Miss You Mad: a psychological romance novel (18 page)

Hannah gave Belle what looked like a small curtsey. "That would be lovely, Mrs.?"

"Hastings," Belle finished. "But please call me by my given name. Belle. We're going to be neighbours, after all."

Hannah made a little chirping sound. "My last name is Hastings, too."

"Indeed?" the old woman said. "Who's your father?"

"Benjamin."

Belle put a delicate hand on her chest. "You're Benjamin's girl?" She fanned herself. "I haven't heard from your side in years."

Hannah positively beamed.

Belle patted Hannah's arm as she swayed on her feet. "It's time that old feud was put to rest Besides." Belle looked pointedly at me. "Buffaloes have short memories."

I decided I rather liked the inebriated old buffalo.

I didn't much mind pulling equipment out of the back seat and lugging it into the tiny house. I didn't even mind changing the few light bulbs that were needed throughout the small space. But when Howard asked me to start dusting the four years of neglect from every surface, I out and out refused.

"Well, I'm going to be busy setting up the server." He fiddled with a plug to make it look good.

I stared across at Hannah where she stood marvelling over the 'fabulous light' that streamed through the studio windows. She walked from the old easel that stood in the middle of the windows, Helen's probably, over to the short hallway lined with Japanese art. She sat on the cot pushed up tight to the wall and stretched her legs across the floor. The tips of her bare toes touched the opposite wall. I hoped she'd catch my eye and save me from such menial tasks as cleaning up after a painter who'd been dead four years and hadn't had the grace to clean away her latest activity before she croaked.

No go. Hannah gave me a pout. "Just wipe off the table, Daniel. Then we can have some lunch."

"Why can't Howard?"

She got up and crossed the five feet to where Howard jiggled a cord. "Why don't Daniel and I go pick up some fast food? We'll lay a blanket here on the floor and have a picnic."

Howard shrugged. I guessed that as long as he didn't have to do any cleaning, he'd agree to anything.

Still, I wanted to notch a point for myself onto his computer geek forehead. Especially when he stared at Hannah as she turned back toward me and crossed to take my hand. He looked as if someone had poked worms into his mouth.

At least Hannah saved me from the awful chore of dusting. She pushed into the driver's seat while I opted for the passenger side.

"How does McDonald's sound?" I asked.

She screwed her lovely face into what could easily have passed for an albino raisin. "I was thinking more along the lines of a baked potato. Or a couple of sandwiches."

"You call that fast food?"

"I call anything I don't have to cook, fast." She checked both directions for cars as we reached the end of of the road.

"I figured you'd be a great cook, what with your artistic talent..." I pumped the passenger side floor when a cat streaked across the road. Hannah deftly swerved without touching the brake.

"I guess God thought one talent was enough." She reached across to hold my hand.

I stroked her palm with my baby finger. "I'm a great cook. Maybe I can make you supper on Saturday."

She tightened her grip. "I'd love that. Maybe in return I can sketch you."

"Like Titanic?" I waggled my eyes at her.

"You'd make an interesting nude."

I noted that she said,' interesting', not good. What was that supposed to mean? Then, I realised something that made my stomach tingle.

"Do you
always
paint nude?"

She smiled. "Are you asking me to put us live on the net?"

I choked. Of course, since I choked on nothing but my own spit, I couldn't breathe. I swallowed and swallowed and swallowed, and couldn't stop swallowing long enough to catch a breath. She waited patiently till I'd finished.

"You know, Daniel, you're priceless. I'm really glad I met you. I don't know what I'd have done."

I guessed the feeling was quite mutual. She'd made a change in me, as well. I couldn't tell her that, though. If I did, I'd have to start with how we'd met. How I'd wanted to stop living. How I didn't want to think about anything anymore.

"I just wish I could think of a better place for you to stay. Helen and Lucy's house is awfully little," I hedged.

She frowned. "Are you kidding? That house is perfect. I couldn't possibly have found a better place."

"I suppose I could have offered you my house."

"Then where would you have lived?"

"We both could have stayed there."

She shook her head. "I need my own space."

"But that space is so small."

"What else do I need? A place to paint, a place to live... a place to love."

I couldn't understand what drew her about such a house. So it had belonged to two eclectic painters who ran it without electricity, without modern amenities. So, it had a well-lit studio with windows that stretched out into a non-existent lawn and up into clear sky. The place wasn't painted, it had scrub brush that reached shoulder height, its cramped loft was reachable only by a hand made ladder. So what if it sat 20 feet from the beach, it was little, damn it. Little. With a great amount of landscaping to be done if it were to look at all presentable.

"It needs a lot of landscaping," I said.

"Whatever for?" She answered. "I don't care what anyone thinks. As a matter of fact, I don't give a damn."

"I suppose," I responded. "It doesn't really matter." It didn't, did it? One could spend a lifetime trying to make someone else happy. One could spend a long lifetime. "You really like the place?"

She touched my arm. "I love it. It's everything I could have ever dreamed for."

"I'm glad." I said. "I'm really glad for you."

She smiled. "I figured you would be. Before we go back, I'll check out of the hotel. I didn't because I wasn't sure I could get the house. And I can tell the clerk to send my art supplies over."

"You mean we didn't move everything?" I found that hard to believe. Her little car had been chock full.

She shook her head. "Not even half. Howard hired a courier to ship the rest of my supplies To the Grand. I can leave a message with the counter clerk to send the courier to my new place. Howard can ship the rest of my apartment when he goes back tomorrow."

