Page 3 of Until You

“Take all the food out of the bag and put it on the counter? Why don’t you just take it from the bag straight to the cupboard?”

My hand stills as I’m about to set a jar of pasta sauce on the kitchen counter. She has a point. “It’s something . . .” your mother used to do. The words die on my lips, and I force a smile to hide it. “Never mind. You know what? You’re right.” I walk over to the pantry with the grocery bag in hand and start placing its contents on the shelves without rhyme or reason. I know I’ll stock it fully later this week and will be reorganizing it, but for now, it’ll do.

The few items look measly on the bare pantry shelves, but we have a pantry, and that’s more than we had at our old place where we used a coat closet to store our food.

Now to find the plates in the mess of boxes I brought in from the back of the truck. With my hands on my hips, I contemplate the ten boxes stacked in the kitchen, cursing myself for not labeling any of them.

“There’s a letter here from your whoever he is,” Addy says, pointing to a stack of papers on the end of the counter.

“He’s my great uncle, which means he’s your great, great uncle,” I say and set the last of the groceries down.

“Wow. This person is really pissed at you.”

“Language,” I warn as I turn around to see her shuffling through said stack of papers. “One, quit being so nosy. And two, who’s mad at me?”

“The person who wrote these.” She holds up the haphazard pile. “And they were just here for me to look at them. Aren’t you the one who says whatever is left out is fair game?”

It’s amazing the things kids remember when it suits their case.

I walk over, take the stack of papers from her, and playfully whack them on her head. “Someone brought her sass with her all the way from Chicago.”

“Did you think I left the best part of me behind?” She flashes a grin that tells me I’m most definitely in trouble in the coming years.

Who am I kidding? I’m already in trouble.

“Lucky me,” I tease.

“Are they from the lady who lives over there?” Paige asks, pointing in the direction of the cottage.

“I believe so,” I say.

Wasn’t this the one and only drawback to accepting Uncle Ian’s offer? That I was now a landlord to the tenant in that little cottage off to the right of the driveway? I’ve been a landlord before, and it was nothing less than a nightmare.

“Can we go say hi to her? See what she’s like and if she has kids?” Addy asks.

“No. Leave her be. If she lives out here, she probably likes her privacy. The last thing she’s expecting is you two overwhelming her. Besides . . .”

“Besides, what?”

Besides, I haven’t had a chance to run a background check on one Miss Tennyson West yet.

“Nothing. Never mind.” I smile at the girls and then look down at the notes as I flip through them.

They are complaints about her cottage.

A renter complaining? Go figure.

The water pressure isn’t consistent.

The air conditioner works intermittently.

The hot water heater seems to be on the fritz, only working sporadically.

The notes are polite at first. Then a little more forceful as I flip through them.

Some are handwritten, others typed or in black felt pen. They range from sticky notes to formal stationery. And each one is signed with the name Tenny.

They’re all legitimate complaints from a tenant. Can’t say that I wouldn’t have written similar notes if it were me.