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As Franco babbled about Amazons, Zach immediately saw why his previous design hadn’t worked. His curls and curves fought with the clean lines of the house. This particular style of Victorian was known for gingerbread embellishment, but clearly, it had to be the right gingerbread.
Franco had moved on to domes and turrets, equating them with hats and turbans. Zach wasn’t going in that direction, but he did have another idea for a gingerbread pattern with straight lines and spare curves.
“You’ve got a good eye,” he said to Franco.
“Yes. And I’m especially good with colors, should you find yourself in need of a second opinion.”
In spite of himself, Zach felt the edges of his mouth turn up. “I’ll keep that in mind. Hey, have you seen that homeless girl around here?”
“One sees so many.”
“I’m talking about the one you let in this morning.”
Franco’s face was blank.
“Giant coat? Funky hat? I know, that sounds like most of them.”
“Ah.” Franco raised his finger. “I know who you mean. She’s not homeless.”
Zach exhaled. “Good to hear. I thought she looked a little soft for the streets.”
“Not to worry.”
Franco and the dogs walked on and Zach got to work designing a crenelated running trim with wagon wheel spokes that would be a bear to cut out. But worth it.
OKAY. HERE IT WAS. Marnie’s first night in the Victorian apartment.
“Welcome, welcome.” Franco, her new landlord, bowed and ushered her into a jungle. “Mi casa es su casa.”
“At least on Mondays and Tuesdays,” Marnie said. “What’s with the greenery?”
“I’m plant sitting.” He gave her a sly look. “Normally, I would put them on my balcony, but I didn’t want to intrude.”
Marnie knew a hint when she heard one. “I don’t care if you put the plants on the balcony. I like plants.”
“Excellent.” Franco handed her a huge Boston fern. “Go on. I’ll be right behind you.”
Marnie could hardly see around the plant, but climbed the stairs to the second-floor apartment, 2B.
There were four apartments in the old Victorian, but she gathered that Franco was the only one renting his out piecemeal.
She thought it was clever of him, actually. This way, he could concentrate on his script. And he was, no doubt, making more money than if he’d rented it to one person. And, as he had told her, Sundays were his.
Franco had given her a key when she’d dropped off her suitcase and duffel this morning and now Marnie unlocked the door and stepped inside. She set the fern down by the front door and surveyed the apartment.
It was exquisitely decorated in period furniture that made Marnie nervous, but she figured she’d either get used to it or break something. Probably both. She immediately went over to the bay window, from which she could see the work going on across the street and looked for the construction guy.
He wasn’t there. She was relieved in a way, but knew that she’d have to speak to him again at some point. They were pseudo-neighbors now, after all.
It was only hours after their evening encounter last week that Marnie had realized that the man hadn’t been hitting on her. He’d been offering her help. It said a lot about him and unfortunately, something about her as well.
Girlfriend material. As if. She cringed inwardly and it was a feeling she was getting tired of.
A great huffing and puffing announced Franco’s arrival. He’d rigged a pole to hold several hanging baskets and looked like an ancient Chinese water bearer.
“I’m not doing that again!” he moaned. “We’ll just have to make more trips.”
Marnie heard the “we’ll,” but figured she’d let him get away with it this time.
Franco staggered into the bedroom. “Hurry, hurry.”
Marnie followed him and opened the French doors to the balcony.
With much moaning and groaning, Franco knelt and raised the pole.
Marnie helped him get the hanging baskets off. She watched as he arranged them on a pretty white wrought iron plant tree, then brought him the giant fern.
“That, we’ll put in the corner. All right, then. Next load.”
Marnie didn’t mind helping since she hadn’t actually thought about what she would do tonight. She hadn’t eaten and she wanted to get settled in, then maybe explore the neighborhood streets she didn’t see every morning on her walk.
Franco had allocated part of the bedroom closet to her and she understood that the other tenants of 2B would also have closet privileges. Not that she planned to leave much stuff here, but it was nice to know that she didn’t have to lug everything with her each week.
After she and Franco had brought up the rest of the plants, he offered her tea.
“That sounds good.”
“I left a few basics in the kitchen and you’re welcome to help yourself. I suppose you and the others can use boxes or labeling to keep your things straight.” Franco put water on to boil and gave her a tour of the kitchen amenities at the same time.
Marveling at the novelty of having a man wait on her, Marnie shrugged off her parka and sat at the kitchen table. Franco leaned against the counter as he waited for the water to boil.
“And now you must tell me everything about yourself.”
“I gave you my social security number. My life is now an open book.”
“I’m talking about more than good credit and your employment history. I want to know about a woman with the unusual name of Marnie LaTour, her hopes and dreams—and how she believes renting an apartment for two days a week will help her achieve them.”
