“I’m not a fantasy, and I have a real emergency,” she replied through gritted teeth.“I need your help.There’s a leak in my house, and I can’t fix it.”She held her hands out to her sides as if to emphasize her point that she had been trying.
Water fantasies were going to have to wait.“Alright, keep your shirt on; I’m coming.Or don’t keep the shirt on.”
Andrea ignored him and led him to her house and straight into her bathroom.Not that he needed a guide.He could hear the rush of water and see the flooding already on the floor.
“Where’s your water line?”he asked, all business now.
“In the crawl space.”She pivoted on her heel and led the way back outside to a little door on the side of the house.
“How about tools?A wrench?”
“Yes.”Andrea ran toward her garage and came back a moment later with a bag full of tools.
Using the flashlight on his phone, Jack shimmied into the hole that was not built for a man his size or as broad shouldered, but he managed to squeeze through.Jack army-crawled over the dirt and through what felt like hundreds of spider webs, hoping he didn’t cross any other more predatory animals down here.
He had his knife, but that wasn’t going to do him much good against a gator.With limited light, it took a few minutes to find the water line and even longer to situate himself to adjust his frame to turn off the water.
“There; that should do it.”
“Do what?”Andrea’s voice sounded far away.
“Stop your house from becoming a water park,” Jack responded as he came out of the hole.He was eager to get back out into the fresh air and not be in the bug-infested ground.He looked down at himself and saw he was covered in dirt and cobwebs.
Jack brushed himself off as he went back into the house.“So what happened?”
“My bathroom sink had a drip.I decided to tighten the bolt to see if that would help—”
“—And instead you got a shower.”
“Exactly.The whole elbow came off.I tried to put it back on—”
“—But the force of water wouldn’t allow it.”
“No, so when I couldn’t fix it myself, I came to you.”
“I’m glad you did.Much longer and this place would have been floating down the street.”
“No, it wouldn’t,” she denied but chuckled.
“No, but it would have ruined a lot of your stuff.Good thing these houses have tile floors and not hardwood.You came to me quick enough it shouldn’t be too bad of a cleanup.”
“No, thank you for that.I should have known to turn the main off.I don’t know why I didn’t.”
Jack placed a comforting hand on Andrea’s shoulder.“Don’t beat yourself up over it.We all forget to do certain things when under stress.”
They both stopped in the entry of Andrea’s bathroom.The floor had about half an inch of water on it that was working its way through to her bedroom.
“Do you want me to stay and help you?I can help with the floor or put the elbow back on.”
“I hate asking for help, but yes, please stay.If you’ll work on the sink, I’ll get to cleaning up.”
Andrea started setting down towels around him to soak up the water.Jack picked up the elbow that had been tossed on the floor next to the toilet and shimmied under the sink, not caring he was getting soaked.
“Aren’t you worried about getting wet?”Andrea asked.
“It’s water; I won’t melt.”He paused in his work and cocked his head to the side so he could look up at her.“Unless that was a backward way of asking me to take my clothes off.”
“No,” she sputtered.“I was just—never mind.Get your clothes wet, I don’t care.”Andrea avoided his gaze, tucking her chin to her chest and walking away.He could hear her in her bedroom setting down more towels.
