To Rent a Home

To Rent a Home

He arrived one day when I least expected it. There was a BANG BANG BANG on the door and there he was.

"Hello," I said. I eyed him carefully because he was no Jehovah's Witness or Girl Scout. In fact, he was about the age of forty with wild hair that was going gray prematurely. I wanted to tell him "if you wait a moment, just a moment, I will go upstairs to get some dye for that. See my roots? No one can tell!"

"Why hello there," he replied, and his voice was hearty like a handshake. Or a meat sandwich. 

He was dressed peculiarly- his blazer seemed roughed about and all his colors were dark. Not black, but. Dark brown and dark yellow and some tweed mix I did NOT understand but who am I to judge? Most of my clothes come from the bargain rack at Target. 

I waited on him, then, expecting the next thing he would say with this big dumb smile I perfected as an adolescent. Like "yes, yes, please let's keep going."

I nodded. He coughed.

"You have a beautiful house!" he finally told me. I was aware of how masculine his voice was. Very masculine. Ned never sounds like that. 

"Hmm. Well, I guess it's nice," I said. Truth was, I never thought about my home that much. It had been in Ned's family for the past two generations and upon marrying it, we got it. His parents said so-long to Ohio winters and hell-o to perpetual mosquitoy summers in Florida.

And then:  he really got to talking. 

"You have no idea! My god, I've driven around the state three times in search of a home like this. They just don't make them like this anymore. Every home that comes out now- no soul! No style! All the same, and no yards! Plus, the front porch! Do you know how rare those are becoming? The front porch is a symbol of family and community and just all around good citizenry, universal brotherhood! I guess those are lost causes in 2011, though." 

I did have no idea, but I kept nodding because it sounded very nice. Meanwhile, I thought:  three times he's driven around this state? With gas like it is? What is this man made of, million dollar bills? 

"Yes!" I chirped. He coughed again into his hand. They were big hands. You know what they say about a man's hands.

"The next thing I am about to ask you may sound funny, but please don't take it the wrong way."

"Okay, I hope I take it the right way." I have a tendency to say stupid things. Ned tells me this all the time.

"Clarissa, you say the stupidest things, and I work in sales," he says when we get ready for bed at night and I tell him I still am not sure when my feet are bigger in the beginning of the day or the end. 

This man didn't really care, though. He was full of nervous energy; I could tell by the way he was shaking like on the verge of explosion. Like a soda can someone had shook around too much and was about to foam all over the place. 

"Can I stay here and do some writing? I mean, can I rent your house and stay with you? You don't have to leave; that's not what this is about."

My eyes got big. All I could think of was every weird group sex story I had read on the internet. And wonder if they were, indeed, true. "Writing" might be some kind of educated code for "fisting" I furthermore did not understand. 

"Um..." I trailed off into space. I thought of our daughter and I thought of if this man was some child sex trader and Julie would disappear into the never-do-talk-abouts of Thailand or some under heathen nation. 

"I mean it's not WEIRD. I'm just working on a novel and I'd like to finish it, but I need inspiration. I need the perfect environment. I need somewhere that won't dampen my spirits and let my creative energy flow. Do you follow?"

"No." I was very honest. I was so lost. My creative energies were lost trying to channel Oprah in journal entries every night.

"Clarissa," Ned would tell me, watching me on the other side of the bed. "You must have the dullest journal ever."

"That's not true!" I retorted. "Here, let me read you a piece. Our many Jewish friends and acquaintances are being taken away in droves. The Gestapo is treating them very roughly and transporting them in cattle cars to Westerbork, the big camp in Drenthe to which they're sending all the Jews....If it's that bad in Holland, what must it be like in those faraway and uncivilized places where the Germans are sending them? We assume that most of them are being murdered. The English radio says they're being gassed."

"You are now stealing from Anne Frank, Clarissa, congratulations." I didn't think he would have read that.

"Come to the end of your driveway, let me show you," the man instructed and I did what he said. There was a formative air to him, but it was also a kind air. I meekly followed him to the end of the driveway and it was my driveway, after all. 

We stood by the ancient mailbox, big and red. I had always wanted to paint that thing but could always find an excuse not to do it. He dropped his arms, here. 

"See that?" he told me. "Look at the leaves and the shading, the way your home is just tucked away from the street. See how it's bungalowed within itself! Why, couldn't you imagine a family in 1943 retreating here? Couldn't you see exotic greenery overtaking the lot? I fell in love with it the moment I saw it. I feel like I can do my best writing here. I feel like I can do absolutely anything here. Don't you?" 

