CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
On the Friday evening, almost two weeks after our fight and ensuing make up, Seth took me out to a new Ethiopian restaurant near Lincoln Square. We settled into a small table for two near the window. I set my clutch down on the white tablecloth and picked up the menu.
“I’m going to go wash my hands,” Seth said, getting up.
“All right.” I smiled at him over the menu and he grinned back.
Every time I set my eyes on him, my stomach did a flip. Every. Single. Time.
I perused the menu, studying the vegetarian and chicken selections. The dimly lit restaurant was getting into its rush hour. White apron clad servers hurried about, tending to couples and small groups of friends in hushed tones. On the other side of the window, headlights shone, making the leftover water drops from a summer shower glow.
The whole world was pristine and perfect.
Deciding I’d just ask the server what they recommended, I set the menu down and folded my hands on the table. Something buzzed. Seth had left his phone on the other side of the table. Its screen lit up, ringing away.
I looked around me, thinking I’d reach over and shut the phone off so it wouldn’t bother other diners, but no one seemed to notice.
“What did I miss?” Seth appeared over my shoulder.
“Your phone just rang.”
“Oh. Sorry.” He sat down and looked at the screen. “My mother,” he explained.
I couldn’t help but smile. “That’s sweet. What do you think she wanted?”
He nodded. “She calls every once in a while to check in.”
“You can call her back if you want. The server hasn’t even come over yet.”
Seth waved the offer away. “No, it’s fine. What are you having?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never had Ethiopian. I was thinking I’d take a suggestion from the waiter.”
His phone began ringing again. He grabbed it from the table then silenced it and put it in his pocket.
“Seth,” I slowly said. “Maybe it’s important.”
He looked uncertain.
A tall waiter came over. “Good evening,” he said in a smooth voice. “How are you doing tonight?”
We ordered drinks and entrees, then the server took our menus and left. Seth rubbed the back of his neck and looked out the window. He was avoiding looking at me. Was he worried about his mother?
“Just go call her,” I said, a slight sharpness to my words.
His eyes flicked toward mine. “All right. Fine. I’ll be right back.”
He cleared his throat and went across the dining room and into the hallway leading to the kitchen and bathrooms. I studied my bracelets while I waited, sliding the thin bangles up and down my wrists. Seth was too far away for me to overhear his conversation, and though I knew that was a serious moral transgression, I couldn’t help my curiosity. Seth’s mother might as well have been a ghost or someone off the page of a history book. He never talked about her. I knew she lived north of Chicago, but that was about it.
After a few minutes, Seth came back.
“Is everything all right?” I questioned.
He nodded. “Yeah… no.” He shook his head. “The water pipes burst in the basement, and the house is flooded.”
“Oh my God. That sucks.”
“Yeah.”
“Why did she call you? Does she need some place to stay?”
“No, the upstairs is fine. She just, ah, needs my help clearing the stuff out of the basement.”
“When are you gonna go?”
He looked at me and hesitated.
“You are going to go, right?”
“Of course I am. I just have to figure out when.”
“Well, the stuff is probably sitting there getting ruined. What’s down in the basement?”
He shrugged. “A lot of boxes. Some furniture.”
“You can go now. Let’s just cancel the order. I’ll come with you.”
I sat up straighter and looked for our waiter. Seth’s hand came across the table to lock down on my wrist. “No. That’s fine, Quinn.”
“But your mom’s stuff...”
He nodded. “I’ll go tonight. But let’s just have dinner first. I don’t want to ruin the evening for you. Plus, I’m starving.”
“Okay,” I conceded. “It sounds like you’ve got your work cut out for you.”
“I do,” he huffed.
“I can help. I don’t have to go to the office this weekend.”
His smile was tight. Forced. “No, I can’t ask you to do that.”
“We could drive up there and get it done all in one day.”
Seth took a sip of water and shook his head. “Really. It’s fine.”
I stared at him. “Seth...”
Seth’s lips pressed together. “All right… okay. Let’s go.”
It was ridiculous how relieved I was. “Great.”
“But you don’t have to.”
“I just told you I want to.”
He slowly nodded. “Okay… I’ll text her and let her know we’ll be there tonight.”
I tried to rush through dinner, but Seth took his sweet time, eating at a glacial pace and then ordering a second drink that he barely touched.
Leaving the restaurant, we swung by my house to pick up Starlet.
“I guess I should pack a bag,” I said, unlocking the front door.
“Yeah, we’ll stay in a hotel. I don’t want to burden her with guests. Let’s just get there and assess the damage. Maybe we can get it all done tonight.”
“Sounds good.”
I tossed the necessary stuff for one overnight stay into a bag and packed Starlet some dog food for the next morning. We climbed into Seth’s Jeep and set off.
“She doesn’t have anyone to help her out with this,” Seth said, keeping his eyes on the road.
“I’m glad we can go then.”
“She has friends, but they’re all… older women.”
“Makes sense.” I scratched behind Starlet’s ear.
“Since she and my dad got divorced...” He trailed off.
I looked at him with interest. “Yeah?”
He shrugged. “Nothing. She just doesn’t have a lot of people around.” He glanced over at me. “Thank you.”
I smiled slightly at him. “You don’t even have to thank me. It’s what I want to do.”
The drive took almost two hours. By the time we entered a quiet neighborhood of brick ranch houses interspersed with old fashioned two story white clapboard homes, it was nearly ten o’clock.
Seth pulled into the driveway of a two-story brick house. Solar lights placed along the front walkway lit up a rose garden and ceramic gnomes.
“Gnomes,” I commented. “Cute.”
Starlet woke as the engine cut off. She stood in my lap, stretching her back legs and looking around in interest.
Seth didn’t unbuckle himself or open his car door. “Maybe I should go in first.”
“Huh?”