Howard, Howard, Howard. I wished he'd just go back to fucking Toronto already.

Hannah and I decided we'd eat supper in the hotel's restaurant. Actually, I decided. She wanted fast food that was healthy and I wanted Howard to go hungry just a little longer. The plan was as good as any, and it accomplished both of our agendas. Poor Hannah, she had no idea how petty I could be. Little man, I am. Very little man.

"We'll bring him a doggy bag," I told her as we entered the lobby. It worked quite well as a convincing tool. "It won't be hot, but it will be a damn tasty meal."

"If I didn't know better, Daniel, I'd think you were being mean." She stopped at the desk.

I affected my innocent look. "Who me?"

"I'm going to check out," she said, ignoring my protest. She approached the desk and waited till the clerk noticed her.

"I'm expecting a delivery."

The clerk turned all business. "Is it being shipped here?"

Hannah nodded. "Yes, but I have another address it can go to. I expected it sometime today."

"Oh, it's still pretty early. Only quarter to five. It could be here any minute."

"Good," Hannah said. "Can you have them take the stuff to 86 Helen Lucy Road?"

The clerk jotted down the information on a pink message slip. She impaled it on a black message stick and I wandered around while the final business was completed. Getting hungrier by the minute, I shuffled down the ramp to the restaurant entrance. Smells of roasted chicken and deep-fried potatoes came out. I decided right then to gorge on rapure pie. It had been at least a month since I'd eaten the dish. Perhaps I'd introduce it to Hannah.

She came toward me and took my arm. "All done. Now we can eat. Then we'll go back to the house and finish cleaning up."

"The clerk will have your stuff sent?"

Hannah nodded. "I signed some form. She said she'd tell the delivery men where I could be found."

Supper was remarkably uneventful. I guessed I was just too tired out to carry on much of a conversation. Hannah didn't seem to mind. She shovelled in the rapure pie without commenting on how gross it looked or how wonderful it tasted. I supposed she travelled the lines of her tangled synapses, deciding on her next project. It was a comfortable silence. One that felt right. I yawned when the check came. She smiled.

I got Hannah to drop me off at the bank. My BMW could bring me safely home and I'd escape having to clean. Let Howard dust. I'd feel much better helping out when he was safely aboard a plane back to Toronto. Not that I was jealous, mind you. Jealousy was for people who cared. Jealousy was for people who wanted to live. And I didn't fit either bill.

I stopped dead in my tracks. I did want to live. I did care. The mustard yellow BMW waited quietly in its parking space. The Colonel sat in his spot and showed white in the black of the vehicle's interior.

I unlocked and opened the door. "Colonel old man, you're about to be liberated." I threw him on the floor in the back seat. He looked ridiculous in front, anyway. He was a ritual I'd begun years before I lucked out and made a fortune. I didn't need him anymore. I was an adult. I could use my money for good and not the evil of bank charges and deposit fees. Money made money, but it didn't make a man happy. I couldn't believe I'd missed that concept. All this time, I'd been sick over not having a purpose, thinking money was the thing a man worked for.

It wasn't true. A man worked, played, loved and built character. Money was a means, not a destination. If I couldn't share the wealth I didn't deserve to have it.

Sweet Jesus, I felt the stirring of excitement.

What the small town called a library, William would have termed a study. It had all of three rooms, one larger than the other, and it had precious little in the way of shelves. Luckily, though, it had four computers and free wifii access. And since it was the middle of the day, all but one was being used. He settled in. His smartphone was too small to do the work he planned.

Within moments, good for even an old Pentium, he was rewarded with the bank's homepage and discovered after clicking through, that the bank wasn't a bank at all, but more of a co-op founded by the same man who had accosted him. A Daniel Jones, who, if the info was correct, was hailed in the town's newspapers as some sort of new money mogul. And the website listed everything from service charges to employee names, picture, and emails.

Next he tried every social media client he could find.

William sensed someone standing close. He looked up.

The librarian was a short woman with a round build. Her medium-length hair curled a bit around the edge, near her ears. She looked friendly. William let go the breath he didn't know he had been holding.

She leaned down. "Can I help with something?"

"No," William stammered.

She narrowed her eyes. It made her look less friendly. It made her look threatening. "Are you sure? You've been here for quite a while."

"We said no. We don't need any help." It sounded nasty, even to William. Would dear William of old have been so rude? Probably, yes, if it was in character.

The librarian turned heel and stomped away.

William could again give his attention to the matter at hand. Thankfully, he had a benefit over the master playwright. He had the Internet. And you could be anyone you wanted to be over the Internet. He opened a phising app and sent little miss Gina a text.

R U busy?

William waited an eternity before she replied. He prayed this Daniel fellow wasn't standing next to her.

Depends on who this is.

Who do U think?

I'm not in the mood 4 games, Dan. What do U want?

Where are U? U took off so quick with that Hannah chick, the cops got majorly pissed. They need your info.

William was certain his lungs stopped expanding.

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

He swallowed his panic and typed.

Have the cops left yet?

Y. U best stop at the station for your statement.

Did U give 1?

Yes.

What did they ask?

Regular stuff. Description.

Did they ask where Hannah lived?

I told them she was staying at the Grand. You've certainly kept everything else a secret.

William pushed away from the screen. The Grand? Didn't he pass a Grand Hotel to get here? Wasn't it right next door?

Saints be praised; Hannah was within touching distance.