Page 2 of Waiting for Forever
Paige waved, then sighed somewhat wearily. While she was making great strides at work, it was her personal life that needed some help.
A lot of it.
“Did you get the keys yet?”
Paige looked up as her brother claimed the Adirondack next to her.
She nodded. “Signed on the dotted line yesterday. It’s all mine.”
Tyson lifted his bottle of beer, tapping it against her wineglass. “Good for you. Welcome to the world of being a homeowner. Just an FYI, this is when everything in the house starts to fall apart.”
Paige laughed. “Everything in that house fell apart years ago. I’m not expecting much in the way of surprises.” Buying a house hadn’t been on Paige’s radar until the last baby shower—Adele’s—when she realized she was thirty-one years old and essentially just sitting around waiting for…well, for her forever to start.
She’d gone home from the shower feeling stupid because she’d wasted years waiting for something to happen, even though she didn’t know what that something was. Getting married and having kids like every other person in her family was one option, but Paige was just as happy remaining single.
Maybe a little too happy, which was why she wasn’t actively pursuing a long-term relationship.
Paige was a workaholic, primarily because she loved her job. It never felt like work, so she tended to spend a lot of hours holed up in her office, either the one at Sparks or the one at home. She didn’t go on a lot of dates, simply because she wasn’t around people enough for anyone to ask her out. Plus, while she’d been out of high school for well over a decade, most guys around here viewed her as the same high-strung, nerdy Paige she’d been as a teen, which, to be fair, wasn’t too far from who she still was.
She was a creature of comfort, and for her, that meant schedules and predictable routines and lots and lots of big, fat, juicy to-do lists. God, she loved a to-do list.
And while her social life and list of available suitors basically sucked, she wasn’t desperate enough to find someone to try online dating. Jesus, just the thought of signing up for that kind of chaotic, “toss the dart and hope to pop a balloon” style of dating blew her controlled, methodical mind.
Paige preferred dating the old-school way. Meet someone, strike up a conversation, feel an attraction, go out for coffee then—if that goes well—advance to dinner. Putting her photo and pointless information about herself on a website, then letting a bunch of randoms spam her inbox was just all kinds of wrong.
Since she wasn’t sure where she wanted to land on the relationship front, she had decided to take the bull by the horns on another aspect of her personal life instead. She was sick of wasting money on rent, so she bought herself a house.
“How long did that house sit empty?” Tyson asked.
Paige grimaced. “Five years. Ms. Bly never married, so everything she had was left to a great-nephew, who’s apparently independently wealthy. I guess Ms. Bly’s house wasn’t worth enough in his mind that he needed to sell it right away.”
“Must be nice,” Tyson murmured.
“Right? Rent it or Airbnb or something, but he just paid the property taxes and let it sit empty. Anyway, the neighbors got tired of mowing the grass and complained to the town.”
Tyson chuckled. “Only in Maris would neighbors mow the yard of an abandoned house forfiveyears before thinking to complain.”
Paige giggled. “In their defense, they’d taken turns mowing it for Ms. Bly for a good twenty years before her death. The woman was ninety-four when she died, for Pete’s sake. Anyway, the town reached out to the great-nephew, which forced him to get off his ass and deal with the house.”
“When do I get a tour?” Tyson asked. “Tomorrow? How about tomorrow?”
Paige sighed because she’d been expecting and dreading that request. “It needs a lot of work, Ty.” She’d done the walk-through with the real estate agent on her own, and so far, no one in her family had seen the monstrosity she’d bought.
Tyson shrugged. “I assumed so. Ms. Bly lived in the thing for over sixty years. Is it the blast from the past I’m anticipating?”
“Maybe even worse. It’s the house time forgot. It’s a seventies nightmare, with avocado and brown appliances in the kitchen, shag carpeting and aggressively floral wallpaper in every room, not to mention the wood paneling. So much wood paneling,” she said with a shudder.
“Jesus. I can’t wait to see it.” Tyson rubbed his hands together with too much glee at her expense.
She narrowed her eyes. “If I promise to take before and after pics, can I convince you to wait until I’ve tackled at least part of the remodel?”
Tyson shook his head. “Hell no. I’m already planning a photo shoot for me, Harley, and Cal in seventies attire, sitting on that shag carpeting for our Christmas card this year. Harley’s getting maternity bell bottoms and Cal and I are thinking of growing pornstaches. You gotta let us in.”
“You idiot,” Paige laughed, picking up a pretzel from her paper plate and chucked it at her brother’s head. “That’s my house you’re talking about.”
Tyson deftly dodged the flying pretzel. “Besides, you can’t keep us out. We’re helping you move in, remember?”
He had a point there. “Oh. Yeah.”
