Her face must have fallen.
“We can make it work,” John assured her. He gave her the name of an electrical supply wholesale store two towns over. “They’re reasonable and they know their stuff.”
But when Phoebe had driven the forty-five minutes to get there and stood in line behind a slew of loud contractors (all men), her hopes dwindled. Apparently it was a contractor wholesale store, and everyone in line (in work boots) was there to pick up large orders. As she stood in front of a guy who she was pretty sure was checking out her rear end, she tried to focus on her list. Schoolhouse-style nickel pendants. Flush-mount fixtures for the hallways. She glanced around uncertainly. There didn’t seem to be a showroom anywhere in sight. When it was her turn, the guy at the cash register took one look at her with her Starbucks coffee cup and handwritten list and instantly looked put out.
Phoebe stole a peek at his nametag. “Hi, Ron. My electrician sent me here. I’d like to look around the showroom at options.”
“For?”
“Lighting?” As soon as the word left her mouth, she flushed deeply. The guy behind her chuckled out loud.
Ron stared back at her impatiently. “I kind of figured that.”
“What I mean is, I need to pick out fixtures. I’m renovating a house. Is there a showroom I can see?”
“Look, we’re not Home Depot, honey. We supply electrical to licensed contractors we have service relationships with, not private customers.”
“I’m sorry, I was told you have a showroom.”
Ron glanced impatiently at the clock. “We do, but it’s in the next building. And as you can see we’re pretty busy filling orders this morning. Maybe you can come back with your electrician.”
“But he’s the one who sent me,” she said hopefully. “John Glazer from Litchfield Electric?”
“Doesn’t ring a bell.”
Phoebe could feel the snickering expressions around her, and she had the urge to flee. It was the inverse experience of FairfieldDesigns. She’d gone from a sleek cappuccino-pushing saleswoman who wanted to sell her the Taj Mahal of kitchens, to a surly chauvinist in scuffed Timberlands who didn’t want to sell her a damn thing.
Ron looked past her at the next guy in line. “You should probably come back when you know what you need.”
But Phoebe did not budge. She set her list down and waited until Ron looked her in the eye. His eyes were flat with indifference. Phoebe had not sent the twins to school for an extended day and driven almost an hour for this. “I know what I need, Ron. I need eight LED can lights for my kitchen ceiling, which is ten feet tall. But not the new construction variety. I need the remodel type, which I understand is for a prebuilt ceiling. It needs to be IC, insulation contact. Wouldn’t want to risk an electrical fire.” She glanced at her list, trying to keep the quake out of her voice. “And I’d like all that with a baffle trim. Better to reduce the glare. Did you get all that? You may want a pen.”
The guy behind her let out a low whistle. “Guess she knows what she wants, Ron.”
Ron narrowed his eyes. Five minutes later, Phoebe was in the showroom with a smiling gray-haired woman named Ruth. Together they selected recessed lighting for the kitchen and a nice-looking bronze semi-flush-mount ceiling light for the hallways and common spaces. But the feature lighting, like bathroom sconces and kitchen island pendants, were well out of her price bracket.
Back at home, Phoebe pulled her desk chair up to her laptop. Three hours later she’d found a discount chandelier on one popular home design website she’d discovered and a set of brushed nickel industrial-style pendants for the kitchen on another site. At a box store site she found outdoor lighting, from gooseneck lanterns over the garage to floodlights. Even after one splurge onRestoration Hardware for a cast-iron sconce set for the master bath, she still had three hundred dollars left in her budget. The next morning she proudly presented her printed orders to John and Dave.
Dave scrutinized the tally. “Are you sure you got everything? What about the bedrooms? And the upstairs bathrooms?” Phoebe pointed to her selections for both.
John high-fived her. “Not bad.”
Dave, whose reserve Phoebe was used to by now, offered her a smile. “Bravo.”
Phoebe was thrilled. It wasn’t just the outward progress on the house that she relished. There was something about doing the work, herself, that invigorated her. When she wasn’t on-site to meet with the revolving door of contractors, or at Lenox Town Hall applying for permits and scheduling inspections, she was in her car driving up and down the corridor of Fairfield County in search of fixtures and finishes. It was endless. But she loved the pace and the change of focus that came with each day. Even the setbacks were invigorating: the snap decisions that had to be made, the sense of accomplishment when something gone awry had been wrangled back on course. Construction was a lot like motherhood: ripe with unknowns. There were sky-scraping highs that made you giddy and breathless, and avalanche-like lows that left you buried. And somewhere in the middle that maternal scrap of hope that it would all prove rewarding. For the first time since leaving her career in copy editing and staying home full-time with the boys, Phoebe felt the whir of her old self humming to life beneath her skin. She could do this. Shewasdoing this.
Olivia
The farmer’s market was her favorite part of the weekend. She wasn’t sure if it was because she was the daughter of a chef who’d taught her to eat foods in their peak of season, or the vibrant vegetables arranged on wooden tables, or perhaps the calloused soil-stained hands of the farmers who stood behind them, but Olivia found the Saturday morning market a feast of the senses. She paused at an organic vegetable stand where she was a regular. Mr. Waters, the farmer, was handing out crisp green sprigs as samples. “There she is! You must come to the asparagus festival at the farm,” he told her. “It’s next weekend.” The lush stem cracked with a satisfying snap as she popped a sample into her mouth. “Heaven,” she said. “I’ll take two bunches.”
Mr. Waters smiled appreciatively. “And how about this little one? Does she love asparagus like her mother?”
Luci stared back at him, and the speech pathologist’s advice echoed sharply in Olivia’s mind. “Encourage her to use her signs and gestures around others.” She took a deep breath and nodded at Luci. After a long moment, when Luci still had said nothing, Olivia prompted her. “Do you like asparagus?” Luci averted her gaze, but just as Olivia’s heart sank she lifted her hand shyly and gave Mr. Waters the thumbs-up.
“That’s right, darling!” Olivia gushed.
If Mr. Waters wondered at the tears welling in her large brown eyes, he gave her a reprieve, instead reaching for a sunflower. “For you, my little asparagus eater,” he said, handing it to Luci.
The small interaction boosted Olivia so thoroughly she stopped for fresh-squeezed lemonade and didn’t even balk at the price, three dollars per cup. She bought two. She even lingered at the animal pen under the maple tree where Goatboy Soaps set up their stand each weekend. Luci loved to pet the goats, Matilda and Bee, even though the day was sticky and Olivia needed to get home to the studio to finish up some work Ben had left for her. Best of all, today held the promise of what would be just an ordinary thing for most people: they had been invited on a playdate.