Well, put that way…one second she was staring into the friendly, but inquisitive, eyes of her landlord/doorman and the next moment, Marnie had burst into tears.
Marnie couldn’t remember the last time she’d cried. Long, long, ago. She supposed that since her father had died right after she got out of college, she hadn’t had much to cry about. She had a good job, friends and the San Francisco public transportation system. What was there to cry about?
This was so embarrassing. “I’m s-sorry.”
Franco calmly went about the task of making tea. “I find myself confronted by crying women on a fairly regular basis.”
“I don’t even know why I’m crying,” Marnie wailed.
“Yes, you do. You just aren’t ready to tell me about it.” A cup of hot tea appeared in front of her, along with a tissue, which she accepted gratefully.
“It’s so stupid,” she mumbled, holding the tissue against her nose.
“Not if it makes you cry.”
“Crying’s stupid, too.”
Franco sipped his tea and said nothing.
Eventually, Marnie couldn’t stand the sound of her sniffing in the silence and blurted out, “It’s just that a man at work, someone I thought I liked, told me I wasn’t girlfriend material, which I knew because the construction workers never whistle at me and I don’t even know why I care.”
She sniffed. Again.
Franco clasped his hands together. “May I take notes?”
“Why?”
“I’m a student of the human condition and hope to incorporate certain stories into my scripts.”
Great. She was a human condition. Marnie held her head in her hands. “I don’t care.”
“Does it matter if it becomes a film script?”
Like it would ever be produced. “No.”
Franco went to the telephone table and returned with a pen and pad of paper and began scribbling. “Now what else is bothering you?”
“My mother is going to Paris,” Marnie threw in for good measure. She’d just found out.
Franco gasped. “And not taking you?”
“She’s chaperoning the French club. She teaches high school.”
Franco gestured dismissively. “Consider yourself lucky, then. You don’t want Paris at this time of year. Now, what do you want?” He stared at the pad of paper. “Do I understand that you wish construction workers to objectify you?”
“No! Well, kinda… Actually, I guess I just want to be the sort of woman they would want to objectify—whistle at. You know.”
“I’m getting the idea, but please enlighten me.”
And so Marnie told him all about Barry and not being girlfriend material and the construction workers and the foreman thinking she was a homeless person. Franco nodded and said “Uh-huh” and “mmm” a lot as he took notes.
He was such a good listener that Marnie even told him how she’d worried about telling her mother she’d be staying here and how her mother had misunderstood and thought she was moving out and that her mom had been so happy that now Marnie was really going to have to look for somewhere else to live. None of this had anything to do with being girlfriend material, but Marnie had thought she was helping her mother by living with her and now her mother didn’t need help anymore and it was Just One More Thing.
“I’m sorry to be such a drama queen,” she moaned, holding her head.
“Drama is my life,” Franco said fervently. “What are you going to do?”
Marnie drank her entire mug of lukewarm tea. “I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do.” Franco tapped his pencil impatiently.
She did know. “Okay, but I don’t know how.”
“Oh, hon, you don’t want that Barry creature.”
“Oh, no. But I want him to ask me out to Tarantella. I want him to beg me.”
“And you want the construction workers to whistle at you.”
“Maybe just once.”
“I could pay them for you.”
Marnie laughed, then immediately sobered. “You’re saying that’s the only way—”
“No, it was a joke. A bad one. But I did make you laugh.” He studied her and Marnie was reminded of the construction foreman’s thorough scrutiny.
“We have a lot of work ahead of us.” Franco stood.
“We?”
“You didn’t think I wouldn’t respond to your cry for help, did you? We’ll start by doing your colors.”
“What?”
“We’ll ascertain which colors are most flattering to you before we go shopping, my little Cinderella.”
“Shopping isn’t one of my favorite words. I mostly order online.”
Franco gave a world-weary sigh. He used sighs very effectively. “I shall return with my swatches. You need to change.”
“I know.”
“I meant your clothes. What did you bring?”
Marnie looked down at herself. “Uh, more jeans. Some T-shirts.”
“Do you have a white T-shirt?”
“Mostly white. It’s got the blue writing on it from the Carnahan Easter 10K Fun Run.”
“Wear it backward or turn it inside out. And let me check my costumes—”
“You have costumes?”
“Yes, I’m an actor and a playwright and sometimes due to budgetary constraints in the small theaters, one must exercise many talents.” He headed for the door. “I’ll be back.”
Marnie cleared away the teacups and unpacked her suitcase. The closet was empty, except for a large hanging bag. She hung up three T-shirts, two pairs of jeans and her pajamas and robe. She didn’t know what to do with her underwear, so she left it in the duffel, which she set on the closet floor.
“Yoo-hoo,” she heard. Marnie couldn’t remember a time when she’d ever heard a grown man say “Yoo-hoo.”