It was a lot to take in, but I cocked my head to the side and reconsidered my house from a vantage point I never had before. 543 Cherry Lane, where I had spent the past several years, otherwise rotting. 

"Oh, wow,"  I said, studying it. "I think you may be right." 

True, it was easy to suddenly see my adopted home squeezed into the pages of Better Homes and Gardens. Maybe not in the front, maybe not in the beginning. But maybe somewhere in the middle. And when I say "middle" I mean towards the back of the middle and after at least one ad for Viagara. 

The man was then staring at me. Almost burning into me with his eyes! And what were his eyes? They were just as dark, under his charcoal gray eyebrows. It made me blush. 

"Do you do anything here?"  he asked me. It felt like a very personal question. It felt like an intrusion. 

"Well, I clean. I raise my kids. Sometimes I read. I cook meals and I watch Oprah. I told myself I should volunteer more, maybe go to the church pantry once a week and help out, but I never do because I am scared of homeless people." 

"Really? That's fascinating," the man said that with genuine interest. Not Ned's blaise dismissal of intimate details I shared with him, of my dreams or anything else. This man sounded just as fascinated as he said. "What all do you cook?"

I shrugged.

"I like to use lots of oregano." I was very honest with him. I think honesty is a virtue but I don't remember. The only time it's not is when Beth Sue, from PTA, asks me if she looks fat in her acidwashed jeans. And I always have to say "Beth Sue, curvaceous isn't fat. Beyonce made women like you 'in' again." And then she gets offended, but I'm never entirely sure why.

"So, the house." The man gulped, I could see it in his throat. The bulge going up and down. 

"Yes, the house. It's a very nice house, I have to agree."

"Are you okay with me staying here for a bit? I mean, I'll pay you, and I'm not much of a burden. I eat one big meal a day and shower every two days and the way things are headed with me in regards to my hair," he chuckled. "I may be showering less, soon." 

"How much are you going to pay me?" I inquired. And then it occurred to me I shouldn't have said "me," really. I should have said "us." Me and Ned Wicketts. Whoops. 

"Why, a lot! Money isn't a big deal to me. I have enough of it. An inheritance, and then, you know, I'm a pretty well-to-do writer. Haven't you heard of me?" He said his name then and again I was honest and shook my head. 

Now, maybe if he was say, F. Scott Fitzgerald, or Judy Blume, or that perky girl with all those Harry Potter books under her belt, I would have said "yes!" But, no.

"Ah, I see. Well I'm popular in metaphysical circles." I did not know any metaphysical circles. I didn't know any circles, really. Or squares, come to think of it. 

So we stood there in my driveway, and I told the writer man he could use my house for his writing. And whatever else that had meant. 

"That's weird," Ned said when he came home and found the writer man sprawled on our front porch with a stack of papers, a pen, a plump bag and a cigar. He had asked me for a beer but I didn't have any. Ned had stopped drinking five or six years ago and I was never much of one because it only takes one beer to get me drunk and then I do even more stupid things. Like one time, I had a glass of champagne to celebrate a girlfriend's engagement. Very easy to do, right? But next thing I know, I am sitting on my couch, calling up the Home Shopping Network and order $400 worth of earrings. So I stay away. 

"He's paying us, Ned," I whisper to him. Ned can be so rude sometimes, and I couldn't tell you what, but I got an inherently good vibe from the writer man. I didn't want any reality show like drama going down on my time, or in my house (as beautiful as it now was).

"I see. How much?" The amount was a lot. I wouldn't tell you my age or my weight, either, but rest assured that Mr. Writer was paying us well to use our front porch as his writing studio. Ned agreed, by the expression on his normally pretty stoic face.

"Huh. That's a lot. Well, I hope whatever he's writing turns out good. Sure he's not a pervert?" I shook my head. "I guess we'll find out. I have a gun hidden under the bed, Clarissa." Then he paused. "Don't get any ideas about the gun."

"I wouldn't."

"How long is he staying for? Did he give you any inkling?" Again, I happened to be at a loss. Oh, inkling. Ned! Really! Who uses that word! 

"Til he finishes?" Ned rolled his eyes. He put his suitcase down by the door, like he had been doing since we moved in and he started working at Vagabond Incorporated, and went outside to have a chat with the writer. Which must have been a good chat, because I heard laughter and Ned returned into our house, stinking of cigar smoke.

"Clarissa," he told me, with the teethiest smile I had seen on his face in a good long while. "We're having steak tonight." 

"Mom," Julie said to me later when she got home. Julie was eight, but sometimes she acted like she was 13 and then sometimes she acted like she was 40. She had already tried unsuccessfully to file for a 401k plan last summer, with the money she made selling lemonade and walking dogs. The bank would not give one to her and told her to come back when she was done with high school. 

