I couldn’t focus at work for the rest of the day. I cancelled the rest of my meetings and sat in my desk chair staring out at the city. I didn’t want to believe that Lowell could do what Ian suggested, but Lowell told me time and again how concerned he was about his financial situation. It was possible that he could do something like that to ease the stress. I didn’t really know him that well.

He tried to call me when I got home from work, and I couldn’t think of what to say so I just let the phone ring. I knew that he needed to talk to Sally at the Toolbox first before I could share any information that I knew. I decided to turn the phone off for a few hours and focus on myself instead. It was only a few hours, and I knew that I could talk to Lowell about it later. No approach seemed perfect, but it seemed like a reasonable plan to avoid a huge emotional scene. I didn’t want to risk exploding something that could turn out to be small into a massive rattling uproar.

After eating a sandwich and catching up with news around the city on the TV, I decided to make an inventory of the jobs that still needed to be completed around my house. Fortunately, no other disasters had appeared since I started dating Lowell.

I took three deep breaths when I thought about him again, and then picked up a small pad of paper and headed for the basement. I had a small leak in the basement on the wall underneath the stairs. I could trace the source of the water to a tiny crack. The moisture only appeared with heavy rainfall, and I was told that I didn’t need to have anything reconstructed, but it would require a professional patching job. I noted the problem down and inspected the rest of the basement.

After I was satisfied that there were no other glaring problems, I headed back up the stairs to the main floor. The dining room had a ceiling light fixture problem. The switch didn’t always work. I already changed out bulbs twice and determined that the problem had nothing to do with the bulbs themselves or how tightly they were screwed into the sockets. Instead the problem appeared to be in the circuitry somewhere. I added the issue to my list.

The roof leak was repaired. The problem was found in a seam where the roof changed direction, so that would not be added to my list. Instead, I still had the stain on my living room ceiling that needed to be patched or painted.

I continued my inventory throughout the house, and when I was finished I had eleven jobs that needed to be completed both big and small. I felt exhausted with the scope, but I was relieved that nothing new had happened in the last couple of months.

Returning to the kitchen to grab something to drink, I looked at my cell phone and then decided to leave well enough alone. I was feeling the most relaxed that I’d felt since having lunch with Ian, and I needed a few more hours distracted from the the issues with Lowell.

I sat down at my computer to enter my handwritten list into a to-do list app, and that’s when I saw the unfinished project I worked on the night before.

I wanted to surprise Lowell with an international trip together. I was looking at Costa Rica as a choice. I thought an exploration in the cloud forests with zip lines and hiking would be a perfect match for Lowell, and it would push me a little further in taking more risks. We had a recent conversation about passports, and he said that he had one that was still valid after obtaining it for a trip to Mexico just after college.

The trip was meant to be a surprise gift, so I didn’t say anything to Lowell in advance of working on it. So far I purchased plane tickets because they were on sale, and I knew the specific airline had a generous change of reservations policy.

I was looking at options for hotel reservations as the next part of the plan, and the screen was still up that I was searching the night before. Sighing heavily, I dug out the plane reservations, and I was set to cancel them when something in my gut said Not just yet. Hold off on that, Sven. Instead, I closed the window and ignored the trip plans while I typed in my list of household projects.

When I was finished typing on the computer, I noticed that it was only 8:00 p.m., but I was already exhausted. I decided to settle on the couch and turn the TV on. Before watching some random show, I headed for the kitchen to pull a beer out of the refrigerator.

I picked up my phone and turned it on briefly. It told me that Lowell had called twice more, but he didn’t send any text messages. I nearly pushed the button to call back, but I still wasn’t sure if I was ready to talk. Instead, I typed out a quick text message that just said:

I sent it and then turned the phone off again. I made a decision to make an effort at direct contact by either phone or text at 10 p.m. or when I decided to finally head upstairs to go to bed for the night.

With the beer in one hand and the phone in the other, I returned to the living room. I set the phone on the coffee table and pointed the remote control at the TV while I sipped at my beer. The cool liquid was soothing, and the mindless nature of the TV helped me relax. In less than fifteen minutes, I curled up on the couch and fell asleep.