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I WAS WORKING IN THE upper bedroom, enjoying the sunshine pouring through the windows. It was on the third floor of the tower. It was my favorite space in the house, with its grand ceiling-height windows and a cozy book corner complete with a window seat. Actually, I had a hard time naming my favorite place. I loved the kitchen. The library was amazing. And this bedroom was awesome.
The crew and I had made significant progress on the woodwork restoration. The second floor was well underway. The crew was going to be moving up to the third floor soon. I was working on the finer details before the rest of the crew came in to work on the rest of the rooms. The third floor was almost completely untouched by renovations. Clearly, when the family lived in the house, the first and second floor were where they spent their time.
As I worked, my mind kept going back to the encounter with Paisley. I felt a pang of guilt, knowing I had unintentionally scared Timothy’s daughter. She was a surly teenager. We had all been there and done that. For some reason, I felt the need to apologize. I didn’t want her to dislike me. It shouldn’t matter, but to me, it did. I left my stuff where it was and went back down to the second floor.
To my surprise, she was lingering near the staircase, eyeing me skeptically. “Hey, Paisley,” I began, approaching her cautiously. “I wanted to apologize for earlier. I didn’t mean to startle you. I wasn’t aware anyone was home.”
“Whatever,” she said, shrugging her shoulder.
“I’m happy to meet Mr. Hastings’s daughter. He told me a little about you when we were getting your room ready.”
Paisley raised an eyebrow, her expression guarded. “Is that what Mr. Hastings called me?” she said slyly, looking down at her perfectly manicured nails. “Hm, interesting.”
I blinked, caught off guard by her question. “Well, yes. He mentioned you’re his daughter.”
She flipped her long dark hair over her shoulder and sniffed. “It stinks in here. Is that you?”
My eyebrows shot up. “No, I haven’t been working long enough to get ripe.”
“It really smells. He didn’t tell me it was going to be so stinky.”
I chuckled nervously. The girl was intimidating. I tried to remind myself she was just a teenager, but damn, she was scary. “I’m just here to help restore the house. I didn’t mean to intrude or make you uncomfortable. I’m going back to work.”
Paisley shrugged and her demeanor slightly softened. “Whatever. It smells weird up here.”
It was her way of asking what I was doing. It had been a long time, but I could still speak teen. “It’s probably just the wax for the floors and the fresh paint on the walls. We’re working on restoring everything.”
“My mom wanted to paint everything white,” she said, shrugging. “My mom thinks Timothy’s idea of restoring the house instead of tearing it down is ridiculous. It’s so old. Do you know how old this place is?”
I couldn’t help but wonder why Paisley referred to her father as Timothy. It wasn’t my place to pry. “I do know how old it is,” I said, nodding. “It’s an architectural gem. It’s beautiful.”
“It’s old.”
“Yes, it is. What do you think about the house so far?”
Paisley’s eyes flickered with a hint of curiosity. “I hope it’s haunted.”
I couldn’t contain my laughter at her unexpected comment. “Haunted? Why would you want that?”
She smirked, a glimmer of mischief in her eyes. “I like dark, spooky places. This house is too nice.”
I shook my head, still amused by her determination to be difficult. “Well, I can assure you, it’s not haunted. But it does have its own charm.”
As I started making my way down the stairs, Paisley followed, her steps hesitant at first, then more assured. The air seemed to lighten, the awkward tension dissipating as we descended together. When we reached the ground floor, I headed toward my truck parked outside.
Paisley followed me. I didn’t say anything. She was obviously curious but too proud to ask questions. She circled my truck, eyes darting from one tool to another when I opened the toolbox I carried at all times.
“What’s all this for?” she asked.
“Just some tools for the restoration,” I explained. I opened another toolbox to reveal an array of brushes and scrapers. “We’re trying to bring the old beauty of the house back to life. The idea is to make it look exactly as it did when it was first built, with only a few changes.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Well, some people believe that old things have a value, a beauty, that can’t be replicated in the new,” I replied. “This house has seen many years, many lives. Can you imagine the stories it could tell?”
Paisley ran her fingers over a set of old chisels. “It’s just wood and bricks,” she said dismissively.
I smiled at the sullen teenager’s determination to remain indifferent. “True, but to some, it’s more than that. I have studied carpentry pretty much my whole life. When I see something like this, I’m so excited. This house was built before modern machinery. All the wood you see in there was done by hand. People had to carve out those intricate designs and cut every piece of wood.”
Paisley squinted at me, her eyes narrowing in consideration. “Sounds like a lot of work for something that’s just going to get old and break again.”
I shrugged, shutting the toolbox with a soft click. “Everything gets old and breaks eventually. That doesn’t mean it’s not worth appreciating while it’s here.”
She paused, her fingers idly twirling a strand of her dark hair as she mulled over my words. I could tell by the look in her eye that she wasn’t quite convinced yet, but I had planted a seed.
“That’s your job?”
“It is,” I said, nodding. “It’s a job I love. I think this house is a masterpiece.”
