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Mack drove faster than he should have down the backcountry roads but made good time. When he reached the Indian Nation Turnpike, he headed north toward the town of Henryetta, wending his way through river valleys and rolling hills decked out in every fall hue known to mankind. Looking over the country, he could almost understand why his father had called this part of the country “Heaven on Earth” after he finished his stint in Korea.
One man’s heaven could be another man’s hell, he reflected.
His route took Mack past Lake Eufaula, the largest manmade lake in Oklahoma. One-hundred-thousand acres large. And to the south was another manmade lake almost as big. Lake Texoma. He had read once that there were over two hundred lakes in Oklahoma. Rimmed by the Ozark Mountains to the north, the Ouachitas to the east, and the Arbuckles to the southwest, the region became a stewpot in the summer—a hot, humid cauldron dense with trees and undergrowth that concealed things from view and set his nerve endings tingling.
“A jungle,” he mumbled. Aware that he was sweating in his clothes, he trained his eyes on the broken stripes in the middle of the highway.
He reached the realtor’s office only fifteen minutes late. As he eyed the one-story yellow-brick building, he questioned the realtors’ inclination toward building materials. Brick was good, he supposed. It tolerated the elements well enough, but he was a wood man himself. The trouble was, good lumber was getting hard to find. Even then, it wasn’t allowed to cure long enough, was sent to building sites too green. Studs were so green the sap ran, which made it twist and bow as bad as a swayback nag. That’s why builders were going to metal studs nowadays, replacing wood with metal. It made no sense to Mack. With all the trees in eastern Oklahoma, there was no excuse to resort to metal. To his thinking, it wouldn’t be a great loss to clear-cut the entire state, turn it into prairie, just like the Panhandle.
Panhandle. That one word helped clear Mack’s thinking. Pulling the manila envelope from beneath the front seat, he went inside to find the woman he had been conversing with for the past several weeks. He introduced himself to the receptionist, informing her that he had an appointment with Roxie Komenski.
“That would be me.”
Mack turned toward the voice and saw a tall, middle-aged woman thin as a broomstick with platinum blonde hair, cut and combed in a short burr. Her accent was definitely not homegrown.
Roxie Komenski extended her hand. “Good to finally meet you, Mr. Barlow.”
“I go by Mack.”
“Roxie will work for me. I have a number of places lined up to show you, the ones I sent descriptions on. And I put together the listing for your place.” She pulled a packet of papers from a portfolio. “Might as well get it out of the way now. Just sign on the line marked with an X.”
Efficient, Mack thought, nodding with satisfaction. All business and that’s what I’m here to do. Tend to business.
He took the thick packet of papers and noted the place with an X was on the last page. “I’ll just look the rest of this over first—”
“They’re standard terms. I put together the asking price based on my inspection.”
“Inspection?” He paused. “Thought I told you not to do that, Roxie”
“I had to get some idea of its worth, Mack.”
He paused. “Mama didn’t mention it.”
“We waited until we saw her drive off.”
Mack rubbed his mouth. “You staked out the place?”
“Sometimes we have to get inventive. No one will be the wiser. An old dog in the front room barked a little, nothing more. We weren’t there long.”
“We?”
“I took another realtor with me. He climbed up on the roof.”
Mack was slow to respond, but his eyes indicated he was chewing on the realtor’s words. Suddenly, the light switch flipped. “Did he speak English?” he snapped.
“What?”
“Never mind.”
Roxie moved on. “He said the roof needs replacing.”
“No way, Jose— That’s a forty-year roof, just had it put on six, seven years ago.”
“Marketing hype’s not a guarantee. Shingles typically last through the warranty, then give out. Bet if you read the warranty on those shingles, it was for seven years. House will also need some updating before I can flip it.”
Mack paused again, letting his mind catch up with the woman’s words. He had met people like her in the military, people from back east that talked fast. People from places like New Jersey. New York. New Hampshire. States with New in their names that were the oldest states in the union. For some reason, he found that thought incongruent. Then he started wondering what someone from back east would find appealing about Oklahoma. Then he caught up.
“Flip it,” he said. “You mean, fix it up to sell it. Think that would pay off?”
She shrugged. “Sometimes you have to spend money to make money. It’s that or sell it for the land. Was me, that’s what I’d do. Probably get as much for the land alone as you would for it and the house. Old houses in the country aren’t worth a damn these days. You follow CNN? Real estate market’s in the tank.”
“Yeah,” Mack said slowly. “I heard that rumor.” He stared at the listing in his hand, then placed it in the envelope with the other papers she’d sent. “I’ll just take this with me, give it a quick once over.”
