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Julia

The newly built house was a monstrosity: three stories tall, made almost entirely of glass, and partially blocking what was once Julia’s cherished view of the lake. She had spotted the towering eyesore halfway down the long driveway that many visitors mistook for a road.

For months, she’d been eagerly anticipating her annual summer vacation to the lake house where she’d spent her formative years—but now everything was ruined.

Ten minutes ago, it was a different story.

From the passenger seat of their brand-new Land Rover Defender—which they couldn’t afford—Julia had been composing her vacation kickoff Instagram post.

Finally arrived, let the relaxing begin!

Or better: Be back never.

Maybe… Collect moments, not things.

She could come up with a hundred of these and never run out.

Julia kept her posts simple, engaging, and heartfelt, but how fun it would be to write the truth for once: My ass is saddlesore from the three-hour ride north, Christian and I are going broke, oh and our neighbor just royally screwed us over. #blessed

It wasn’t until Julia exited the vehicle that the magnitude to which they’d been screwed fully registered.

“You’ve got to be kidding me…” She trailed off, unable to find the words to describe the visual assault before her.

Julia didn’t stick around to help Christian, her husband, unload.

Instead, she trotted to the adjacent property, where she proceeded to circle the perimeter of the new house in a daze.

Her eyes raked the gaudy glass structure from top to bottom.

Unbelievable! It looked as though a UFO had crash-landed in the forest. It was a scar upon the land, a sacrilegious affront to the otherwise pristine surroundings.

Lake Timmeny deserved better.

“What on earth was he thinking?” Julia muttered to herself. The he was David Dunne, the homeowner, not to mention her lifelong friend—or ex-friend, depending on how this went down.

Julia knew that David was renovating, but he conveniently neglected to mention that the work involved demolishing the house his grandfather had built and erecting a structure that was more than twice the original size.

The new building was modern and sleek, in stark contrast to the two charming, rustic neighboring homes—one belonging to Julia and the other to Erika Sullivan, the third musketeer in their lakeshore trio.

The state forestry service was supposed to protect the surrounding woodlands, which had managed, up until now, to keep the natural beauty unchanged.

So how had David skirted the zoning issue, clearing enough trees to make the Lorax keel over?

Even the birds were less chirpy. But the air hadn’t changed.

Lake air had a particular freshness—the smell of clean water mixed with pine needles from the surrounding forest—that always made Julia’s heart soar.

But not today. She doubted anything could lift her spirits.

Julia turned her head in disgust only to have her gaze settle on an obtrusive lawn sculpture—a giant round orb made of reflective bronze. It was one of many such geometric objects scattered about, all probably meant to be artistic, but to her they just screamed “trying too hard.”

Nutmeg, their older Lab mix adopted from a shelter years ago when Julia and Christian were on the cusp of divorce, came loping over, sniffing the ground, savoring the new smells that had accumulated since last season, oblivious to the galling insult looming above.

The lucky dog had no idea that David’s home now completely blocked the old path to the lake. It used to be that Julia could walk out of her house and head straight for the shoreline. Now she’d have to take a roundabout way just to put her feet in the sand.

What angered her most was that it looked like the view from her kitchen’s bay window was forever changed.

Julia had always enjoyed watching sunsets over the water, a chilled glass of wine in hand, and music playing as she prepared dinner.

Thanks to David’s glass-fronted castle, she’d be able to see into his kitchen to know what he was cooking.

The three dwellings were built close together, facing the water, but not in a perfect row.

David’s plot of land was in between and in front of Julia’s and Erika’s respective homes.

In the past, his simple two-bedroom cottage wasn’t an obstruction.

Julia believed she still had a clear line of sight to the lake from some rooms in her house, but Erika wasn’t so fortunate.

David’s creation appeared to block her water view entirely.

What the actual fuck?

It was possible David used his newfound wealth to bribe his way out of the standard permitting process.

She could only imagine how Erika, her hotheaded friend, would react.

A fiery redhead who was one of the most sought-after defense attorneys in Connecticut, Erika was no-nonsense in the courtroom as well as in her personal life.

She had trouble leaving work at the office, which had been an ongoing source of tension between her and her husband, Rick, a professional hunting and fishing guide.

Rick had quite a collection of guns—so if Erika couldn’t beat David in the courtroom, Julia briefly entertained the crazy notion that he might solve the issue another way.

Julia’s daughter wandered over. She looked striking in her cutoff jean shorts and flattering red top—the perfect summer attire.

A rising high school senior, Taylor was something of a teen boy’s dream, with long blond hair and an aloof manner that guys her age found irresistible.

Except for her hair color, she was a mirror image of Julia at that age.

And now that clothes from way back when were in fashion again, her daughter’s outfits reminded Julia of her own wild and carefree days, many of which had been spent at this lake with David and Erika.

“It’s soooo ugly,” declared Taylor in a drawn-out voice, echoing Julia’s sentiments exactly.

The cold, boxy structure was devoid of character—like three doctors’ offices stacked on top of each other.

Even the furniture, which Julia could see through the plethora of windows, was fittingly austere, like a mating between Ikea and OfficeMax.

The back of the house faced the water, and Julia made her way there.

A wraparound deck on the second level was large enough to host a flag football game and featured a steel railing thick enough to contain cattle.

From here, Julia noted the only carryover from the old house—a stone chimney that poked through a sharply angled roof.

But really, it was the windows that galled her.

Everywhere she looked, there were windows.