“Just to see what the damage is.”
I stared at him. He wasn’t making any sense. “I think I can handle it.”
“Never mind,” he said quickly. “Let’s go.”
He got out of the car and came around to open my door for me. Starlet jumped down onto the pavement and ran for the grass to relieve herself. Seth took the lead, walking up the drive.
“Come on, girl,” I told Starlet.
Instead of knocking, Seth opened the front door and went right in. “Mom! We’re here.”
Anxiety seized me. I’m meeting a boyfriend’s mother. This kind of event wasn’t exactly a regular thing in my life.
I followed him down a carpeted hallway, rooms went off to the left and the right, shrouded in darkness. A well-lit staircase pricked at my curiosity. I peered around in interest at the place Seth had grown up.
“In here!” A thin, blonde woman appeared from one of the rooms at the end of the hall. She smiled at the sight of us. “Hello.” Her eyes fell on me. “Thank you for coming.”
I stepped forward. “Oh, it’s no problem. I’m happy to help.”
Seth spoke up. “Mom, this is Quinn. Quinn, this is my mother, Ellen.”
We shook hands. “Nice to meet you,” I said.
“So what’s the damage?” Seth asked so quickly his words nearly cut into mine.
His mother sighed heavily. “Well, the water is all gone now, and I got the boxes out that I could manage, but that darn couch is still down there, and there are those big boxes on the shelf. They didn’t get wet, but I’m worried about the dampness. You know, there’s the one with all the pictures from—”
“Let’s get started,” Seth interrupted. “So we can save everything.” He put his hand on Ellen’s shoulder and turned her around.
She looked over her shoulder at me. “Does your dog need some water?”
“I’m sure she would love that, thanks.”
We set Starlet up in the kitchen with a bowl of water and one of the chewing bones I’d brought for her then took the door that led from the kitchen down into the basement. The musty air hit us before we got to the last step. I wrinkled my nose and peered into the darkness. Ellen hit a switch and the basement flooded with light, showing a washer and dryer, a couch, and lots of boxes on shelves.
“I don’t know about the washer and dryer,” Ellen said.
“Have you tried them out?” Seth questioned.
“Not yet.”
“Don’t worry. If they’re broken, I’ll get you new ones.”
We went to work moving the couch out of the basement, which took forever. It was just a loveseat, but it was heavy with all the water it had wicked up. The stairs and doorway were so narrow that I wondered how the couch had gotten into the basement in the first place. The floor was still damp, so we set about mopping it up with old towels. Once they were all used, Ellen threw them into the washing machine, which, it turned out, worked just fine.
“Now those boxes,” she said, pointing up at the shelves.
“Are you sure?” Seth asked.
“Just the ones with the pictures. I don’t want the damp air to ruin them.”
He nodded, his face grim. “Okay.”
Seth stood on a chair and retrieved the boxes then handed them down to me. The three of us carted them upstairs and into the kitchen. The time above the stove read twelve forty-five.
Ellen sighed and sat down heavily in a chair. “Thank you for coming. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“It was no trouble,” I told her.
“Would you like something to eat? Or some coffee?”
Seth jumped in. “We should really be going. Thanks, Mom.”
“Well you’re not driving back to Chicago tonight, are you?”
“We’re going to stay in a hotel.”
“You don’t have to do that. There are rooms upstairs...”
“I already booked a room at the Hilton.”
I looked at him. When had he done that?
“Oh. All right then.” She pulled the nearest box on the table near her and opened it up. “Let’s see what’s in this one.”
Seth put his hand on my lower back. “We need to get going. I’ll call you soon, Mom.”
She nodded. “All right. Bye, Quinn. Thank you for your help.”
“Bye. It was good to meet you.” I scooped Starlet up.
Seth’s hand still on me, he steered me out of the kitchen and into the hallway. As we passed the dark rooms, I peeked into one and saw the shape of a fireplace. “What’s your old bedroom like?”
“My old bedroom?” He opened the front door and waited for me to go through.
“Your old bedroom is upstairs somewhere, right?”
We stepped onto the stoop, and he shut the front door firmly behind us.
“I would have liked to see your childhood room,” I explained, not liking how rushed I felt.
Seth shook his head at the ground. “No, you wouldn’t. There’s nothing there worth seeing. Mom’s gotten rid of all my stuff anyway.”
“Really? That’s too bad.”
“Yeah.”
His palm, which he hadn’t moved from my back since he put it there in the kitchen, pressed even more firmly, urging me forward. Seth set the pace, rushing us down the walkway and for the Jeep.
I glanced over my shoulder at the brick house. One upstairs window glowed with light, but the rest were dark.
We climbed into the Jeep. Starlet jumped down onto the floor and laid on top of my bag.
“When did you book the hotel?”
“What?” Seth rested his arm over the top of my seat and backed the Jeep out of the drive and into the road.
“When did you book the hotel? You told your mom that you already made a reservation.”
“I didn’t. I just don’t want to impose.”
“It seemed like she wanted us to stay. I don’t think we would have been imposing.”
Seth shook his head and put the car into drive. “I know she wanted us to stay, but it would have been stressful for her in the end, and she doesn’t handle stress well. Trust me. She would have had to get the room ready, then wash the sheets tomorrow… and she’d worry about us nonstop. She’d want to make us breakfast in the morning. Mom’s one of those people who runs themselves thin without trying to.”
“Hmm. Okay.”
His eyes flicked toward me, but he didn’t say anything else. We drove in silence for the nearest hotel, leaving Ellen and the house behind. I tried to ignore the strange feeling in my gut. I tried to tell myself I’d been reading Seth wrong.
Was it just me or had it seemed like he wanted to get me out of the house as soon as possible?
And when we first got there, when he suggested that he go inside first… that was just too weird.
Was he hiding something in that house?