“It’s just a house.”
“But this house has been preserved,” I said as we started back inside. “This house is almost untouched by time. That is unheard of. It’s a testament to the quality of craftmanship.”
“I’ve been to castles before,” she said as if it was the most normal thing in the world. “They’re old and they’re still standing.”
“You’re very lucky you got to see those,” I told her.
I started back upstairs. Surprisingly, she tagged along without protest. I pointed out some of the things I had done, trying to show her the beauty she was surrounded by and was clearly taking for granted.
“You really like this old stuff, huh?” she mused.
I smiled. “Yeah, there’s something special about preserving history. Each piece has its own story.”
Paisley’s eyes lingered on an antique chair we had just finished restoring. “But it’s so old.”
“It’s not that old,” I said, laughing. “I mean, over a hundred years, but there are older houses. Not typically here in the US but around the world. I would love to see some of those.”
She shrugged and looked away, seemingly unimpressed. “I still prefer new stuff,” she declared, crossing her arms over her chest.
“New isn’t always better,” I responded gently, my gaze sweeping over the aged wooden floor beneath us. “This floor has been walked on by countless people, and yet it’s still here. There’s a kind of resilience to that.”
“Yeah, I guess,” she said hesitantly, glancing at the floor before looking back at me with a new curiosity in her eyes. “But doesn’t it get boring? Doing the same thing over and over?”
“Restoring houses isn’t about doing the same thing all the time. Every house is different. Every house has a story. Look at this wallpaper. I like to think about the woman of the house sitting in this room admiring the wallpaper. Maybe she didn’t like it. I don’t know. There’s always a story.”
“It’s old,” Paisley said again. “And it’s falling off the walls.”
“It is,” I said with disappointment. “That’s why I’m going to be peeling it off. I can’t save it, unfortunately.”
“Huh,” she muttered, but she was still staring at the wallpaper.
“Do you want to help take it off? It can be kind of fun. You just pull it off. What doesn’t come off, I’ll scrape.”
I expected her to say no, but to my surprise, she nodded, agreeing to help.
“Sure,” she said. “Why not?”
I smiled, glad that Paisley was finally taking an interest. I handed her a pair of gloves and a scraping tool. She looked at it skeptically but put the gloves on anyway. I gestured to a section of the wall where the floral wallpaper was already peeling.
“Start there,” I instructed. “Try not to damage the wood underneath.”
Paisley nodded and approached the wall hesitantly. She gripped the scraper with determination, flaking off a piece of wallpaper. The old paper peeled away under her gentle hands, revealing the smooth wood beneath it.
As Paisley worked, I continued to watch her, a sense of satisfaction washing over me. This was how it began, the appreciation for an old house and history, one fragile layer of wallpaper at a time. I reached my own gloved hand out to another portion of the wall, joining her in the task. The soft scraping sound filled the room as we worked side by side, each movement revealing more of the ancient history that lay underneath.
“You can almost feel the history coming off with it,” I said, my voice hushed to match the quiet reverence in the room.
“I guess,” she muttered without stopping her work.
I showed her the new wallpaper we intended to put up, a pattern reminiscent of the original but fresher. Paisley eyed it with a nod of approval. “Not bad,” she remarked. “I guess if you like flowers.”
“You don’t?”
“I prefer paint. I like to paint,” she admitted.
“Maybe you should think about a mural in your bedroom,” I suggested. “You have that one wall with no windows. It would be perfect.”
“A mural?” she asked, a grin playing on her lips.
“Yes,” I said, nodding. “Something that speaks to you. It could be a favorite place or just something you love.”
“Maybe,” she murmured.
Paisley looked different from her father. I wouldn’t have guessed they were related. I didn’t see his features in her at all. He was tall and muscular while she was petite with very feminine features.
As we peeled away layers of faded wallpaper, Timothy walked in. His eyes widened in surprise at the sight of his daughter working alongside me. “Paisley, what are you doing here? I told you to stay away from this mess.”
Paisley shot him a defiant look, her hands still gripping the wallpaper scraper. “I’m helping.”
Timothy sighed, clearly agitated. “Go find something else to do, Paisley. This isn’t your concern.”
She rolled her eyes, unimpressed by his authoritative tone. “Whatever.”
“It’s alright, Timothy. Paisley’s been a big help. We’ve got a system going here.”
He shot me a wary look, his brows furrowed. His look told me to shut the hell up. “Can I talk to you privately, Catherine?”
“Sure,” I said, nodding.
“Should I keep going?” Paisley asked me.
I didn’t know how to answer that. I wanted to say yes, but Timothy was the boss and he didn’t want her in there. “That’s up to your father,” I said quietly.
“I want that stuff in your bedroom picked up,” Timothy said sternly.
Paisley shot him a dirty look. “Whatever.”
The tension between them was thick. I knew it was typical for teenagers to clash with their parents. My dad and I had our rough moments but it was never all that bad. Timothy looked exasperated as he walked out of the room. I followed him out into the hallway, preparing to face his wrath.
