I do this myself. It’s a family situation that doesn’t need to involve you.”
Brett got a puzzled look on his face, this kind of combination squint and eyebrow crease. “All right. I’ll see you later.”
It annoyed me that he gave up so easily. Quitter.
• • •
AFTER BRETT left, I thought about this one summer night when Chase and I were sitting on the kitchen floor in my apartment with all of the windows open, talking about his latest breakup. Chase and I were not suited for marriage. Incidentally, this made us perfectly suited for each other. My one-night stands, his relationships that blew up after three months—these were the events that would normally leave a person feeling lonely, but they brought us together.
God, I still remember how hot that night was, like breathing through a wet towel. I was lying on the linoleum floor with my legs up on the cabinets. It was cooler that way, with my back on the floor.
“It’s always going to be like this,” Chase said. “You realize that, don’t you?”
Chase leaned his back against the cabinets. He was picking at the label on his beer bottle, a familiar if messy habit. And his feet were bare. I don’t like men’s feet. They’re weird and hairy. But Chase’s had never bothered me, which I took as another sign that we were destined for each other.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I fuck up and end up here with you until you meet someone. Then you fuck up and end up here with me. And so on, forever, until we die.”
“Lovely,” I said. I scrunched beer-label pieces in my fist and flung them at him.
He batted them away and smiled. “It’s like that guy who rolls the rock up the hill, then it rolls down again.”
“Sisyphus.”
“Brainiac.”
“You’re comparing spending time with me to eternal punishment.” Though that was kind of accurate considering we spent all this time together and never had sex. “I should scratch your eyes out.”
He brought one knee closer to his bare chest and gave a sexy, lopsided smile . . . to the beer bottle in his hand. Chase and I got flirty, but there was never anything serious on his end. “You know what I mean,” he said.
I did, and my stomach dropped. This was Chase’s way of saying that I was nothing to him but the friend who let him sit on the kitchen floor and complain. Romantically, I was not an option. It hurt when he talked like that. But I never let Chase know how I felt—at least, not until I found out he was engaged, and by then it was useless. That night, as I lay on the kitchen floor trying not to cry, I said, “You watch. We’ll wind up married one day.”
He snorted. “Yeah.”
I act tough, drinking beer and cursing. But all I want is love. It’s all I’ve ever wanted, and even the Lit Chick Corporation could see that. From the moment I met Chase, I knew he could be The One. I could picture coming home to him cooking me a fancy Valentine’s Day dinner, roses on the table and a bottle of champagne chilling. He was like this with his girlfriends, such a romantic at heart. That’s why I could overlook all of his rough edges. Deep down, Chase was also an Elizabeth (Barrett Browning) who wanted to live happily ever after. I wanted that, too. I just couldn’t seem to convince him that we were perfect for each other. “Oh, come on, Chase. You could do worse than me.”
“And you could do better than me, kid.” He shifted his shoulders toward me. “You know I’m shit at relationships. If I fucked things up with you, who would I go crawling to?”
“How about one of your guy friends?” I dropped my legs from the cabinets and stood, feeling the surge of blood rushing back to my feet again. “Whatever, Chase. You’re an asshole.”
I said it through stinging eyes and a lump in my throat, but I smiled like it was a joke. Keep it light. Always keep it light. He wouldn’t meet my gaze. “I know. That’s what I’m saying.” Sometimes I wondered if he always knew about everything I tried to hide.
Chase jokes that I’m smarter than he is, but Chase was so smart about me. I inevitably ruined relationships, like it was in my nature. Take Brett, for example. Nice guy. Attractive. Kind. We couldn’t even spend time in the same space without me taking off his head over some slight. I was incapable of being decent, wholesome, marriage material. Like, I’d fall into bed with a guy or I’d stick my fingers in my ears and tell him to leave my nana’s house. There was no middle path. I wasn’t the shopping-for-antiques-and-grabbing-coffee kind of girl. But I felt like I could’ve gotten there with Chase, if only because we’re so darn similar that he would forgive me for everything else.
“Whatever.” I said it to myself now as I opened the windows. “What-fucking-ever.”
Now I rummaged through one of Nana’s closets. I found a fan to circulate some fresh air and beside it, a candle. Nana had shoved the candle into the back, and I smiled when I found it, because I recognized it at once. It was a gift my mom had given to her a few years ago for Christmas.
“It’s soy,” Mom had said. “It will burn clean.”
There are a few things people should know about my mom. I’ve already covered her open-mindedness that hinges on gullibility, so that’s number one. Number two is that she loves endangered animals, and I don’t mean Siberian tigers. Mom is part of an environmental group that makes a hobby of protesting land-use applications that they believe will disrupt the habitat of endangered species. This is serious business, and I know that because once she wore a T-shirt emblazoned with the image of an eastern wood rat. Number three is that she loves strongly fragranced candles. Nana happens to hate them. So when Mom gave Nana the Christmas candle—it was deep purple and its scent was called Christmas Twilight—Nana had removed the lid and curled her lip in disgust.
