The dripping faucet was panic attack number seventy-three since Kari closed on her house. Or was it one-hundred and seventy-three? Or one-thousand and seventy-three?
“Why did I think this was a good idea?” she muttered, eyeing the trickle of water snaking from the base of the kitchen faucet down the side of the stainless-steel sink and into the drain.
A steady drumbeat of anxiety had plagued her since her first night under her first un-rented roof six months before. Everything leading up to it had seemed fine. Fine for a momentous occasion like being the first person in your immediate family to own property. Exciting, not panic-inducing. She had approached the decision with her usual calm deliberation, looked for a house that was a bit of a fixer-upper but not so much of a fixer-upper that she’d blow any fixing-up budget in the first few months. She’d found a realtor she liked, one who got her and didn’t look down on her for looking for a mid-century ranch to actually live in instead of tearing it down to build a modern McMansion so close to the D.C. Beltway.
The search had yielded a short sale: worn and definitely shabby, but the important parts were well-maintained and it had a sunny back yard on a quiet street in one of the rabbit warren of neighborhoods in Rockville that hadn’t yet completely succumbed to gentrification. The offer was accepted, the settlement date set, an enormous stack of papers signed, and she was handed a set of keys. Then a little gaggle of volunteers moved her limited possessions in. Sam, her niece, had put clean linens on the new bed Kari had put together with Allen wrenches and bags of screws. Kari set up her coffee maker for the next morning and dropped gratefully into those clean, smooth sheets with a smile on her face.
Then rolled to her back, her heart hammering, her brain racing. What if I can’t make the mortgage? What if something breaks? I had nothing to lose and now I have everything to lose.
What have I done?
That first night was a century of fitful sleep, starting awake, then the thoughts scurrying like mice in a wheel, going nowhere, only generating a lot of movement and nauseating whirling.
Why did you have to leave me, Mor? Kari’s lips had trembled at that predawn cry for her mother. I wouldn’t have been able to buy this place if you hadn’t gone and died.
Which was the most ridiculous thought of all. Her mother, in her nineties and in poor health, had slipped away a little more than a year before. There was no question of “leaving.” She had died. She left Kari a small legacy that had tipped her bank balance to the level that enabled Kari to put together the down payment, and nobody but Kari had made the decision to actually purchase the house.
Sunlight shimmered on the slim trickle of water and Kari looked from it to the backyard. Her shoulders eased a little out of their tense hunch. At least out there she had nothing to stress her. She had started to move some of the former owner’s plantings around and made some judicious purchases of new plants of her own. A shady side of the house was shaping up into a beautiful hosta garden. She could see a paved patio area in her mind’s eye. Maybe a grill for cooking outside on hot Maryland summer nights.
Enough. Her eyes snapped back to the sink. She needed to open the cabinet underneath at the very least, check and see if there was any water leaking down there. She took a deep breath and knelt, closing her eyes for a moment in a brief, formless prayer. Flinging the nondescript cabinet doors open, she felt the pipes. They seemed dry, but they were also cold. It was hard to tell. Getting to her feet, she tore a paper towel from the roll and ran it up the bend of pipe. Examined it. Breathed a sigh of relief.
It was dry. For now.
Getting to her feet, the backyard drew her attention again. That azalea she and Sam transplanted a few weeks ago looked wilting and thirsty. The thought of Sam gave her a different kind of pang. A guilty one.
Hell with it. Better to water the plants outside than try to deal with the water in the kitchen.
Kari was out there again, a hose in her hand, a fine spray of water dancing across the azalea she had transplanted with her sister.
Rob shook his head, rubbing his eyes, weariness welling up inside him. No, not her sister. Her niece. He had probably come off like a skeevy middle-aged jerk when he met them a few weeks back, saying he thought they were sisters. He certainly felt like one when he found out he had guessed the relationship wrong.
But they did look like sisters. And apparently the two women weren’t that far apart in age. Not to mention the fact they took his error in stride—as if it happened all the time—but dammit if he didn’t feel like a jerk for stepping in it anyway.
