Page 62 of Structure of Love
Move Mr. Bear to nightstand for the night, check.
I heard the sound of Gage’s truck pulling into my driveway and smiled.
Man I wanted to sex up, check.
I met him at the door, all smiles. “Hi, handsome.”
“Hi,” Gage greeted, planting a soft, teasing kiss on my mouth. “You have no idea how glad I am you said home date. Interesting things went down at work today.”
“Yeah? Dinner’s going to be ready in about five minutes. Come in, relax, tell me about it.”
Gage dropped into what I thought of as “his” chair at my dining table.
“I’ve got beer and long drinks.”
“Gimme a long.”
I handed him one, and he cracked it open, took a sip, and then visibly relaxed.
“Nothing like something alcoholic in my hand to tell me I’m finally off the clock.”
Amused, I took the seat next to him. “So what happened?”
“I’m not sure if I’ve told you this, but I do inspections for people outside of our own jobs. Engineering inspections to verify if a beam can bear the load of the roof, things of that nature. So I went to Saline today for an inspection, but then I get there, and there’s a contractor and the homeowner on-site and I’m like…what’s this? So I walk up, introduce myself,they tell me this house was suddenly inherited because of an unexpected death, and the new owner is the only living relative. He’s finally gotten the keys from probate court and wants to renovate the house, then sell it on the market. All’s fine by me, so we walk, we’re looking at blueprints and realizing there’s been some renovations over the years. I suspect most of them weren’t permitted, so they’ll have to be undone. Depending on when they were done, some of them are probably old enough they might be grandfathered in.”
“Sounds problematic. Is this common?”
“More common than you’d think.” Gage shrugged. “Most of the older houses in Michigan didn’t have any kind of builder’s code, so we run into things like this fairly often.”
I scratched my nose, not expecting his answer. “Why?”
“Well, to recap a full semester I took on the history of building codes—I won’t bore you with the details, I almost failed that class because it put me to sleep—up until 1970, there wasn’t a universal builder’s code in the States. Different places had codes of a sort, mostly fire codes for a building or something of that ilk. Nothing universal, though, and it was a real problem. It’s why in an old building, stairs can be any size. People weren’t required to get a building permit for a renovation, either, they just grabbed any materials at hand and did their best.” He took a sip of his drink. “Frankly, if that’s their best, I’m terrified to see their worst.”
“Huh. I’ve learned something new today. So the new owner didn’t take this well?”
“Was not enthused, but as I pointed out, most of these walls he wanted down anyway to open the space up, so it’s not going to hamper him much in the long run. Theeeen it got weird.”
“Eh, weird?”
“So weird. We encountered a room that shouldn’t exist. The crazy thing was, you could almost see into it from outside thehouse, as it was a basement room with a window, but there was this thick black curtain blocking the view from the inside. And I couldn’t find a door into this room. Like, it was drywalled over. Finally, we were given the go-ahead to punch through a wall, because we had to figure out what was in that room. I had a sledgehammer and crowbar in the truck, so me and the contractor tore into a wall, and Jesus in the crack house, it was crazy what was behind that wall. A whole other room was there. A man cave, really, as it had thick plush couches and six arcade games, like the ones you’d see in a bar or game place, really cool retro games. It was like being in a haunted house, almost? So creepy.”
“Wow, that does sound super creepy.” I tried to imagine it and failed. “Why would someone do that?”
“Even the new owner had no clue, but he was also freaked out. I did take pictures of the arcade games to see if maybe you wanted some for the new bar?”
“Sure, if they’re in decent condition, I’ll take them.”
“Cool. I mentioned to the owner I might know someone who would take them, and he was all too happy to offer them for a small fee, so long as you come get them. I’ll get you two in touch later. Anyway, that was my day. How was yours?”
“Tedious, mostly me paying bills. I did a few hours of admin, then went through a few samples of what Asher emailed me. We’re looking at cabinet design for the upstairs. He’s trying to get a feel for how my new office should look.”
“Ah, yeah, I think he mentioned that in passing.”
“I liked most of what he sent. I was able to narrow things down for him a little, or at least I think I did? I sent him my Pinterest board.”
“Pinterest is Asher’s focus spell, so he probably loved that.”
“My grandmother sat me down with Pinterest before hiring your company, saying a portfolio of what I liked for my barwould help the designer, and I didn’t argue with her because I think she just wanted to play. Turned out she was right, though.”