Episode 56: Homes (Rhyss)

Rhyss’s world was changing.

He liked change about as much as he liked stepping on old gum in the summer.

That wasn’t true. He loved the Emily changes. It was the Lavesque changes that didn’t sit right.

Right now he sat in his car, parked at that beach house, eyes on the bay, the view. This was going to be their home. He’d find her, he’d find their babies, he’d have this place as ready as he could by then.

Another car pulled up alongside his, headlights on the misty water.

Rhyss got out. “Hey,” he said to the woman who got out of the other car. She didn’t look threatening, but who knew what magic she could do. Rhyss kept his hands in his pockets.

“Gorgeous morning,” she said with a smile. “I can see why you wanted this location. Tear this old place down, replace it with something modern. Plenty of glass on the bay side. Gorgeous.”

Rhyss looked back at the house. It was faded and sagging and it was Emily’s. He wasn’t going to replace it with something ugly, he’d keep the character of this house intact.

“Yeah,” he said.

“You have the money?” she asked.

“Papers first,” he insisted. “I want to read them.”

He didn’t know anything about buying a house. He wanted to make sure this was real, not a robbery.

“Half the cash before you sign,” she countered.

He had anticipated that. It was why he’d come early, so he could hide the other half. That way if she killed him for the money she wouldn’t get all of it.

“Okay.” He pulled the bag of cash out of his trunk. “You can count it while I read,” he offered.

He passed her the bag and she passed him a clipboard full of papers.

They were dense. Full of words like party and guarantor and words he didn’t even recognize. He wiped his palms on his thighs one at a time so he didn’t have to put the clipboard down, and kept reading.

He watched the woman while he read, too.

It said a lot about this neighborhood that she counted the money out in the open and then sat on the boulder by the end of the drive with her legs crossed and the money beside her, taking in the view.

He loved that she felt safe here.

When he finished reading, he signed all eleven pages that needed his signature.

He didn’t write Rhyss Hartmann on any of them.

It was dumb, but he liked the way the cursive Z looked, loopy and important.

He passed the papers to her, and she read through them. He saw her eyes widen at the first signature.

It was the first time, but he knew it wouldn’t be the last, that he saw the force of power his name had.

“Pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Lavesque,” she said. She offered her hand to shake. “The rest of the cash?”

“The keys?” he asked. He wasn’t walking away without getting what he paid for.

“Money first,” she insisted. “I’m sorry, it’s not my rules.”

He probably could have blustered and asked what kind of person she thought he was, used his name to make her feel bad for not trusting him, but mostly he just wanted her to go away at this point.

“It’s in the house,” he told her. “I need the keys to get it.”

He watched her puzzle that out.

He guessed maybe she hadn’t ever heard of broken windows before, or guessed that an abandoned house might be full of them.

He sighed, and his shoulders fell. He didn’t want to be mean, he just thought it was funny. Obviously she didn’t. “I hid it in there so you couldn’t find it if you killed me.”

“You already have a key?” she sorted. Her eyes ran over the face of the house, searching for an explanation.

“I climbed in the window.” Something she probably never imagined a Lavesque doing. If he was stuck being a Lavesque he could at least make them seem a little more human.

Maybe he wasn’t making them human though.

For Rhyss, climbing in a window was a way to get something done. For a rich Lavesque, though, it probably came off as arrogant.

He was failing at this so hard.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he realized out loud.

He let her open the door while he hung back, far enough away that it wouldn’t feel like he was looming. He knew he was tall. She was a girl who had come here alone, he was a Lavesque…

He hated his name.

He should have just left all the money in the trunk of the car.

She came out with the second bag of cash, looking like she probably wouldn’t ever want to meet him again. Not that he cared, it wasn’t like he planned to buy a ton of houses. He didn’t like that he’d been rude without meaning to be. He was trying to be clever and survive and she was just trying to do business.

“It’s all here,” she said, like she wished it wasn’t so she could change her mind about the sale.

He’d really messed this up.

He didn’t know how to be a Lavesque and be himself. They were two different people.

“Will that be all, Mr. Lavesque?” she asked. She puckered her lips together and batted her eyes at him.

“Thanks for your help,” he said.

He didn’t know what else to say.

He was glad when she got in her car and left. Once her car had backed up the drive and pulled onto the highway, he turned and faced the house. He swung the key ring around his index finger.

It was probably the most important set of keys he would ever own. Their first house together. Not their only house together, because of the inheritance, but the first that was just theirs.

He climbed up the porch and went in the front door this time instead of the window.

Inside, it was old and tired, but he could see what it wanted to be. It had dark beams that ran wall to wall across the ceiling, and hardwood floors with patches of missing finish. The staircase was narrow and had old green carpeting that smelled bad from being wet too often, and the kitchen had a hearth with a wood-burning stove instead of a gas or electric one.

