Crowned and Moldering

Callie grumbled.

“Sorry, kiddo,” he said, “but it’s the best way to keep you here. Otherwise, your mom’ll send Karl up here with the limo and take you back home.”

“I don’t want to go home with Karl,” she whined, sounding a little like a spoiled brat for the first time.

“Yeah, yeah, you can dial back the attitude,” Mac said easily, pulling out a chair and sitting down next to his niece. “Karl and Mavis do their best.”

“I know.”

“Look. You can stay here for a while, at least as long as your mom is gone. But if you’re going to stay, you’ll go to school. That’s the deal.”

“Do you know how long she’ll be gone?” I asked.

Mac shot me a look that said plenty about what he thought of his sister for leaving a sixteen-year-old girl home alone with “bodyguards.” He finally said, “It’s always hard for Lauren to gauge how much time these things will take.”

“I can imagine.” And I would try not to judge the woman for making difficult choices.

Callie sighed as though she carried the weight of the world on her shoulders. “A new school. Where I don’t know anyone. Are you sure that’s necessary, Uncle Mac? Maybe you could homeschool me.”

Mac snorted, and I couldn’t help laughing. Callie was gri

“Hey, you’ll like it here,” Mac said. “Everyone is friendly. It’s no big deal. You’ll go to school, you’ll meet some nice new kids. Might even learn something.”

“Kids aren’t nice,” she muttered darkly.

I frowned at Mac and saw him clench his jaw. “They’d better be nice to you, or I’ll kick their butts.”

“Oh, Uncle Mac,” she droned, drawing his name out to four syllables. “You just don’t understand.”

“Oh, Ca-a-a-al-lie,” Mac replied in a high-pitched falsetto. “I feel your pain.”

She giggled and the tension was broken. For now.

“Let’s take a walk to the pier for di

*   *   *

While Callie used my powder room to wash her hands and freshen up after her long trip, Mac paced the kitchen. He looked a lot more worried than he had a minute ago when Callie was sitting in the room.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, shaking his head. “I had no idea she was on her way up here.”

“That’s obvious. You don’t have to apologize.”

“What am I going to do with her?” he muttered.

“If you’d like her to stay in the second garage apartment, I have no problem with that.”

“But she won’t have any supervision.”

“I hate to say it, Mac, but I doubt she has much of it at home, either.”

“It’s that obvious, huh?” He rubbed his forehead, clearly puzzled as to his next move. “At least if she’s in the other garage apartment, she’ll be right next to me. I can keep an eye on her. Probably.”

“If you want to supervise her more closely, you could both move into Jane’s bed-and-breakfast. She has a couple of suites with two bedrooms attached to a sitting room. But that seems like a drastic move.”

“Yeah, it does. Callie’s basically a good kid,” he said, sounding a little desperate to convince me. “She’ll probably be okay here.”

“Of course she’s a good kid,” I said, patting his arm. He seemed so discombobulated, and I couldn’t blame him. “She’s smart, too. Made it all the way here, didn’t she? She came to you because she doesn’t want to be on her own, Mac. So, let’s just move her into the second apartment. She’ll appreciate having her own space, and she’s not going to sneak out and go anywhere. She loves you, so she’ll comply with your rules.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

I hesitated, then added, “And if she wants to spread out a little, she’s welcome to use my kitchen or the rest of the house, for that matter. That goes for you, too. I know this is stressful for you.”

“That’s generous of you, Irish.” He wrapped his arms around me and held on. “I’m not sure what to say.”

“Just say you’ll buy me a yacht when this is all done. And maybe something with diamonds.”

He laughed, just as I’d hoped he would. “I’ve got to tell you, this is about the weirdest thing that’s happened to me in a long time. My niece doesn’t usually track me down and show up una

I gazed up at him and smiled. “I believe it. You looked pretty shocked to see her.” I wasn’t about to mention my own reaction when I first saw Callie at the gate.

“Shocked is putting it mildly,” he said, then chuckled sheepishly. “You know, I’ve faced down enemy gunfire and been ambushed by insurgents, but none of that ever stu

I believed it.

*   *   *

On the short walk to the pier, Callie began to sound more and more like a normal teenager as she bounced from one topic to another. “I can’t believe I’m actually feeling excited about starting school in a new place. Okay, I wasn’t, but now it’s sort of like an adventure, right? I mean, nobody knows me here. I can be whoever I want to be.”

With her arms open wide, she spun around in a circle.

Mac shook his head and laughed at her antics. “I’ve got an idea, kiddo. Why don’t you just be Callie?”

She lifted her chin proudly. “That’s exactly who I intend to be, Uncle Mac.”

“Good.” He grabbed her in a one-armed hug. “I like her the best.”

We turned at the corner and headed west toward the pier. From here we could see the sun turning into a hot orange ball on the horizon. The deep blue sky was splashed with streaks of coral and fuchsia as the earth moved toward sunset.

“That sunset is so cool—wow. And isn’t it cool how we can just walk to the pier? What’ll we get? Pizza? No. Fish? That’ll be better, because riding my bike all that way made me really hungry and protein would probably be best for me. So, fish.” Callie turned to me. “I totally love your hair. Do you color it? Are those extensions? Do you curl it?”

I smiled at the mile-a-minute conversation and the abrupt change of subject. “No. It’s all real and all mine.”

“You’re so lucky,” she said. “My hair is so boring. Maybe I’ll dye it red while I’m here.”

My chin dropped. Is she kidding? “Don’t you dare dye it another color. Your hair is beautiful.”

“You sound like my mom,” she said amiably.

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Oh, you should,” Callie assured me. “She’s really smart and pretty. Don’t you think, Uncle Mac?”

“She’s a knockout,” Mac agreed, “and so are you.”

Callie studied me until I began to feel like a smear on a microscope slide. Finally, she said, “I can tell you’re really smart.”

I raised my eyebrows. “I like to think so.”

“She is,” Mac said, but Callie ignored him.

“What do you do for a living?”

She was making my head spin with her rapid-fire switching of subjects, but my job description rolled off my tongue with little effort. “I’m a building contractor specializing in Victorian-home renovation and repair.”

She stopped walking and stared at me. “Wait. You build stuff? Like houses and stuff?”

“Yes.”

Her mouth hung open. “That’s the coolest thing. I’ve never met anyone who does that. Like on the DIY Network? I totally love those shows. I, like, watch them all the time. You could do a show on their cha

“Uh, sure. Maybe on the weekend.”

“Oh, my God. I would love that.”

“Keep moving, kids.” Mac nudged her forward and we continued to stroll toward the pier.

I hesitated to mention it, but finally said, “My sister has a show on the DIY Network. It’s called Concrete Facts.”