Page 22 of The Cadence

A nnie Whitaker-Gassman’s eyes widened. “I love this!” she said, so enthusiastically that I totally believed her. “I love this! Show me more.”

“Annie, we have an appointment in six minutes and it’s across town,” her partner broke in.

There wasn’t a lot of traffic here, but things were far apart.

That woman, Remy, gave me an apologetic look but she repeated that they really needed to leave.

“Also, you’re supposed to be at Bjarni’s horn lesson later, so we can’t start running late,” she added.

Annie nodded and quickly gathered the materials that she’d laid out on the kitchen counter next to where I’d also put mine. “My son plays what I would call the ‘French horn,’” she explained to me, “but real musicians just say ‘horn.’ Isn’t that interesting? It’s all like another world.”

“That is interesting,” I agreed. “I don’t know much about musical instruments.”

She opened her mouth and I was sure that she had more to say on that subject, but then she looked at her partner.

“Remy’s right, and we had better get going.

But I was serious about what I said,” she told me, and Remy nodded, also with a lot of enthusiasm.

“We’ll be in touch about the roman shades and about your furniture. ”

The two of them rushed out and I heard the roar of Annie’s giant engine.

They had come over to take more measurements, to show me fabric and tile samples, and to make decisions about the rest of the renovations for Will’s house.

His idea that he needed furniture had morphed into something much more, like also painting the exterior, redoing the kitchen, and tearing apart one of the bathrooms. Annie would be supervising everything.

She sometimes came across as flakey and unorganized, but she actually stayed in communication and got things done in a way that impressed me a lot.

But still, this was a major undertaking, with a lot of money going out of Will’s bank account.

“I understand that you need chairs, but why do you want to do all this other stuff? I think that the bathroom is perfectly nice,” I’d told him.

“The toilet flushes, there’s plenty of hot water, and most importantly, there are no holes in the floor. What else do you want?”

“You set a low bar, and I still think it should be fixed,” he’d said, and then had headed off in his car.

He was driving the new one now, which I had insisted on.

It was so new that it had cameras all over it and they could record everything that happened on the road.

It would give him more peace of mind, I thought, to be able to verify that there had been absolutely no accidents.

I was also pushing for him to talk to a professional, someone besides me about this issue. It was an idea he seemed to be quietly resisting. “I’m busy,” he’d said many times in response.

That was true. He had so many things to do for the team, especially now that they were traveling for their games. When he was home, I was mostly encouraging him to sleep and eat, but I hadn’t let up on the idea that he needed to talk to someone in the psychiatry realm.

Right now, Will was in West Virginia…I checked my phone for his exact location. I sent him little updates now and then—this would be a good time for another one.

“Annie and Remy just left,” I reported. “I’m here by myself but the doors are all locked and I checked the water meter.

” That was something he’d also admitted to worrying about, that there was a leaking pipe quietly spewing gallons of water into the ground.

“The numbers on the gauge aren’t moving at all so there’s nothing wrong. ”

It took a while and I was out in the garage, in the middle of mixing some paint colors, when he wrote back. “Thank you for letting me know. What did they say about your furniture?”

The whole idea of discussing that topic with Annie had come from Will.

The first time that we had met her, when she had looked around his house to get an idea of what he wanted to fix up, she had really admired the chest of drawers I had gotten off the side of the road and repainted.

She had liked it enough that she’d talked about it a few times, mentioning my skill and how she loved the designs I’d done.

It was abstract stuff, just some little decorations that made it pretty, and nothing too special.

I’d tried my best since I meant it to be for Will but I didn’t think much of it.

But it seemed that he had been thinking about it, and he’d brought up an idea about my furniture the week before.

“Why don’t you talk to Annie Whitaker-Gassman about selling this when it’s done?

” he had suggested as I’d scraped at the orange finish on the top of a table I’d purchased (ten bucks was a good deal for it).

“You think anyone would want this stuff?” I had asked him doubtfully, and he had put down the tablet where he was watching game film.

He’d picked up some of my sketches instead and appraised them carefully, the knuckle of his index finger pressed against his lip.

I’d waited and felt a little anxious. He was truthful, I knew that very well, and I wondered if he really liked what I was making.

“I do think people would want it,” he announced, and I had smiled. “Annie loved that chest,” he’d further reminded me. “What you’re making is unique and there are buyers out there.”

He’d definitely been right about part of that. When Annie and Remy had come over today, I’d talked to them about his idea that I should sell my revamped furniture and they had both been very enthusiastic.

“You totally could. I love it!” Annie had immediately said. “Everyone is finally moving past all the beige and getting back to color and pattern. You know where I could really see your designs?”

She’d looked over at her partner, who nodded as if she saw it, too. “A nursery,” Remy had answered. She’d rubbed her belly, in which she was carrying a baby that was due pretty soon. “My husband Tobin and I would use this.”

“Tobin is also my cousin,” Annie had said. “There are a lot of Whitakers up here.”

I explained all that to Will—not about Annie’s big family, but I did share their ideas about pricing, of how I could get the word out, if I should do custom work, and a lot of other issues that I hadn’t considered.

I slid my thumb to the letters as fast as I could in order to share it faster.

The last time he’d been away, he had called, but he waited until he was in the hotel room by himself.

Luckily for me, there were quiet moments when they rode in buses or had meals, so he also texted.

On their last road trip, I had expected to hear a lot from him because I assumed that he’d be worried (intruders, the oven, et cetera).

No, he had mostly wanted to talk about other things, just shooting the breeze.

He’d told me about the stadium and its facilities (from what he explained, the places they played seemed to vary a lot, with some really great ones and some that were junk in comparison).

He talked about the hotel where they stayed and their meals.

Some of the other guys liked to try to go out the night that they arrived, but their schedules were so tight that it was hard to squeeze in anything except eating and sleeping.

That was all that Will wanted to do. “I bet there’s a lot to see in these places besides just the hotels and football stadiums,” I had remarked.

“There probably is. After this season ends, we can look around. You told me you never got a chance to travel.”

The thing about Will was, if he said something, he meant it—it was real.

I had gotten a huge smile as I’d read his words and immediately started to make a list of destinations, places where we could drive because airline tickets cost a lot.

I knew that because I had thought, briefly, about flying into one of the cities where he was playing so that I could go to his game.

I wouldn’t have stayed with him, since that was probably against the team rules, and I wouldn’t have bothered him.

But it turned out that flying was very expensive and I didn’t want to put so many miles on his car, so I had reluctantly given up on the idea.

I knew that I would need more money for us to travel together and I also needed to get serious about renting a place of my own.

I couldn’t depend on possible furniture sales!

With Will gone, I tried to double up on shifts at the grocery store.

It was easy to schedule myself on Saturdays because none of the other employees wanted to work during the Woodsmen games, even though the store’s owner had set up huge TVs and even though there were practically no customers to deal with.

They were all at home with their attention glued to their own screens.

The last time he was gone, I had kept an eye on the action while I was at the register, focusing all my attention when the defense came onto the field.

I’d also figured out how to record everything on the giant TV in the main house so I could watch it again, and again.

After the game ended and as I waited for Will to come home, I put on my special t-shirt under my Bodine jersey, curled up on the new couch, and cranked up the volume as high as I wanted.

I’d skipped around to the interesting parts and played them over and over.

Even though I kept busy, I missed him. The house did feel strangely large and empty without his big body in it.

When he was in the main house and I was in the guest cottage, we were only separated by a hundred yards.

With these travel games, it was more like when he’d been up here and I’d been in Tennessee, thinking about him.