If You Left by Ashley Prentice Norton

Author:Ashley Prentice Norton
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

THE FOLLOWING WEEK, she dropped Clem at camp, and her black mood lifted. She didn’t know if she felt relieved because her days were free again or because, like all her moods, it left because it wanted to. They talked to Oliver every night, assured him all was well, so much so that Clem told him she wanted to wait before going into the city to visit, which Althea took as a small victory.

She decided to walk to town and try again at the hardware store. She hadn’t done anything remotely active for a while. It took a good twenty-five minutes to get there, but the exertion made her feel even better. When she opened the door, she didn’t dare go to the back, just went up front to the register. There was a friendly-looking older man with the name HAL stitched on his shirt leaning on the counter reading the paper. He looked up at her and smiled, the kind of smile that said he really wanted to be useful and sell her something, or maybe that he was just glad she was there. The store was practically empty. Everyone was probably shopping for cover-ups or sitting by the pool. No one wanted to buy hammers when it was eighty degrees out.

Hello, Hal said. Can I help you? She liked how he said Can I help, as if he knew she had other problems and was willing to listen. She almost said, My husband won’t have sex with me anymore and decided to spend the summer in the city because I fired our decorator who was trying to sleep with him, and I’m not sure how to rectify the situation; what do you think I should do? Surely Hal, who was no doubt happily married, would take pity on her and offer some avuncular advice. But she saw the bins of nails on the wall behind him and remembered where she was. Jesus, Althea, she said to herself. Get it together. She handed him the color strips.

I’d like to buy some paint.

What are you painting?

She explained.

You can’t just buy that amount of paint; we’ll have to order it. A painter usually takes care of that for you. Do you have one?

No. I mean, I was hoping you might recommend someone.

Sure. For bigger jobs, most people go to Aboff’s. But yours seems manageable. I know a good kid.

How old is he?

Twenty-one. He’ll be a senior at New Paltz. But he’s responsible. Shows up on time. Works hard. Doesn’t chat, get in your business, the way people do out here . . .

Could I try him out? Maybe have him do a baseboard or something? Just to make sure he’s good?

Well, that’s not really how it works. You hire someone or you don’t. If you want to know if they’re good, you check references. At least three. And then maybe go see their past projects.

She never checked references, which made Ollie crazy. Her theory was that people weren’t going to refer you to former employers who might say that they were dodgy, incompetent, or simply mediocre.

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