"What's up?" I was preparing the kitchen for the steak dinner. Evidently, it was indicated that the writer had access to a steak and would be grilling it for us. Lord knows if he killed it himself. 

Julie stood right next to me, her height at about my waist. She does not look much like I did as a child, which is a blessing, because I was one ugly kid. 

"That writer has to stop smoking, it's upsetting my asthma." 

"Oh, it's a cigar. Aren't they different?"

"Mom!"

"He's outside. Avoid the outside. Go play in the attic or something." She sighed, dramatic as someone auditioning for a role in Hamlet and Juliet or whatever, and stomped away. 

Sure enough, at dinner time (a little earlier than we normally dined), there was a full-cooked steak on the table. I really didn't know how it came about from the Writer, but I didn't ask questions. 

"Looks very good!" Ned announced. The Writer had taken a break from his craft and was seated inconspicuously at our much-too-large table. His leg was draped over his lap and he rested the tips of his elbows on the said table. I think the table was mahogany? I think I got it at a garage sale? 

"Cheerio!" the Writer said in return. "I've had this steak with me since yesterday and I wanted to give it to whoever would host me. Of course, I really didn't know how long that search would be, or when I would find the right place...."

"Fate," I said, sitting comfortably at my own table in my typical seat. I thought to myself "Oprah would be proud of that answer." 

"Yes." Now the Writer was nodding vigorously. I thought maybe his head would come off. It'd be like one of those wayward Bobbleheads they give away at ballparks. "Fate is a good way to put! Well done, Clarissa." 

Ned was looking at me then. He didn't give me compliments that often, I realize. Or applaud anything I said or thought of or happened to do. Sometimes he told me "you used Pinesol on the banister" but one could take that only so many ways. 

"So what are you writing?" Julie said, between stunted breaths. I didn't know if she was putting on more of a show just to get me afraid, or she was genuinely bothered by the residue of smoke the Writer carried with him.

"A novel, my girl. My last great novel. It's about a fisherman."

"Oh, like Hemingway?"

"Well not quite."

"Like the Perfect Storm?"

"No! I'm afraid not that optimistic."

"Like Jonathan Livingston Seagull?"

"God! How is this girl so well-read?" the Writer triumphed. I shrugged. I didn't know, either. It wasn't like she always had a book in hand; I think she just used Wikipedia a lot. 

"I get bored," Julie deadpanned, and went back to eating.

"Yes, tell us!" Ned was stroking his glass of wine in a way he had not stroked me in a long time. I had a twitch of longing inside of me, but I was able to appease it by having more of my wining. Ha ha ha, so long lovelornness! 

"It's a saga. The fisherman is searching for himself among the waves, for many years. Then, he meets a mermaid, and he realizes she is who he has been searching for," the Writer told us. I had a mental image of the story, which I can't say wasn't influenced by Disney a tad. 

There was a silence that lingered. Ned cleared his throat.

"That's it?" He sounded disappointed. Poor Ned, always building up his hopes to reach the sky. 

"So far!" the Writer grinned. He had very nice teeth. They were yellow, somewhat, but they were nice. 

"Well, to finding your inspiration!" It was a spur of the moment idea. We lifted our glasses in the air and clinked, including one glass of milk. It was, after all of that, what had brought the Writer into our lives and then onto our porch.

He was with us for for a while, the Writer. And it was a good while. I awoke and went downstairs, adjusting my robe, to find him outside sitting on our front porch. Writing. I thought he might sleep indoors, but he was perfectly content in Julie's old sleeping bag.

"This suits me well," he insisted. "I once slept on very little in Africa. I was 19 and thumbing my way through the world. What a life!"

"I had a similar experience on Black Friday," I retorted. Then, as if Ned was there himself, I felt stupid. 

He really was low maintenance, that writer. But I don't think taking in a writer is like taking in a homeless or malnourished cat. But maybe it is. Even Julie found him perfectly interesting, like a charming table decoration. 

"What about your asthma?" I had asked her. She coughed. 

"I can get over it!" What a little trooper she was. She belonged in a Johnny Cash song.

Ned and him got along, too, from what I can tell.

"It's nice to speak of someone with substance for once. I started reading one of his novels. He's a master of minimalism." Ned took off his black socks and crawled into bed besides me. Sometimes he felt like a stranger; that was one of those times. "Good night Clarissa."

"Grrjrrjrjr." I made a noise and turned off my light. 