“This makes our place look like David’s outhouse,” noted Taylor, scrunching her nose.

Nutmeg barked as though in agreement.

Honestly, it was a relief to hear Taylor voice an opinion about anything, positive or negative.

For the last month or so, she’d been as gloomy as an overcast day.

Nothing got a rise out of her. Christian chalked it up to the pressures of senior year and a college decision on the horizon, but Julia remained unconvinced.

Aside from her poetry, which Taylor wrote in an old-fashioned leather-bound journal, their daughter had lost interest in most things—including their annual two-week vacation to the lake. But bearing witness to this glass injustice energized her like a wilted flower in the rain.

Christian approached from the direction of their house (or the outhouse, in Taylor’s parlance).

Technically, it was Julia’s home, after her parents had gifted her the deed that came with the responsibility of maintaining the property.

She and Christian put the house in a trust that Christian oversaw, so the lake home could eventually be given to their daughter.

“I’m telling you, the new car made the drive here feel like nothing,” Christian marveled. “The way she glided over the logging road—she’s really a dream.”

Julia flinched ever so slightly. Even his cars are girls, she thought.

She’d once caught him caressing the leather seats lovingly when he thought nobody was looking.

It reminded her of a man in the throes of infatuation.

Oh, how easily a married man can be distracted by a shiny new toy.

And sometimes those “toys” could talk, laugh, and order drinks at an airport bar.

It was hard not to dwell once the reminder took hold—his mistake… and hers.

Julia gave Christian the once-over like he was being dim. “Really? You’re talking about your new car and not this house ?”

Christian peered up, finally acknowledging the giant fish tank. He took a step back, as if the slight change in his perspective might alter his assessment.

“That’s a big surprise, all right,” was all he said, which annoyed her. Such a bland, middle-of-the-road comment put the burden of outrage entirely on Julia.

“Christian, he’s blocking our view.” She pointed through David’s house into their kitchen to prove her point.

Christian defended his occasional golfing buddy. “There’s nothing we can do about it now, Julia. I get that it’s not ideal, but it is his property. He can build whatever he wants.”

Julia eyed him with contempt. “ Not ideal? Oh, please. It’s too close to the shoreline.

There’s no way a building inspector would have approved this,” she said.

“This was definitely done under the radar and probably under the table, not to mention he didn’t share any plans with his abutters, meaning us. ”

Christian looked away.

Julia glared at him. “Did he share plans with you?” she asked, all fired up.

“No, not really,” said Christian, shaking his head. “He told me what he told you, that it would be a modest addition.”

Julia was relieved. Christian keeping secrets would trigger her lingering doubts and set back all their progress.

He’d been eight years sober, and his affair was finally in the rearview mirror.

How the marriage had survived his brief fling with some woman he’d met while on a business trip defied logic.

It certainly wouldn’t have lasted if his drinking had continued.

“It’s hardly a small addition,” said Julia, stating the obvious. “This is the kind of house a clueless rich asshole would build just to show off.”

“He made one smart investment, so he gets to do whatever he wants, including being a rich asshole. At least someone around here is making money.”

Christian’s remark earned him a stern, albeit silent rebuke from Julia. Taylor wasn’t privy to their financial struggles, and with her mood in free fall, it was best to keep it that way.

Julia’s phone buzzed in her pocket, as if she needed any more reminders of their precarious position.

She grimaced in a Pavlovian response while playing Guess the Bill Collector.

Electric? Landlord? Franchise? She decided not to look.

Everyone wanted their money, yet here they were, ready to vacation, having arrived in Christian’s overpriced tax deduction he drove off the dealer’s lot before Julia had a chance to object. What an absolute disaster.

“At a minimum, this is deeply unfair to us, but even more so to Erika and Rick,” said Julia.

“What do you want me to do about it, Jules? Throw rocks at the windows? He’s built the damn thing. All we can do now is adjust. Just relax. Everything is going to work out.”

Julia winced. “Last time you said that, we bought a gym.”

Christian returned a wan smile. Naturally, she wanted him to back her, but she also understood why he kept his rose-colored glasses on.

It’s how he saw life after he found sobriety.

Every minute was a second chance, and every day was a new opportunity to experience something amazing.

Exuberance and blind zeal had replaced his nightly scotch and soda.

He’d become a whirlpool of a human, always churning up new ideas or get-rich-quick schemes with enough force to suck her down with him.

Even though it was Christian’s idea to buy a VR Gym franchise— the nation’s only all–virtual reality fitness studio—Julia had signed on the dotted line as well.

Nobody forced her to leave the job she loved at a prominent nonprofit devoted to child welfare, which boasted a former First Lady of the United States as a supporter and a brand ambassador, to help Christian run his new business.

Julia jumped in headfirst, her heart full of optimism and her head abuzz with dreams of an early retirement.

How naive she had been. In some ways, Julia missed the drunk Christian—the salesman who was too fuzzy and hungover to turn any of his ideas into reality.

Now what could have been uneventful days became an endless adventure on a trip to nowhere.

“I’m going to put the groceries away,” said Christian. “Just remember that we’re all friends, Jules. We’re only here for a short time, so let’s make the best of it.”

At least he didn’t quote his favorite AA aphorism about accepting things we cannot change.

Everything had changed with this one ugly building.

Christian might be fine with it, but Julia wanted to kill David—and she knew Erika would feel the same. Her friend was due to arrive any minute. Only one question remained: Who would get to him first?