Sissy couldn’t get enough of the builders. She’d been following Nate and the team around the house all morning. As Sarah finished off the sketch she was working on, she kept an ear out to make sure her sister wasn’t getting in the way of their work.
She could hear one of the boys talking to her on the landing.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked.
‘Removing the trunking that hides the cable.’
‘Why?’
‘So I can chase the cable into the wall.’
‘Why?’
‘So you can’t see it.’
‘Why?’
When he didn’t answer, she asked again. ‘Hello? Why?’
Resistance was futile. She could go on like that for hours. ‘Sissy, love, let’s go downstairs.’
She popped her head around the corner to look between the stair balusters. ‘Why?’ She smirked.
‘Smart-arse. Leave him alone so he can do his work. I need your help with the baking anyway. Do you want to get your pencils and sketch pads?’
She put a hand on her hip. ‘Am I baking or am I drawing, Sarah?’
‘You’re baking. Sorry. Come on. You can peel the carrots.’
Sissy felt at home in their house and, just now, that was weighing heavily on Sarah. Because wasn’t Nate already renovating it for when the time came? Who was to say that now wasn’t the time? There’d be just enough room to alter Sarah’s new kitchen area and living room. It would mean two tiny single bedrooms and a studio living area, but it could be done. And then Sissy could live with Sarah.
Was it the right thing to do though? That’s what Sarah couldn’t work out. It would definitely make her feel better to shift the constant guilt from her shoulders. But there was the small matter of the promise she’d made to her mum to make sure Sissy was in a safe facility with professionals to look after her. A promise was a promise, even when the other person wasn’t around to enforce it. But what if Whispering Sands closed down and there wasn’t another home that was as good?
Round and round she went, feeling guiltier all the time.
‘I’m ready,’ Sissy said in the kitchen, tying her favourite frilly red and white gingham apron round her tummy. ‘Where’s the recipe?’
‘We’ll make it up.’
Sissy didn’t look too sure about that.
Of all the things Sarah regretted about her mum’s death, not paying more attention when they cooked together was the one that came back most often to bite her. She’d assumed her mum would always be a phone call away to ask how hot the oven should be or how much baking powder to add.
Not that she’d ever used normal measurements – it was all pinches and dashes – so when Sarah did nail a recipe, she made sure she wrote it down.
She didn’t get the morning muffin recipe but she did have a secret weapon: her sister’s perfect palate. Sissy would taste when they got the recipe just right.
Sarah was reaching for the flour when she noticed the silence upstairs. The teeth-jangling pounding from the pneumatic drill had died away. There were no startling pops from the nail gun or incessant angry-wasp buzzing from the multi tool.
When Nate had first started the renovations, she’d welcomed these lulls. Now she knew better.
She braced herself just as the swearing started. ‘Now what?’ she muttered. ‘Sissy, I’ll be right back.’
She climbed the stairs to the ground floor with a mounting sense of dread. The swearing carried on.
Plasterboard dust billowed from Rachel’s bedroom.
And where there’s dust there’s a hole.
‘Sorry, Sarah, we’ll fix it,’ Nate said as he stepped aside to let her into the room. ‘Did you know your party walls are only four inches thick?’
She didn’t, but surely a builder should. There was a charred hole in the wall. ‘What happened?’
‘Dave was chasing in an electrical socket and hit one on the other side. What are the chances of that? Good aim, son!’
One of the boys nervously patted the other on the back.
‘You probably want to see if your neighbour’s electrics are all right,’ Nate continued. ‘There was an almighty pop when he hit that socket. We might need to do some work next door.’
Their neighbours, the Rogers-Smiths, weren’t thrilled about the renovations as it was. When Sarah first had the quote from Nate about the work, she’d optimistically printed up a detailed works schedule for their neighbours, delivered with a batch of red velvet cupcakes. The schedule went out the window in the first few weeks, along with Nate’s promise not to start before nine a.m. ‘We’ll hit the rush hour if we start too late,’ he’d explained. ‘We’re happy to stay in the vans until it’s time to come in.’
They did stay in their vans for the first week or so. Then, as the boys got more comfortable in the house, they started knocking early, asking to use the toilet. She couldn’t very well say no to that, and soon they were all in the house by eight thirty promising to be quiet.
They had a different idea of quiet than most people.
‘Nate, you’re wrecking more than you’re building! Is it really that hard to look at the bloody plans before you drill through the walls? You’re doing my head in. The instructions are right there in black and white. It really couldn’t be simpler.’