And now he was compounding the skeeve by watching her out of his bathroom window, which had an unobstructed view of her backyard. If she turned her head, she might catch him spying on her. He should stop now. Go put that load of laundry that just finished the spin cycle into the dryer. Yes. He should absolutely do that.
Except…she wiped the fingers of one hand under her eye. Like she was crying. And then took a big breath, her chest heaving, as if she was containing some big emotion.
Something was wrong.
Rob was out of his house and approaching the fence that separated his property from hers before he had a coherent plan. So what came out of his mouth was the supremely inane, “Hey neighbor!” that he had cheerily used the last time he had stepped in it. Like he was Ned fucking Flanders.
Kari’s head whipped around, her light blue eyes meeting his. She swallowed and a wan sort of smile flitted across her face, then she scanned around him. “Hey yourself. No dog today?”
“Um. No. Not my dog.”
“Was it a loaner? A rental?” Her shoulders straightened and she lifted her chin, tossing her pale blond hair back from her face and he could see the effort she put into her casual stance. It made his heart hurt.
“No. My daughter’s dog. My granddog, I guess you could say.” He was babbling. It was criminal, the level of babbling he was committing. And yet, his mouth continued to move. “He visits when my daughter—Mia—needs me to take care of him. It happens about as often as I had expected—a lot. But he’s a good boy.”
He had told Mia that getting a dog was a mistake when she was just starting her career, that her mother lived states away now and couldn’t help. That he wasn’t sure he could help as much as she might need. But Mia knew he was a soft touch. She had gotten Hugo anyway and, of course, left him with her soft touch of a dad every time she needed dog-sitting. And damn if he wasn’t becoming attached to the mutt. No—not a mutt. Of course not. Mia hadn’t been impressed by the #AdoptNotShop hashtag on her beloved Instagram. No, she’d decided to spend money she could have used better elsewhere to buy a purebred German Shepherd puppy.
Rob had been all geared up to be angry with his daughter’s uncharacteristic fit of irresponsibility before he actually met Hugo, who instantly cut him down at the knees, all giant feet and lollopy ears. By the time Hugo was a year old, Rob knew he was basically done. The weapon? A German Shepherd pup. The guilty party? His daughter. One shot to the heart and it was all over. The stupid animal had him wrapped around his paw and Rob was not-so-secretly overjoyed every time Mia called him, starting the conversation with, “Daddy? Do you think you can take Hugo…?”
Kari was looking at him with a funny expression on her face and Rob realized he had been woolgathering. “Anyway. I’m sure Hugo will be back around sometime soon. If you want to see him. Sorry, I don’t even know if you like dogs. But he’s a good boy. Uh, I said that already, didn’t I?” Aaaand now we’re back to babbling.
She shrugged. “I’ve never had one, but they seem perfectly nice. Sam—my niece, you met her—she loves them.”
“Never had a dog? What about a cat?”
She shook her head.
“Hamsters? Gerbils? Guinea pigs?” He was starting to feel a little desperate. “Lizards?”
She laughed a little, lightening the heavy feeling in his heart. “No. Never had a pet.” She paused and eyed him uncertainly. “Was there something you wanted?”
He gripped the fence, the boards rough under his hands. He hadn’t thought this through. He had barely met the woman, let alone know her. He couldn’t ask about the distress that had been so obvious when he was spying on her from his house but had completely vanished as they talked.
“No…just…wondering if you’re settling in okay, if there’s anything you needed.”
She shook her head, her blue eyes grave. “No, I think I’m good.”
“Okay, then. I’ll just…” Rob pointed a thumb over his shoulder, back at his house. “…Get back to laundry. Saturday. Laundry day.” Turning on his heel, he walked back to his back door, desperate to stop the verbal onslaught that seemed uncontrollable.
“Actually.” Kari’s voice stilled his steps. “Do you know a good, hopefully inexpensive plumber?”
Rob turned back to her, a thoughtful look on his face. “What sort of problem are we talking about? Serious?”
Kari looked at the spray nozzle in her hand. “I…don’t think so? But I don’t know. I’m really new to this homeowner thing. I don’t even know if I should just ignore it.”