I should tell you that I loved Ned, but I clung to him kind of stupidly. There was a boy in high school I loved very much. His name was Dan. Apparently, I go for guys with three letter names. If I added the Joe and Ted I also dated at one point, this would give you more circumstantial evidence. I knew Ned wasn't always very nice to me, but sometimes he would make up for it, and in those times I was convinced he loved me more than anything else and that Julie wasn't a mistake of a faulty condom. And I am a woman that is delirious to be loved. Delirious. 

Oh, and Dan left me for a Chinese girl. I think it was a fetish? I don't know, I don't think about it often. I said I was willing to dye my hair black, too. 

A month came and went and he was still with us. Joining us for dinner, providing conversation, writing away like a man possessed. At least, I think that metaphor applies here. 

"Would you like to come to Target with me and get some groceries?" I finally asked him, one Monday afternoon when I was bored and no one else was home. Julie was at some school function and Ned was at work. Normally I appease myself by watching Oprah and arranging my magazines, but it was too nice of a day not to go out. Besides that, I needed crackers and some pantyhose. 

"Hmm, what is this Target?" the Writer said and then I realized, he may have travelled the world, gone throughout the state, and never encountered what clearly God him or herself declared the BEST STORE EVER.

"You should just get in my car. Leave your writing here." He obeyed me, and I was floored by that. Sometimes I would tell Ned to put the lid of the toilet down, and he would not do so, and that dismayed me. 

We drove to Target and I made him listen to my David Bowie CDs from 1990. Not one sarcastic comment, either! I admired the Writer, this way.

"Isn't 'China Girl' the best thing you have ever heard? Oh my god, it so is, don't tell me otherwise," I said to him, getting caught up in the glee of the moment.

"Well, the best thing I have ever heard, my lady, is a concerto in Vienna. But if you'd like to believe this is so, well, good for you!" he chimed. If there was confusion in that statement, I chose to ignore it.

"SO GOOD," I turned the volume up. 

We went through Target together, the Writer and I, and I explained to him every nuance of the store I could possibly think of. The next best thing, I realized, would be watching Oprah with him. It was like having one of my old girlfriends back in the picture. They all have more kids than I do and C-section scars. 

"There's no music playing in this store, please note," I told the Writer as I led him to the frozen foods. 

"Is that something of importance?"

"Well, to some."  I also made him push the cart. I am telling you this because he was very strong and I am not so much. "Where do you get your food at if you don't go to places like Target, by the way?"

The Writer slumped his big shoulders.

"High end organic retailers." And that solved that enigma. 

"Do you think you will put this in your book?" I was hopeful! Maybe this would lead to some kind of art. 

"No, but it is an interesting change of scenery." Dismayed I was, I kept my mouth shut, nonetheless. 

We came home, several bags later. The Writer was puzzled that I needed so much pantyhose. I tend to get rips a lot.

"Why?" he had creaked when we were in the check out aisle.

"You should just deal and not ask questions," I replied. The Writer smirked at me.

"I like it when you act sassy, my lady." Sassy. I suddenly felt like a film heroine of old. Or Katie Couric, pre-evening news. I walked with a swagger, then. 

"You should join me out on the porch," he later invited like it was actually his porch and not one he was simply renting from me and my family. The screen door was open and I could see him lazed out there, pen in one hand, cigar in the other. I crumbled my face. 

"I don't know..." Why was I so lukewarm on it? It wasn't like he was Leo Thurpold in ninth grade and trying to get his hand down my underwear.

"It's a gorgeous day!" Well, it was a gorgeous day. Meekly, thinking "if I don't make dinner tonight, there is a semi-decent pizza shop nearby," I stepped outside.

I guess it was a very intimate thing, for him to invite me to his creative space. God, I had not heard of him, but he could have been a man of greatness. And this could have been an epic event. 

"Would you like a cigar?" I was sitting down on a piece of wicker furniture. I used to have a deathly fear of wicker furniture (it far too much resembles cereal) but Ned made me get over it. 

"Um...." I fidgeted. Did I want a cigar? "Okay."

He handed me one. It was a brown cylinder and it kind of smelled bad. I examined it like the first time I had ever seen a penis, which was a long time ago, I don't really remember. My thoughts were "God that's a horrific thing." 

I played with it for a while before actually smoking it, even when he offered me a light and laughed at my refusal to acknowledge the whirring match before me. 

"Light it! Don't just play with it. Haven't you smoked before?"

I stared blank at him.

"Pot, but that was another life." And it was. I lit the cigar and smoked it with him. At first I did not understand you could not chew on the cigar and had to blow out of it. Once I perfected the art of the cigar, or whatever, it worked rather well with me. It was fun, to be honest. 

