As I step into the foyer, I find Andrea and Jade there with a grin on their faces. It’s mischievous, like they’re up to no good.
“Andrea? Jade?”
Andrea shimmies her shoulders and claps her hands together like she’s about to give a speech to a football team instead of another day of renovation chaos. “I’m sooo excited for today.”
“What’s today?”
“We’re heading outside today. Yard clean up, curb appeal, the works,” Jade answers, the last two words with show hands high in the air.
I blink. “The yard?”
Jade beams like the sun personally blessed this moment. “We’re making the viewers fall in love from the outside today.”
“But we need to put the finishing touches on the bathroom,” I argue, arms crossed. “And we have to lay the floors in the hallway upstairs. And I have to paint that other spare bedroom still. Don’t you think we should finish the inside before?—”
“We’re waiting on a few supply shipments still,” Andrea says with a bright smile that makes me want to gently strangle something. “This will keep the momentum going.” She pulls out her phone and taps away on the screen. “Don’t worry. I think we’re still making good time.”
She doesn’t even look at me again before walking away and Jade follows.
Shethinkswe’re still making good time?
If this fails, she moves on to the next show—the next season. I’m the one who becomes the cautionary tale of the DIY influencer buried under a heap of pink tile. I feel my breath begin to quicken, and for a moment I think I might snap again.
Then Tucker’s voice from a few nights ago sounds in my head.
Strong looks good on you, Scottie. But you can put it down.
With his arms around me, and the safety in his words, I believe him.
I breathe.
Okay. I guess it’s yard day.
I can handle a yard.
Maybe.
I step outside, the sunlight hitting my face enough to make me squint. I lift a hand to shield my eyes and take in the yard. It’s obviously not the first time I’ve seen it, but it feels like it. Thegrass is almost to my waist in some spots and the driveway is coated in slick green moss.
Off to the side of the property, half swallowed by overgrown weeds, a metal swing glider sits hidden by a crooked tree. The paint is chipped down to bare steel in places and one of the chains hangs lower than the other, but the frame is still solid. Still standing.
I can picture someone sitting there with a cup of coffee and a folded blanket over their lap. The image lands in my chest before I can stop it. Inside the small storage space, I found what my grandmother kept. Out here, I can see where she might have used that coffee mug.
With every day that passes, it feels like the house is showing me how she lived.
Finally.
Just as I’m about to make my way closer to the glider, a voice slices through the moment.
“Hey, Scottie!” Lily says. I turn to find her bouncing toward me, bright as ever, and holding a bakery box. She stops in front of me, lifting it. “I brought carbs for courage.”
“You’re a lifesaver.”
Blair follows behind her, wearing athletic leggings and a shirt that saysDemo Day. I scan the rest of the property, and my jaw falls to the floor when I see Griffin and Dallas waving from where they are, unloading equipment from the back of a truck.
I continue scanning the rapidly-growing crowd.
More and more familiar faces scatter across the yard. The clerk from the General Store pulls a lawn mower out of another truck, Autumn from the coffee shop sets up a table with to-go cups of coffee, and kids in matching baseball hats stand in a circle putting on gardening gloves, with Nan pointing in different directions at what needs to be done.
