Rise: How a House Built a Family(41)

“Biggest problem here is your services. Electricity makes things a damn sight easier, and water is as necessary as a rifle in a rabid coon pit. Can’t do mortar without it.”

I looked at my boots, feeling like the author who turned in a manuscript without any punctuation. The services had been my responsibility, and I had failed. Worse, when it came to water, the only thing holding me back was fear. Through my shame, I still had to smile over the rabid coon pit remark. This conversation was a million miles removed from my ordinary life. I smiled, imagining my editor’s voice in Pete’s body: Commas make things a damn sight easier, and end marks are as necessary as a rifle in a rabid coon pit.

“… good thing you have that.” Pete pointed across the slop of Sinkwell Manor toward my neighbor’s house.

I raised my eyebrows, hoping it was a joke.

“Get those pails out the back-a my truck, kids!” he yelled, and the kids obeyed. “Fill ’em up with pond water. We got a foundation to build.”

Hope and Drew didn’t bat an eye, just hauled up as much water from the pond as they could carry—which was more than they could have carried a month ago. Moving the concrete blocks that would be our block foundation had muscled us up a little, and we were no longer horrified by head-to-toe mud immersion. In our minds we were practically professionals.

Pete pointed at Drew. “You’re the mixer. Water, one part mortar powder to three parts sand, and then a bit more water go in the wheelbarrow. Attack it with a hoe until you have peanut butter. Got it?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Keep the water coming, Hope. Little Sis is going to do the trowel work. Mom—because she’s already used to it—does a little bit of everything. Whoever falls behind, she’ll get ya back on track.”

It was a surprisingly smooth operation, even if it was a slow one. Drew set up next to the hill of sand Jimmy had delivered to the backyard. We kept it covered in a giant sheet of plastic to keep it pure for the mortar work, which was torture for Roman. I marked off a corner for him to play in while Drew and I experimented and eventually got the peanut-butter mortar mixing down to an art form. Hope and I took turns hauling water, with Drew stepping in when he was caught up on mixing.

I made a path out of planks for the wheelbarrow and kept moving it to wherever Jada and Pete were slowly settling one block at a time onto the concrete footer. Jada globbed trowels of mortar in place with a narrow trowel that looked like a pie server, and I was proud of her for diving in without complaint or fear. Her cheeks had neat lines of mortar in stripes that looked like war paint. Pete followed right behind her, setting each block down in her mortar bed, and then using his own, smaller trowel to slather the end of the block with mortar before leveling it with the neon-pink string stretched corner-to-corner. The string had a line level suspended in the middle to make sure every layer of the foundation was perfectly level.

Once we had a rhythm going it went faster, but it was still going to be a long process before the layers of eight-inch-tall blocks added up to a wall more than six feet tall. My shoulders tensed as I watched Pete slide in twelve-inch increments down the sixty-foot-long back of the house and then slog through the muddiest side by the Ink Spill, which was about thirty feet. When he rounded the corner to the front of the house, he put his hands on his hips and stared at me. His exasperated look probably had something to do with me hovering over him and willing speed vibes at him with a laser-like stare. Still, he didn’t scare me; a guy on his knees with his hands on his hips is not intimidating, even if he is wearing his baseball cap backward.

“Got a job for ya,” he said.

Was that a loan-officer smirk I saw on his oh-so-friendly face?

“You put these blocks here?” He waved at the blocks we’d spent weeks lugging around and stacking neatly near the footer.

I nodded. Slowly. I had a good idea what was coming next. So maybe a guy on his knees could intimidate me after all.

“Too close to the footer. We’ll have to build scaffolding on the high parts. Hard to level block any higher than your waist so we’ll have to climb up to it.”

“So…” I waved at the long line of blocks. Well over a thousand of them. “We have to move all of this?” My voice squeaked a tiny bit.

“Hmm. ’Bout half.” He pushed onto his feet and stretched, laughing a little.

Every other sentence came out with a little laugh. Still, I couldn’t help noticing that this one carried more mirth than his average.

“See that root there? The one that looks like a dog? Start a line there.”

When I turned my head sideways and squinted, the root Jada had dug out of our future kitchen did look like a puppy. I lifted a block off the top of a stack and started the new row. Drew raised his eyebrows and shook his head at me when he brought the next wheelbarrow load of mortar and shoveled it onto a warped piece of plywood that Jada and Pete used as their mortar palette. My boy was wise enough to know when mistakes were funny straightaway and when the humor had to wait patiently for pissed-off to take its leave.

We worked until it was too dark to see. We had just started the second layer of block, which was depressing, especially when I looked at the seven-and-a-half-foot-tall marker at the front corner. This phase of the project was going to take a minute or two longer than the weekend I had allotted.

Drew and I cleaned tools in the icy water at the edge of the pond. The neighbor, Timothy, came out and offered to let us run a hose to his pump house. “I only use the well for landscaping, so I won’t even notice if you tap in, especially this time of year.”