He could imagine the blue and yellow kitchen, windows intact, blue flowered curtains ruffling in the breeze off the bay. He could see the layout, sitting at that island in the kitchen and stealing cookies off the cooling rack while he and Emily talked. Her teaching him how to roll the dough and cut the shapes.

Upstairs, the two bedrooms took up each end of the house. Both had bay-view windows and low ceilings that made them feel cozy.

He loved it. He could see why Emily did too.

He wished she was here.

Soon; that was the next part of his plan.

First, he needed to take care of his mom, which required a second set of keys.

He left the house – locked it behind him even though the windows were smashed, and drove down the highway, out onto the peninsula, climbing and climbing the hills. The road stopped being a highway near the Lavesque houses, which were in one group about two-thirds of the way down the peninsula.

Today he drove past them, further along the peninsula, higher into the hills, until he came to the second-to-last house.

He drove up the steep drive and parked his car in the loop at the top.

He took the Sam’s assets keys out of the manila envelope and looked up at the giant house in front of him. It was white, with a pillared front porch that could have garaged about a dozen cars.

He got out of his car and looked around.

There could be someone here, or it could have magical protections against him.

He walked carefully onto the porch, keys in hand, and looked out at the yard. The grass had grown in, with some brush and a few small trees where it looked like there had been lawn before. There was a tennis court with grass growing up through the cracks.

Tennis. Rhyss wondered if he’d like it. If Emily would. He wanted to at least try it with her and see if it was fun or if it was as dumb as it looked.

He sorted through the keys and found the one that matched.

And then he was inside.

The house on the beach was falling apart.

This place looked like it had preserved everything from the last day anyone had been there. The air felt old, stale, but the house…there was food on the table by the door, a basket of real fruit. Not rotted at all.

“Hello?” he called.

He didn’t hear anything. He shut the door behind himself and walked further in.

Everything was clean and white and cold.

The views were gorgeous. – Ocean out almost every window, lower hills of the peninsula out the north-facing ones.

He followed the curve of the living room, with its white carpet and white couches and white tables, into a formidable black and red dining room with twin chandeliers that hung over an enormous black table.

From there, the house circled around toward the kitchen, which was a pastel blue with white cabinets and countertops.

There was a note on the counter.

From his mom, he knew the handwriting. It was addressed to Jill:

To claim the house and renew the wards, remember the baby’s name.

Not Rhyss, then. Anyone who knew them could guess that.

“Zach,” he said out loud.

Behind him, the refrigerator hummed to life. He heard the sound of the air conditioner clicking on, and out in the mess of a yard, sprinklers watered the lawn.

He smiled.

He’d done magic.

He hadn’t prepared the spell or anything, but he’d said the word that made it work.

He sat down at the white piano, which was bigger than his bed at home, and pressed one of the keys down softly.

Nothing happened.

He tried again, harder, and this time a tone rang out in the empty house. He didn’t know pianos worked like that. He pressed more keys. The harder he pressed them, the louder they played. He found sets of notes that sounded good together and other sets of notes that sounded like his mood.

He closed the lid and stood.

There was more house to explore.

The first floor, besides the living room, dining room, and kitchen, had a movie-viewing room with rows of dark blue chairs and a massive screen. There was another room, long, with a long table covered in miniature mountains, lakes, tunnels, train tracks, and a miniature town.

Rhyss pressed the black button on the end of the table. From the tunnel, a tiny old-fashioned black train engine moved around the track, looping around the giant table.

Trains. It was the least-expected part of today so far.

He made his way up the sweeping curved staircase to the second floor. There was a blue bedroom with trains and boats on the wallpaper and a little kid-sized bed and way more toys than Rhyss could believe he had ever owned. The bedroom was bigger than his whole house in Clovercrest.

Another bedroom, pink with frilled white everything, had obviously been Jill’s.

Up a short set of four steps was the final bedroom. It had windows with a panoramic view of the entire end of the peninsula. Open ocean on one side, Sylem on the other, the tip of the peninsula to the south.

He squinted. Sure enough, he could see his new house with Emily from here.

He waved at it, happy to see something so Emily in this place.

He went to the closet and looked at the rows of crisp dress shirts. They were all mediums, nothing that would fit him. It was probably the biggest proof of all, besides his owl, that Sam wasn’t actually his dad.

He went back down the stairs, this time into the garage, and looked at the row of cars, all classics, all in perfect shape.

Yes.

The keys sat in each car, waiting to be driven.

He picked the curvy grey one and got in.

He expected the battery to be dead, but like the fruit on the table the battery had been preserved by whatever that spell was.

He went back inside and got himself an apple from the bowl, and then came out to the car and backed it out of the garage, onto the drive.

Full tank of gas, amazing car.

His list of tasks for today: Get his mom. Get her settled in here. Go work on the beach house.

Then, tonight, start looking into the kidnappings in this city.

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