The stare she gave him was icy. “You said you needed to move that place to get money to resettle your mother.”
“Yes ma’am, I do, but I’d like to see these offerings you told me about first.” He tapped the packet of papers. “I’ll get back to you with the listing soon enough.” The room grew so quiet, he could hear the clock on the wall ticking.
She paused, exhaled deeply. “It’ll be faster if you ride with me.” She walked away, her stride long.
“Hold up,” Mack called out. “I’m meeting some folks for lunch in McAlester. I’ll follow you.”
“Suit yourself,” she said, not breaking her stride. “If you lose sight of me, I’ll be at the Seven-Eleven on the highway.”
Mack revisited his conversation with Roxie Komenski as he walked to his car, his mind crimping on something else she’d said. He was certain he had told her that he was a carpenter. If the real estate market was on the skids, wouldn’t it follow that the building trade was, too?
“Don’t need CNN to tell us the country’s in deep doo-doo,” he mumbled. “Just look out the window.”
The new Cadillac sedan the realtor had revved up and waiting gave him pause, and he considered that maybe his last thought wasn’t entirely true. Some people didn’t seem to be hurting all that bad.
Within minutes, Mack was back on the Indian Nation Turnpike, steering his ten-year-old, secondhand Bronco with one hand and drumming his fingers on the armrest with the other. What Roxie Komenski had said about getting inventive troubled him. Architects were the inventive ones in his business. He just followed their plans and the simpler the plans, the better. Inventive led to delayed schedules. Higher costs. Compromises in quality. Inventive wasn’t always good.
Mack stepped on the gas pedal to keep the realtor in sight. He followed the Caddy down remote county roads and finally stopped in front of a sign that read GOOD SAMARITAN RETIREMENT HOME. He sat in the car, calculating the distance from where they sat into town and figured it was ten miles, at the least.
“This is pretty far out in the sticks,” he called through his open window. “Why’d they build a retirement home way out here?”
“Cheap land,” she called back.
“Don’t doubt that.” The land he looked at right then would turn into a swamp in a heavy rain. Mosquito heaven. He took in the austere-looking building again, noticed the realtor was staring at him, and got the feeling he was supposed to fill the space with words. “Brick is good,” he said, “doesn’t need a lot of maintenance, but . . .”
“But . . . what?” She paused, blinking. “You said safety was top priority.”
“Yes ma’am, I do want my mother and aunt to be safe, no two ways about it.”
“Well, it doesn’t get any safer than that.” She aimed her index finger at the tall building. “Same contractor built this as put that new wing on the prison.”
Mack sucked the spit from between his teeth. “What say let’s take a look at second best.”
She blew the air from her lungs and looked at her listing sheet. “That would be the senior apartment building. The residents need to be able to care for themselves. That’s a requirement.”
“Let’s take a look.”
The engine on the Cadillac revved to life. Again, Mack took a tandem position.
“Note that it’s brick,” the realtor said twenty minutes later. They stood in front of another complex set in a square and surrounded by an asphalt parking lot.
“Where’s the yard?” he asked. Patched asphalt ran right up to the sidewalk and overgrown evergreens hugged the narrow space next to the walls.
“Yard?”
“You know, grass and trees. Someplace to walk around, maybe do a little gardening.”
She raised pencil-thin eyebrows. “Balconies look down on a courtyard. They can sit on the balcony or in the courtyard. Old people sit a lot. There’s something special I want you to see. Follow me.”
Mack followed the realtor and a plump woman guide whose name escaped him into an elevator. They exited six floors up into a long, dark hallway. Mack extended his arms as he walked and found he could touch both walls without straightening his elbow. As he took a quick look down each end of the hallway, where EXIT signs indicated stairs at the far end of each, the image of a panicked herd of cattle being run through a de-ticking chute flicked through his mind.
“This is a very safe building,” Roxie said as if reading his thoughts. “Look at that.”
Inside the small apartment, the woman guide pointed to a red panic button that residents could push if they needed help. “The residents can get help fast. You know, in case they fall.”
Mack eyeballed the distance between the button and the floor. “No way a person could reach that button, they’re on the floor.”
Roxie’s pencil-thin eyebrows took another hike. “You said your mother and sister would be living together.”
Mack cocked his head, frowning. “You lost me.”
“The one not laying on the floor could push the button.” She sounded impatient.
He cleared his throat and turned in a circle in the living room. A small bathroom was wedged between two closet-sized bedrooms and a sliding glass door led onto a balcony that looked to be four by eight.
“Well?” the realtor said.