“It’s nice, isn’t it?” Mom had assisted Nana by tilting the hurricane glass closer to her face. “Mmm, I love it.” She brought it back to her own nose and inhaled deeply before turning the candle to me. “Mindy, smell this.”
I did. It smelled like cinnamon, ozone, and armpit. “Wow” was all I could say.
“I know,” Mom replied, and then shoved the candle under my brother Michael’s nose.
I caught Nana’s eye in that moment and we looked at each other and then away quickly, the way people do when they share an unspoken secret. That candle was nasty. But Nana kept it, just like she kept those old pictures. The wick was waxy and white. After burning it for fifteen minutes, I could barely smell the garbage anymore. And really, the body-odor note had mellowed over time and left only cinnamon and ozone.
As the candle burned, I found Nana’s rag mop and bucket and washed the kitchen floor. I took my time, the way I remembered her taking hers. I even turned the wooden chairs upside down on the breakfast table so I could wash beneath it. She still used the same orange-scented floor soap she’d used for ages, and the memories kept coming: Warm summer air drifting into the living room as Michael and I waited for Nana’s floor to dry so we could grab a snack before heading to the beach. Grandpa humming as he went back and forth between the house and the inn, always doing three things at once, always happy about it.
I’d lost something.
I’d grown up without realizing it, and those carefree summers were gone. Now I was saddled with bills and a career, my roommate’s cat, and a madam. I paused mid-swipe across the floor to lean my chin against the top of the mop handle. I’d been a jerk to Brett. All I’d wanted was for him to understand my anger and agree with me. Was that too much to ask? He’d been kind to me and my family, and I’d lost my temper with him. I missed those childhood days when I didn’t care what people thought of me. When I was a kid, I’d never questioned that one day I’d fall in love, and that the person would love me back.
At least the floors were clean and the house no longer smelled like garbage.
I’ll bring Nana lunch, I thought as I locked up. I’ll sit with her while we watch her soap opera and we definitely won’t talk about Vaughan and the inn. I’d remembered to grab the lease before I left, but I rolled it into a tube as I walked down the driveway. A woman with a helmet of blond curls was power-walking past, carrying two small pink weights in her hands. “Good morning,” I said as she approached.
“Morning!” she nearly shouted with enthusiasm. To my dismay, she stopped at the foot of the driveway and waited for me. “Are you renting?” She gestured to the house.
“Oh no. That’s my grandmother’s house. I was just cleaning up a bit.”
“Well, look at you. Heavens, I heard all about Jai.” She lifted her large amber sunglasses, revealing bright hazel eyes. “Is she all right?”
The woman had a full, round face that appeared fuller because her features were gathered close together, leaving an expansive stretch of cheek. She had the aura of a Southern belle and a faint accent as well. She was wearing bright pink blush and matching lipstick, and if she hadn’t used such a heavy application, the color would’ve worked well for her.
“Nana will be okay. She broke her ankle.”
She clucked her tongue. “The poor, poor thing. Thank goodness she has a granddaughter like you to stop by and check on her house.” She emphasized each word and set her hands on her hips, pink weights and all. I didn’t know what to make of it. Her reaction seemed over-the-top and I shifted, uncomfortable. “But where are my manners?” The woman set her weights on the ground and extended a hand. “I’m Luanne Henry.”
“Mindy Ling.”
“Do you live around here?”
“Over in River Junction, but I’m staying in town for the summer to take care of Nana.”
“Bless your heart. She is lucky to have you.”
“Yes. I’m heading to see her now at the nursing home.”
“She must have been scared out of her mind. People have been talking about it, how she was lying there, helpless, until that nice young man found her. That people walker. Darling man.”
A dart of electricity hit me at the mention of Brett. This was followed by a stab of guilt, since I’d been less than charming earlier. But he was so wrong about me being a SWERF! You still have to apologize. Ugh.
I took in Luanne’s attire: a loosely fitting tunic and bright blue leggings. The leggings were a solid color, but the tunic was covered in giant birds. I pointed at it. “Great tits,” I said.
Her eyes widened. “I’m sorry?”
“The pattern on your shirt. Those birds are called great tits. I’m a Lit Chick representative.” Sort of.
She set a hand over her heart and threw her head back in laughter the way people never do in real life. Everything about Luanne was an exaggeration. “Oh my, I thought you meant something a little bit different than that. Whew!” She was enjoying her chuckle, so I smiled politely. “Well, I think it’s wonderful that you sell Lit Chick. You know, you’ve got about fifty women in this town who’d drop everything if you set up a champagne boutique. Might want to consider doing that sometime.”