Nate’s normally jovial face tightened. ‘I don’t think I like your tone of voice, Sarah. It was a mistake. If you’re so unhappy with the work then maybe we should just go.’
She nodded. ‘Yes, maybe you should call it a day now.’ She was sick of them.
‘Fine. We will.’ With that he signalled to his boys, who all started packing their tools. Within minutes every screwdriver and hammer, spirit level and machine was packed away.
‘Come on, boys,’ he said, not looking at Sarah.
They hoisted the heavy bags and toolboxes onto their narrow shoulders and started for the door.
‘You can leave your tools here,’ Sarah said, suddenly worried that she’d made a big mistake.
‘No, thank you, Sarah.’
‘You’re coming back tomorrow though, right?’
‘Sure,’ said Nate.
Then the front door closed, leaving the house silent again.
He’ll have to come back tomorrow, she thought, once he’s cooled down.
But he didn’t come back the next day, or the next day. After a week of ignored calls and texts, Sarah had to admit she’d made a huge mistake.
What if he never came back? They’d be left living in a building site with neighbours who hated them.
After SparkGate, Sarah taped a grovelling note to the Rogers-Smiths’ door so that the scorch marks on their sitting room wall wouldn’t come as a total shock. Unfortunately Nate’s team had set fire to the socket that their telly was plugged into. Sarah offered to let Mrs Rogers-Smith watch EastEnders at theirs, but she didn’t take them up on the offer.
Finally, after nearly two weeks and a dozen unanswered texts, Nate responded.
We can be there tomorrow.
Was all forgiven? Excitedly, Sarah pulled out her baking pans. They’d get such a spread of treats for their coffee breaks that they’d never want to work anywhere else.
‘They’re coming back!’ she told Catherine and Rachel when they got home from work. ‘Nate and the team. Tomorrow.’
‘I’ll be glad to get back into my own bedroom,’ Rachel said. ‘It’s been really disorientating.’
‘Plus you can’t have sex in the other room,’ Sarah pointed out. They had a strict No Sex in Communal Space rule after Rachel had admitted doing it in the shower when the others were out of town.
‘You’ve jumped ahead a bit, Sarah Lee. First I have to have someone to have sex with.’
‘Oh. Well I was thinking about your date.’
‘You mean Thomas?’ She shook her head. ‘That’s not going to happen. We’re meant to go out later this week but I might cancel. He’s nice enough but I’m just not feeling the love.’
‘You can’t just cancel on him,’ Catherine said.
‘Why, does that break one of the RecycLove rules or something?’
‘Well no, but you should probably tell him face to face. You’ve been out three times?’
‘Four,’ said Rachel.
‘And it’s been okay?’
‘Okay … that’s the best word for it.’
‘I’ve got ten more minutes till the cake’s done,’ said Sarah. ‘So I’ll just tidy up a bit.’ She grabbed the broom and dustpan and headed for Rachel’s room. She wanted to make it nice for Nate.
The building site was immaculate the next morning when she began watching out the window for Nate’s white van. She didn’t dare go for her run in case she missed them. Every time a car drove down the road she thought it might be Nate. She waited, listening for the door buzzer.
By ten a.m. they still hadn’t arrived. That wasn’t like them. They liked to get in early. She fondly recalled how they’d all stand around in the kitchen with their coffees, taking the piss out of each other.
Those were happy days.
Another vehicle approached. Better late than never, she thought, relief flooding through her. She hurried to the kitchen to turn the gas on under the coffee pots.
But when she returned to the sitting room window, there were no white vans outside.
She checked her phone for messages.
It was really unfair. You don’t tell someone you’re coming and then not turn up. She wouldn’t do that to a builder.
… Wait a minute. That wasn’t right. How would she do that to a builder? She didn’t mean builder.
She meant boyfriend. She wouldn’t do that to a boyfriend.
Because it was the same kind of feeling, wasn’t it? The waiting, the watching and wondering. She was acting like Nate and his team were her fickle boyfriends. What was wrong with her? She was practically replaying their first meeting with the When Harry Met Sally soundtrack in her head. Get a grip, she thought. It wasn’t like Nate was going to turn up on the doorstep with an armful of spanners for her, proposing to go back to work.
It looked like he wasn’t turning up at all. They’d been dumped by their builders.
She went back to the window to wait, just in case he had a change of heart.
She would take him back. All he had to do was ask.