“Kind of small for two people. How ‘bout—”
“Let me guess,” she snapped. “You want to look at third best.” Without a word, she spun on her heels and headed down the dark narrow hallway.
Mack left the plump woman guide standing next to the panic button and caught up with the realtor, who was already in her car. Through her opened window, she informed him the next stop was a gated community north of town.
He drove hard to keep the Cadillac in sight. At a covered entrance landscaped with flowers and shrubs, he watched Roxie converse with guards, then pulled up next to her in a parking lot. She motioned him to join her, mouthing, Get in! He was barely seated when she took off.
“You wanted a safe place for your mother and aunt. Well. this one costs more but it’s as good as it gets. You notice the gate?”
“I did—”
“There’s also security officers that drive around on a regular basis.”
“That sounds pretty good—”
“That’s the clubhouse.” Pointing through the windshield at a building in the distance, she read from a marketing brochure propped on the dash. “Woman’s Club meets the first Tuesday of the month, Coffee Hour on the second Tuesday, cards every Friday afternoon, plus there’s a quilting club, a Gram’s Club—”
“Gram’s Club?”
“For women with grandchildren.”
“Mama and Sister don’t have grandchildren—”
“Square dance on weekends, a couple of book groups—lots to keep them busy.” She pulled into a parking lot next to a chalet-looking structure, put the car into PARK, and opened her car door.
Mack did not move.
“Well?” she said. “Don’t you want to check out the activities going on inside the clubhouse?”
“I’ll take your word on it.”
She closed her car door and stared out the windshield. “I’m getting the feeling you don’t like this place either.”
“I didn’t say that. It’s better than the other two. Not overgrown, you know, like a jungle, but it’s got yards.”
“They’re called green spaces.”
Mack stared at her.
“They’re supposed to be healthy. Something to do with the exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide.”
“Well, then,” he said, “let’s drive around those green spaces, look at the perimeter fencing.”
“Look at fencing . . .?”
“And one of those duplexes.”
“They’re called patio homes. There’s two built together with an adjoining wall.”
“Okay. Let’s take a look at one of those patio homes.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere.” She drove back toward the front gate where a model home was open for viewing. “They’re two-bedroom units.”
“That’d work,” he said. “Could put a sleeper sofa in the living room for company.”
“If your mother or aunt needed help, they could bang on the adjoining wall.”
He grunted softly. “Better than nothing, I guess.”
“There’s a combination living room and dining area, kitchen comes with appliances, including a combo washer/dryer, and a cement patio—lined with trees and grass.”
“No garden spot?”
She gave Mack a sideways look. “There called patio homes for a reason. People garden on their patios. Container gardening’s big these days.” The realtor glanced at the brochure again. “Did I mention there’s a Garden Club?”
“Garden Club?” He frowned. “What do they do, look at each other’s pots?”
He got no response. Their route took them past new construction near the back of the subdivision and the perimeter fence. The realtor slowed the Cadillac so Mack could get a close look.
“Hell, that’s nothing but bob wire,” he mumbled.
“Barbwire’s good fencing.”
“For keeping livestock in or out, depending on which side of the fence you’re on. Not worth a damn for perverts and escaped convicts.”
“You know of another place around here that has its own security patrols?”
“You make a good point.” He paused. “We can skip the duplex.”
“What? Thought you wanted to look at the model home.”
“No need. Could tell from a distance they’re shooting the shingles on with staples and putting the studs on sixteen-inch centers.”
“Sixteen-inch centers satisfies standards—”
“This is tornado alley, lady. I had twelve-inch centers in mind.”
She paused. “Let me get this straight. You’re not going to look at the model home.”
“Let’s move to the next thing on the list.”
The burr-headed woman hit the brake hard and stared at him. “This isn’t Oklahoma City, buddy. These are your choices.”
“Well, they’re slim pickings.”
“They’re filling up fast.”
He paused, exhaling slowly. “I’ll think on it.”
Stomping the gas, Roxie drove to Mack’s car, shifted into PARK, and stared out the windshield.
Mack rubbed his fingers across his mouth, then sighed. “Any chance of changing the specs on one of these places. I work in construction, maybe I could oversee the building of it.”
“I’m not a miracle worker . . .”
He reached for the door handle.
“But I could try.”
“You could make it happen, we’d be getting closer to what I had in mind.”
“Might have to put your money where your mouth is, Barlow.”
“Balls in your court, Komenski. I’ll give you a call in a couple days.”
“And you need to sign that listing agreement,” she said as Mack was closing the door. “Given the remote location and shape it’s in, it’ll take a while for me to flip your place.”
“Couple days,” he repeated.