His eyebrows went up. “Don’t ignore it, whatever it is. Plumbing can be a pretty serious thing. Water getting where it shouldn’t creates all sorts of problems. It can ruin drywall, create mold, even cause structural damage in the worst cases.”
“Oh god.” Kari’s heart kicked, a sickening thudding in her chest. The panic was back.
“Want me to take a look at it?” Rob had moved back to the fence as they talked. Kari eyed him, her habitual suspicion of people who offered things threading through her.
“Are you a plumber?”
“No.”
“A contractor?”
He gave a brief laugh. It made laugh lines fan out from his eyes and Kari’s heart seemed to flutter instead of kicking this time. “No. But I’ve been a homeowner for a long time. And growing up, my parents had rental properties as investments. So my brother and I were free apprentices for my dad. Someone would move out, we’d paint, do basic plumbing, electrical, fix holes in the drywall—you name it.”
Kari tried to assess whether or not she wanted to let him into her house based on everything she knew about him. Which was practically nothing. Divorced, a grown daughter, a “granddog.” Probably her age or a little older. Dark brown hair going silver. Kind brown eyes and a sensitive mouth. Fit, in a rangy sort of way.
Attractive, if she was perfectly honest.
She bit her lip. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d be grateful. There’s a leak from my kitchen faucet.”
He walked to the gate that led to his driveway, let himself out. “Yeah, that could be a problem. Not something you want to ignore.”
She shut off the tap and coiled the hose, meeting him at her back door, her shoulders tightening. “I did check under the sink to make sure it wasn’t leaking there.”
“Good thinking.”
Opening the door, Kari moved to the sink and waved at the faucet. The same gleaming thread of water slithered from the faucet into the sink and down the drain. Or was it worse than before? She couldn’t tell. Strange how such a mundane thing could look so sinister.
“Ah. Yeah.” Rob’s hands landed on his hips and he peered at the faucet for a few moments.
“Bad?” Kari’s stomach clenched.
“Not generally. That’s usually a quick fix.”
“…But?”
Rob waved at the sink. “That faucet might as well have cracked out of an egg at Jurassic Park.” He grasped it and twisted it from side to side. “Stiff, too.” Glancing around the kitchen, he added, “Not a lot of updates here generally, though, so I guess that’s no surprise.”
“I’ve only just moved in,” Kari said, hating how defensive her voice sounded.
“I know.” Rob held up two hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’m just saying I can fix it pretty readily with a few parts, or you could spend a little more money and I could update it to one with a pull-out spray nozzle. It’d make doing your dishes a heck of a lot easier.” He waved at the counter with its dish rack, apparently noting the lack of a dishwasher among the cabinets that looked rattier than ever with him there to observe their shabbiness.
“You can do that?” she asked.
“Do what?”
“Replace an entire faucet? On your own?”
Rob grinned at her, an appealingly lopsided expression. “Sure can. It’s not exactly rocket surgery, you know.”
“Rocket surgery?”
“Yes. Don’t you know I’m a renowned rocket surgeon? That’s my day job.” His face was solemn, but his eyes twinkled with suppressed humor.
Kari nodded. “I see. Master plumber, rocket surgeon. I’m starting to get the idea your accomplishments are endless.”
“Too true. So. Want that new faucet of your dreams?”
That all-too-familiar panicky feeling trickled through her again. “Uh. How much would that cost, you think? General idea?”
He shrugged, frowning. “It would depend, for sure, on how grandiose your dreams about faucets are, but probably in the hundred dollar range if you want to go with a budget option.”
An unfamiliar but welcome wave of relief crashed over her, making her weak in the knees. “Is that all?”
“Yeah. I mean, like anything else, you can spend big money on something if you have it and want to, but…a big money faucet might look a little out of place among the contractor’s special cabinetry and the vintage vinyl flooring.”
Kari nodded. “You sure I shouldn’t call a plumber?”
He crossed his arms over his chest, looking both amused and a little wounded. “Don’t you trust my skills?”
“I do.” She was surprised to find that was the truth. Despite his tendency to run off at the mouth, he had a calm, non-showy way of carrying himself, of assessing the situation, that inspired confidence. “But you don’t owe me anything…”
He frowned again. “I don’t have to owe you. Let’s shut the water off and head for the home center.”
