I point off in the distance towards the road where a sign stands. Lonely, but not for long.
“What is that?” She squints her eyes.
“Sold,” I say.
She makes a face at me. “What?”
“It’s a sign that says ‘sold.’”
“Oh, no! Someone bought it?” She looks around, suddenly sad.
“Someone bought it all right. Me.”
“You? How? I mean, how did you get a loan so fast?”
“Loan? Come on, Daisy!” I actually laugh out loud. “Banks do not give loans to my family. I paid cash.”
“What? Vic, how much was it? Where did you get that kind of money?”
“It was… a lot. But still a good deal. I haggled them down fifty grand. So. A little over seven hundred.”
“Wait. Seven. Hundred. Thousand? Where the hell did you get seven hundred thousand in cash?”
“I’ve been saving for about ten years now. Plus”—I pause—“I have a little side thing going.”
“What kind of side thing? You’re growing pot? When I said greenhouse, I didn’t mean grow house.” She giggles a little at her joke.
“Not pot, don’t worry. Nothing like that. But it’s kinda hush-hush, so I’m not gonna talk about it too much. I started doing it a few years ago so I could fix up the mansion. The windows were horrible. I mean, that place is impossible to heat no matter what, but the windows we had—or didn’t have, in some rooms—it was almost uninhabitable. Something needed to be done. And one of my buddies had a thing going. So I got in on it.”
She stares at me for a long moment, smiling. “Vicious Vaughn. You are a property owner.”
“One day”—I hold up a finger—“I’ll even be a homeowner. And it won’t take as long as you think. I put in the order for the lumber this morning. Should get dropped off in a few weeks.”
“You’re going to build your own house?”
I shrug. “Why not?”
“I don’t think people do that. They hire a builder.”
“Yeah, but they overcharge you for everything. So this way is better.”
“Do you know how to build a house?”
“I mean… yeah. Sure.”
Daisy laughs. “Just like that, huh? ‘I’m gonna build a house.’”
“Not just me. Pops and Vann said they’d help too. The twins said they’d take extra clients so we’d have time to get the framing up before it snows. Then we’ll do what we can over winter, finish in the spring, and one year from now, Daisy Lundin, we will have a home.”
“We.” She whispers this word like she’s almost afraid to say it out loud.
“I’m getting a little ahead of myself. And who knows, maybe by next summer you’ll already be done with me. But you’re not tired of me yet, right?”
“No,” she says quickly. “No. I’m not tired of you at all.”
“Good. So.” I look around and shrug. “This is us.”
She walks over to me and my hand just knows what to do. It slips around her shoulder and pulls her towards me. And her hand seems to know what to do as well, because her fingertips find the belt loop at my hip.
“I brought us a picnic. You wanna eat lunch?”
She looks up at me like I’m her fucking king. “That sounds perfect.”
We spend the early afternoon eating the burritos I picked up and looking at the plans for the farmhouse in my magazine. It’s gonna be fun building a house with her. I can’t wait to get started. I have been looking at this piece of land for so long, planning, and dreaming, and wishing. And for a while it was about the money. I needed it, and didn’t have it. But I really did save up. I really did pay cash.
I’ve had enough cash for about a year now and still, I could not convince myself that I should buy. Not until yesterday when Daisy took a chance on my vision and decided to believe in my dream.
We talk, do not have sex this time—there’ll be time for that later since Vivi is still in Bellvue—and then, around two-thirty, I need to get back to town because it’s Friday night and that means I will have a shitload of clients. So we pack up, get back on the bike, and then I drop her off at home.
She kisses me goodbye for the first time ever.
And she tastes like the wind.
“I’ll be done around eleven-thirty. Want me to stop by?”
She kisses me again. And this time she whispers, “I miss you already.”
I am lit up with happiness after I leave Daisy’s apartments. I pull my bike right into the reserved motorcycle parking in front of Sick Boyz and enter my world of body art a wholly different kind of man than I was the last time I was here.
Belinda smiles at me from the front counter, busy with a group of people setting up appointments. I even nod to my twin brothers as I walk down the hallway towards the breakroom.