"So how's your writing going?" I wheezed. He ashed his cigar down on some fancy silver ashtray he had brought with him.

"Eh, I'm nearly finished. One last chapter and I will be gone."

"Gone!"

"Yes!" 

"To where?" He shrugged.

"I would say 'where the wind takes me' but that's a cliche, so I will just wherever's next." 

"Oh." I knew I was going to miss him. It was nice to have him around. Weird, but very nice. Like a dog that you didn't really own but just showed up anyway. I wondered if I loved him. Maybe I did. But I wouldn't dream of cheating on Ned. I had see Desperate Housewives one too many times. 

"I hope it's a good place," I offered. What a lousy thing to have to offer.

"Well, it will be no where near as nice as here, Miss. Everything's grown on me about this place- the porch, the husband, the daughter, you. That mailbox has so much character, too." He took one of his spare fingers and pointed it down at that mailbox I was too lazy/unmotivated to paint. 

"I need to paint it," I said to him. I realized afterwards how sad I sounded. Pathetic.

"Oh, don't. Let it stand that way. It's very William Carlos Williams." And:  what a funny name! 

"Hmmmmmmmmm." I blew more smoke. And we sat in silence and enjoyed our surroundings. I had taken more pride in my home, ever since the Writer arrived. I had seen it through a different perspective.

He had to go, a few days later. He just came in and said it to us, like that.

"I'm leaving! I finished my novel today. I should pour you all Scotch to celebrate." Then he shot a look at Julie, who seemed perplexed (that's a good word to use in Scrabble, for the record). "Except you, but we'll take a raincheck on that for the future."

"I like Kool Aid." She really did! 

"That's brilliant," Ned said. "You should give me some Scotch, I mean, we're all adults here. Save this one." He rumpled Julie's hair with his bear hand. I wanted to slap him for reasons unknown.

"Will you take any Scotch, Clarissa?" The Writer was looking at me with these big sad eyes then. They were so big. I was paralyzed; my throat seemed to close in on me. I swallowed, or tried to. 

"Um....maybe. Excuse me," I gagged and left. I climbed our stairs steadily, Julie and Ned as oblivious as ever. I went into the bedroom I had decorated in 2007 with the help of O magazine, my one and only. I laid out on the comforter and cried. Downstairs, they continued to celebrate, and no one was none the smarter.

He left shortly thereafter, waving at us all and leaving us with a fat check to divide upon his departure. It was very fat. That night, to celebrate it, we went to Chili's, and gosh darnit, I got a non-alcoholic cocktail to savor. 

As for his book, Ned read it and said it was not very good. It came out three months later. On the cover was a half-naked woman posed as a mermaid.

"Very popular in metaphysical circles," the cover sure read. I blanched and looked up the word in the dictionary, because it bothered me not knowing it. 

"I don't know if you want to read it," Ned warned me. "There's no pictures in it." 

Julie read it, but she liked it. I was concerned, you know, with the nudity on the cover and all. 

"Yes, but it's nothing I haven't seen at Janie's house before."

"What?" 

I never did see the Writer again. Or Mr. Writer. Or Writer Man. Sometimes, in my head, I referred to him as "Ned with Balls," but I wouldn't admit that to anyone. Oh, I just did. We moved out of the house several years later. Julie was in college, and we wanted something more low-maintenance. 

"It's going to be sad to leave this house behind," I thought outloud. I should never think outloud.

"Not really. It's just a house," Ned retorted. I sulked. The moving vans were in our driveway and our belongings were in them, ready to go somewhere smaller and simpler. "I'll be in the car." And off he went, putting a hat on his head, because Ned had absolutely no hair left. Maybe a strand or two, but really. 

The moving vans began to leave, one by one, hurrying off. Soon, it was just Ned and me, and Ned had fallen asleep in the car because I was taking too long. I found myself actually standing at the end of the driveway, inspecting the house the Writer had instructed me too, all that time ago. 

I thought for a moment I may have seen him standing there, observing it, hands on his hips. With a look on his face as to why we would ever want to leave such a lovely place. But then again, hadn't he left? 

Ned honked the horn twice. I had something in my eye, and left with the smell of cigars still somehow entrenched in my nostrils. 

"C'est la vie," I said, upon getting into the car. I wasn't sure why I said it. I never spoke Spanish, in most situations.

"You mispronounced that, I think, Clarissa," Ned's voice sleepy voice rattled. 

We drove to our new house in silence. And it was far, far uglier than the other one had ever been, before or after my encounter.

- 

I am not sure what this means, if it means anything, but it was fun to write and I wrote it in a day.


also, I realize the alcohol thing may cause a paradox. eh.