She turned me down so easily; it was frustrating. “I can help you,” I said, emphasizing the words this time. “Really.”
“Honey, I don’twantyou to,” she replied. I felt unexpectedly hurt, hearing this. Which must have shown on my face, because she added, quickly, “Saylor, you haven’t been here in over ten years. I want you to enjoy it. That’s what your mom would have wanted, too.”
Trinity walked past me, carrying a stack of folded linens, and went into room seven, dropping them onto the bed closest to the door. On the cart the phone started to ring andMimi picked it up, just as a white van that said ARTHUR AND SONS WINDOWS pulled up to the office.
“Hello? Oh, hey, Tom. Yes, it’s unit ten. Okay. Meet you there in five minutes.” She glanced at the van, then sighed again. “Lord, and there’s Artie coming for an estimate. Everything’s happening at once today.”
The man in question was climbing out of the van now, carrying a clipboard. He lifted a hand in our direction, and Mimi, looking stressed, waved back. As she started making her way to meet him, I opened my mouth to say something, then closed it. Three times might have been the charm, but it could also mean not taking a hint.
“Why do you really want to help?”
I turned around to face Trinity. “Why?”
“Come on,” she said. “You’re the spoiled rich cousin and everyone’s been told to make sure you have fun here.”
I’d been tiptoeing around her so much the flare of temper I felt, hearing this, was welcome. “Not by me,” I said, an edge to my voice.
“Who cares? Why not just kick back and enjoy yourself? I would.”
“Well, that’s you,” I told her. She raised her eyebrows. “Look, you don’t have to like me or the fact I’m here. But don’t pretend you know me. Mimi let me come stay here with zero notice. The very least I can do is help her out whensheneeds it.”
“Yeah, but have you ever actuallyhelda job?”
I’m only seventeen, I wanted to say. Just as I thought this,though, I realized she’d probably been working for years. Things were different here. Out loud I said, “I can help you, if you’ll let me. It’s up to you.”
She looked at me for a second, and I leveled my gaze back at her. Finally she said, “Go by the office and tell Mimi you need the keys to room ten. Then go let Tom in. Don’t give her a choice.”
“Okay,” I said, surprised at how victorious I felt. “Then what?”
“You need something else?”
“What I need is to not feel I’m just sitting around doing nothing while she’s working on her bad knee,” I told her. “That’s something I’m pretty sure my mom wouldn’t have wanted.”
She glanced out the door, toward the office. “Okay. Come back here after. I’ll show you how to do the beds.”
I nodded, then started down the sidewalk. Of course she hadn’t denied not liking me, not that I really expected her to. But I’d take her offer. Since arriving, I’d felt like not family and not a guest, the sole inhabitant of this weird place in between. It felt good to have a job and task at hand. Like the chaos that was this trip could actually get a bit more organized, and I might just find my place in it.
Seven
“You know, it’s not exactly that I don’t like you.”
“No?” I asked Trinity, spraying down the mirror in front of me, then starting to wipe it from the center out, as she’d showed me earlier.
“Not really.” She added two folded dish towels to the dish rack, hanging them just so. “It’s more theideaof you.”
I looked over at her. “That’s supposed to make me feel better?”
“It’s not supposed to make you feel anything,” she replied. “It’s just the truth.”
“You called me the spoiled rich cousin,” I pointed out.
“Okay, well, I can see how that might have seemed bitchy.”
Might? I thought. But I stayed quiet, taking my annoyance out on a stubborn streak.
“But look at it from my point of view,” she continued. “Here I am, hugely pregnant and uncomfortable—”
“Not my fault,” I pointed out quietly.