“That’s a great idea, Luanne.” Yeah. Never happening.
“In fact,” she continued, “you could always set something up at bingo night. Over at St. Ignatius?” She pointed in a direction but I didn’t look. “Every Tuesday is bingo night. Each card is five dollars, five for twenty dollars. Oh, it’s not gambling,” she assured me. “It’s only for fun. We raise money for charity and local businesses donate prizes. I’m sure Father MacGovern wouldn’t mind if you set up a little boutique in the corner of the basement.”
“Yeah, maybe.” I scratched the back of my neck. “I’m a little low on inventory right now, but if I get the shipment in on time—”
“It’s only a thought, sweetie. Only a thought. I’ve got a million more where that one came from!” Luanne bent down to pick up her hand weights. “Do give Jai my best, will you? Tell her Luanne Henry was asking after her.”
“I will.”
But Luanne didn’t leave. She stood in place with a wistful look on her face. “I know Jai from church. She’s a regular at the nine o’clock mass. You might want to bring her by some Sunday. I don’t know whether they have religious services at the nursing home where she is, but knowing her, she misses her church family.”
Nana has a church family? This was news. “Sure. Yeah, that’s a great idea, Luanne.”
She smiled broadly, with her mouth closed. “And if you can’t bring her to church, maybe you can bring her to bingo. I don’t think there’s ever been a night that Jai hasn’t come to bingo, in all the years I’ve known her.”
Also news to me. “Oh, for sure. Nana’s crazy about bingo.”
Luanne got a faraway look in her eyes. “It’s only for fun, of course. It’s not gambling.” And with that enigmatic comment released, she fluttered her fingers at me. “I should go. Gotta keep my heart rate up!”
I watched her wiggle off down the sidewalk before crossing the street. So Nana played bingo and went to church now? Then I would suck it up and take her to church and bingo. This summer, I was going to be the very best granddaughter I could be.
When I crossed the street onto the property of the inn, I was still glowing from Luanne’s compliments, uninformed as they were. I was a good granddaughter that Nana was lucky to have, yes I was. I was going to bring Nana lunch and a cookie, and that would make her day. Thank goodness she has a granddaughter like you. My head was so swollen with the compliment that I nearly missed the figure hovering near the cottage, almost as if she were waiting for me. Vaughan. “The lawn looks nice.”
She wasn’t doing anything but standing there with her arms lightly folded across her chest, watching as I approached. My grip tightened around the lease in my hand. I should hit her with it. The thought flew into my mind, followed by another one: That would be assault.
“What do you want, Vaughan?” I practically snarled at her as I neared. “I know you’re not here to talk about the lawn, and I hope you’re not here to ask me for another favor.”
Her left eye twitched and narrowed. It was unnerving. “I wanted to make sure that you were okay after last night. You seemed so upset when you left.”
I raised my wrists to show her the bruises that were developing. “I was handcuffed. You’re operating a whorehouse. Yes, I was upset. I’m still upset.”
Vaughan released a long, patient sigh. “I was hoping you had moved on from that talk. You’ve known me for a long time, Mindy. These thoughts of yours are foolish.”
Her voice was so calm, her manner so disappointed and concerned, that I actually started to question whether I had been mistaken after all. Was I overreacting and seeing things that weren’t there? Was I the one who was wrong?
I felt the smooth paper of the lease bundled in my fist. No, I wasn’t wrong. “I know what you’re doing, and you can’t do it here. See this?” I unrolled the lease and stabbed the first page with my finger. “It’s your lease. And it says you can’t conduct illegal or illicit activity on this property.”
“Mm-hmm.” Vaughan set her hands on her waist.
“Listen. I don’t care about prostitution. I’m no SWERF,” I added, mostly to reassure myself. “It’s a living, I get it. But this is my grandmother’s inn. She’s old-fashioned and she doesn’t want you running this kind of business.”
“But you need evidence that I’m conducting that kind of activity, sweetheart. All you have is your own experience with a sadly misguided undercover police officer.”
I clenched my jaw. “Did you push my nana off the ladder?”
Vaughan laughed softly and tucked her white-streaked brown hair behind one ear. “Now that’s a new one. Goodness. I was hoping to have a productive conversation to put everything behind us.” Her tone sounded sad. “Apparently that’s not going to happen.”
“Apparently not.” I rerolled the lease and pointed it at her. “I want you to leave. I’ll give you some time if you need to find a new place. But this isn’t working out.”
Vaughan smiled. “Oh, honey. What about my guests? And my girls? What would they do without me?” She turned. “I can see we’re finished here.”
Watching her walk away, I bit my lower lip so hard that it started to bleed.