The Last House on the Street(15)

“I think you should take out some more trees.” Daddy eyes the land around the house as I pull into the newly paved driveway.

I have to admit that the trees look oppressive. Before, I thought they would embrace the house. Now it looks as though the house has slipped inside a deep green cave.

No one should have put a house there. Isn’t that what the woman said? Weird Ann Smith?

“Maybe,” I answer my father.

Outside the car, I reach for Rainie’s hand, but she runs ahead, hopping along the new sidewalk that runs from the driveway to the front door. Daddy and I catch up with her there, and I tap in the code to unlock the door.

Although it’s only late afternoon and the walls are more glass than wood, the house is indeed a bit dim inside. I flick on the lights and take a look around. The first story is completely open, the ceiling high. I can see all the way to the kitchen from where I stand. Unobtrusive shelves divide the dining area from the living room, the kitchen from the great room. The walls have now been painted a pale taupe. The new hardwood floors, a rich toffee color, are incredibly beautiful and warm the open space exactly as I’d hoped they would. It’s been two weeks since I’ve been in the house and it looks like it’s ready and waiting to be filled with furnishings and family. The architect in me is proud and amazed at what Jackson and I created. The widow in me can barely move.

“Let’s look around,” Daddy says, as if perplexed as to why I’m just standing there lost in thought in the foyer. His voice echoes in the emptiness. We walk through the great room with its spectacular copper-fronted fireplace. The wall of floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook the wide deck is the rich deep green of the trees. I remember Jackson saying he couldn’t wait to see that wall of windows in the fall when the leaves would wash our entire downstairs with color. I wish he would have the chance.

The hand-painted art-deco tile backsplash has finally been installed in the kitchen and it looks even better than I imagined. I know the whole downstairs is absolutely stunning, yet I can’t feel anything. I don’t care about pretty tile. I just want my husband back. I draw in a long breath, doing my best to keep the tears at bay.

We head up the open staircase from the great room to the second story. It’s slow going with Rainie, but she hangs on to the railing and doggedly works her way up. When we reach the last few steps, I keep my eye on her, wondering if she understands how that staircase took Jackson from us. But she seems to have no idea how the stairs altered her life, and once she reaches the top, she cheers with the achievement of climbing them. Daddy laughs, and I shake off the horror of memory and join him.

We explore the four large bedrooms, the massive closets, the four bathrooms. I remember the hundreds of hours Jackson and I spent picking out floor tiles and fixtures for those bathrooms. Everything smells of new wood and paint. Rainie knows from our last visit which room will be hers, and she chatters about where she’ll put her dollhouse, where her bed will go. Downstairs again, we cross through the great room and outside to the huge deck. We are absolutely, utterly cocooned by trees, so much so that the construction noise fades into the background and we hear mostly birdsong.

“You’ll have plenty of shade in the summer,” Daddy says. “How far back does your property go?”

“Pretty far,” I say. “Jackson and his construction buddies put this circular trail in”—I point to the stepping-stones at either end of the deck—“and he said the property goes all the way back to a little lake, but I never walked that far with him.”

“You’ll want to fence it off,” Daddy says, nodding toward Rainie. “That lake might be small, but it’s deep.”

“Oh, you know it?” I ask.

“Oh, sure,” he says. I shouldn’t be surprised. After a lifetime of living in Round Hill, he knows every inch of it.

“I’ll get some estimates.” I study the trees and for the first time, I notice an enormous oak in the distance. “That tree.” I point toward it. “That must be the biggest tree in the neighborhood.”

Daddy follows the trajectory of my arm. “Yeah, that tree’s been here forever,” he says. “The Hockley kids used to have a tree house up in its branches. I hung out there as a kid myself sometimes.” He looks a little nostalgic and I smile. I like the idea that this land had once been my father’s playground. It makes it feel safe and familiar. That fact and the sweet scent of the forest give me courage about living here.

“Hey, Rainie,” I call to my daughter, who is trying unsuccessfully to catch a blue-tailed skink that’s running around on the deck. “What do you think of our cool new house?”

Rainie stops chasing the skink. She stands still on the deck, looking up at the house. She stretches her arms out wide. “I think it’s the beautifulest house in the whole world,” she says, her tone so serious that Daddy and I both laugh. I look at my father and he reaches out to run the backs of his fingers down my cheek.

“Everything’s going to be all right, Kayla,” he says. “You’ll see.”



* * *



I’m relieved when we leave the house. As we drive back to my father’s, I feel trapped. Rainie and I have no choice but to move into the house. Our old house is sold and we can’t stay with Daddy any longer; he needs to empty his house for the new owners. Maybe I could put my new house on the market and rent something until I find a house small and cozy and safe for Rainie and me, but the thought is painful. The Shadow Ridge house was our baby, Jackson’s and mine. As ambivalent as I am about moving into it, I don’t want strangers to live in it either.