Her mother glanced up. “Obviously, Becca.”
Becca poured coffee into the remaining two inches of space. “And you ... aren’t surprised he’s in town?”
“Well, I suppose I should have figured he’d show up eventually.” Her mother started slamming the boxes back onto the pristine shelf, punctuating every other word of her sentence. “I just would have appreciated a little forewarning that he’d called you, you know, so when he confronted me and asked if I’ve, you know, poisoned your opinion of him—”
“Mom.” Normally her mother wasn’t quite this keyed up. “Are you all right?”
“No, I’m not all right.” Her mom flung pasta boxes into the cabinet. “First, a man I haven’t seen in years shows up on the doorstep, and then I discover that kids spray painted all over the front of the house.”
The coffee was burning her hands through the sides of the mug, but Becca kept a death grip on the ceramic. She’d been stuck on her mom’s comment about her father showing up, but now her thoughts went in a new direction. Was this retaliation for showing up at Drew’s party?
Her mom was still ranting, snapping yellow vinyl gloves onto her hands before grabbing a can of EASY-OFF. “I don’t know why these people think I have time to deal with the front of the house being treated like a highway overpass.”
Becca carefully set her coffee on the counter and turned for the kitchen doorway. She would just go see for herself.
She was almost running by the time her hand seized on the doorknob. She yanked at the door, ready to throw herself onto the porch to see the damage.
So she almost fell on top of her father, kneeling there with a paintbrush in his hand.
He looked the same, but sort of different, which was surprising enough. It was like looking at her mom’s old yearbook photos—still clearly the same person, just ... not. He was a good-looking guy, she guessed, with sandy brown hair that had yet to turn gray, though a few gray whiskers had crept into his goatee. His eyes were a steely gray she’d inherited, though his were deep-set over solid cheekbones. He was wearing some kind of uniform, khaki pants and a button-down shirt with patches on the sleeves, alternately reading Department of Natural Resources and Wildlife Control Division. A green truck sat in the driveway, a matching logo on the door.
“Easy,” he said. “The door’s wet.”
She jerked her hand away, though she hadn’t touched anything but the interior knob. A fresh coat of paint made the door shine in the early light. He’d gotten three-quarters of the way down, and she could just see the edge of a line of red spray paint near the base.
She stared at the door, as if she could somehow read what had been written through the beige layer of Duron.
Her father put the paintbrush in his left hand, then held out his right. “Bill Chandler. Nice to meet you.”
Becca scowled. “Hilarious.”
He pulled his hand back, then gestured for her to step onto the porch. “Pull that shut so I can finish.”
She was tempted to close herself on the inside. But she stepped onto the porch, careful of splinters, and pulled the door shut. Now, facing the house, she couldn’t see any graffiti, except the stripe at the bottom of the door.
She had no idea what to say to her father, so she stuck with the mundane, as if she saw him every morning. “Mom said it was all over the front of the house.”
“It was just the door. Your mom tends to exaggerate.”
That pissed her off. Her back straightened. “How would you know?”
He nodded, then dipped the brush into the paint can by his right knee. “You’re right.” He paused and glanced up. “She used to exaggerate. Does she still?”
Becca didn’t want to nod. But he was right. She stared out into the yard instead.
He brushed a stroke up the front of the door. “I left a message for you to call me.”
“I don’t return calls from complete strangers. You never know what they might be selling.”
“That’s true. Why take a chance, right?”
An insult was hidden there, she was sure of it. She frowned. “What do you want?”
“Right this second, I want to finish painting this door.”
“You think slapping some paint on the door is going to put you back in Mom’s good graces? Where’d you even get that paint, anyway?”
“Your mother had it in the shed. And I have no idea about her graces, good or otherwise. I just thought I’d help out while I waited for you to wake up.”