“Now?” He was ready to drop everything to help her? Kari, raised with her parents’ insistence on self-reliance, had never experienced such open-handedness before. Something about his spontaneity made the offer especially compelling.
“No time like the present.”
“Didn’t you say you have Saturday things to do?”
“Nothing that can’t get pushed to Sunday. Let’s go get you the faucet of your dreams.”
Kari’s pale eyes were wide as she scanned the wall of faucets at the home improvement big-box store. “How do I decide?” She turned to Rob and he realized those blue eyes were almost level with his own. Good grief, she must be close to six feet tall.
How incredibly attractive.
Right. She had asked him a question. “Narrow it down to the ones you can afford. What’s your budget?”
Her gaze swiveled back to the wall of fixtures. “I hadn’t really budgeted for a new faucet at all. But…I guess if I can keep it around that hundred dollar mark you mentioned it won’t break the bank.”
“Okay.” He rubbed his chin, the weekend stubble rasping against his palm. He pointed to a few fixtures. “Those are all good choices. I wouldn’t go with that one.” He pointed at another faucet. “I’ve had bad luck with that brand in the past. Wouldn’t risk it.”
“Okay, so between those…” She counted, fingers pointing at each option as she considered it. “Four, which one would you choose?”
“It’s not about what I would choose. What do you want? What look appeals to you? What sort of features do you want?”
“Features?” Her face twisted into a funny grimace. “Like options on a car?”
“Sort of. Like that pull-out spray nozzle. How does that sound?”
A laugh puffed through her lips. “You know, I’ve never thought about it.”
“About what?”
“About what I wanted in my house. I mean, aside from furniture or decorative items. Stuff I could take with me when my lease was up. But everything else? The landlord chose it. Usually the cheapest thing possible, I guess. Whatever would just scrape by, get the water from the ground to the sink.”
“Well…” A smile tugged at his lips. “Now you’re the landlord. Um. Lady. Lady with her own land. You get to choose. What do you think you would like to have? In your house.”
Kari’s hand lifted to her chest and settled there, pressing against the thin cotton of her tee shirt. Rob swallowed, averting his gaze from her chest and turned to look at the wall of faucets, gleaming with finishes ranging from shiny chrome to brushed steel. She pointed at one model. “That one.”
He followed the trajectory of her finger and tapped a unit. “This one?”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s ninety-nine dollars—seriously, why do they do that? Why not round up to a hundred?” She readdressed herself to the wall of faucets. “And because it has a pull-out thingy with a spray thingy and it’s brushed metal instead of shiny and it…has a brand name I recognize. Does that pass inspection, Professor?”
Her words felt like a soft punch of regret to his sternum. “Yeah.”
“Why did your face just go all funny?” Her eyes narrowed, her expression concerned.
“Did it?”
“Yeah.”
He shrugged. “Don’t know.” She could have no way of knowing she’d just inadvertently dusted off a dream of a lifetime ago. Bending, he found a box that corresponded with the item number of the faucet she had selected. “Let’s get checked out and I can install it for you.”
“You sure you’re want to do it?”
He paused, looking sideways at her. “Don’t you think I can?”
She waved her hands in front of her face. “Didn’t mean to disparage your abilities. It’s just…you’re giving up your Saturday to do this for me. I feel guilty. I could always hire a plumber.”
“Not an issue. I like doing this sort of thing.” He hefted the box. “Need anything else while we’re here?”
“I don’t know.” She looked up and down the wide aisle, then nodded at the box. “Will that have everything you need to do this? Or do we need to get additional pieces or parts or whatever?”
“I’ll get some new supply lines. Otherwise, this should have everything we need. Except for tools, of course.” He laughed at the sudden, stricken look on her face. “Which I have. Don’t worry.”
“Okay.” She nodded toward the front of the store. “Let’s get this show on the road, I guess.”
And as Kari followed him to the aisle that held the other things he needed he realized that he hadn’t helped a woman around the house in a very long time. It was a little scary how good it felt.