Cameron’s right eye, the one I could see, was beginning to twitch.
“Your neighbor on the left, Leilani, she makes these amazing windchimes, and there are, I want to say, twenty or so hanging on her patio, as well as in her trees. I’m sure she’ll be more than happy to move some to your patio or trees if you like.”
He made a noise in the back of his throat.
“Naheer, on your right, he keeps bees that produce the best honey you’ve ever tasted. He also has an enormous tabby named Oscar, who only has three legs. He wanders a bit sometimes, so if he pops onto your patio, just tell him to go home.” She laughed then, and it was a deep, throaty sound. “You know, of course, I’m talking about the cat wandering, not Naheer.”
“We did.” I vouched for Cameron too, since he seemed beyond speech at the moment. “I love all the trees; it’s like you drive through the front gate and right into another world.”
“That’s exactly how my mother wanted it to feel,” she told me. “The property originally belonged to my great-grandfather. Of course, it was a brothel back then. After that, it was a bed-and-breakfast, and then it was my mother who turned it into apartments in hopes of building a community of artisans. She’s the one who did the mural.”
“How do you keep the colors so vibrant?”
“Oh, we restore it every few years.” She leaned forward to put her hand on my shoulder. “‘We’ meaning my whole family descends on me and we get it done.”
“That’s nice.”
“It is,” she concurred and then pointed. “Here we are.”
We parked, got out of the car, and walked through a tall wooden gate painted to look like driftwood, then followed the path leading to the front door of the downstairs unit, the one she was showing to us. The path that jogged off to the left led to the stairs going up to the second-floor unit. I couldn’t help but notice most of the steps were littered with a variety of plants, which I figured could make them tricky to navigate at night, or with an armload of groceries, but then, they weren’t my steps, so I didn’t have to worry about it. “Cowrie and her husband, Niko, live there,” Agatha told us. “They’re a charming couple, both schoolteachers. Cowrie teaches social studies, and Niko teaches biology.”
“So more than just artisans here?”
She grunted. “Sadly, a lot of artisans have trouble paying rent.”
“Dear God.” Cameron was muttering under his breath again, and it took a herculean effort on my part not to laugh.
Agatha unlocked the door and ushered us in. The first detail to jump out at me was that the apartment was small, but I knew going in it was only five hundred and fifty square feet, including the patio, so I wasn’t exactly surprised I could see the entire apartment from the front door.
There was one bedroom, one bathroom, a hall closet, where Agatha said the washer and dryer hookups were, and a galley kitchen that extended to the back patio. There was a dishwasher, a bit more counter space with cabinets underneath, and a white, I was guessing granite, sink. The sliding glass door that led out onto the postage-stamp-sized cement pad was ancient—I had to lift it a little to get it to slide—and Agatha wasn’t lying about the vegetation; it was overgrown, but with plants rather than weeds.
The ceiling fans were oddly oversized, there were mirrors on the closet doors in the bedroom that had been there so long they were back in style again, and when we got to the bathroom, I couldn’t help but notice the toilet was one of those where the tank was suspended above the bowl that you flushed by pulling on a chain. I loved the pedestal sink, though the fixtures could stand to be replaced, and there were no cabinets or even a linen closet for storage. The mirror was definitely the room’s best feature, held to the wall by brushed chrome brackets molded to look like art deco gargoyles.
I couldn’t stop smiling. Cameron was clearly overwhelmed, but not in a good way.
“Are these hardwood floors original?” They were in great condition if so.
“Yes! As is the tile in the kitchen. My grandfather stole it from Rudolph Valentino’s house when they renovated it after he passed.”
I nodded. Cameron whimpered.
“Full disclosure”—she stepped in close to me, slipping her hand around my bicep—“the last tenant…she didn’t fit in here. Always complaining about the pagan holidays we celebrate, or how often we have communal cookouts and potlucks, or the Friday night movies in the parking lot. We use the side of units nineteen and twenty for the screenings.”
Of course they did.
“Now, I have to tell you, I’ve saged this place five or six times since the tenant left, but I still feel her sticky energy in here. I can do it again, but I suspect you boys moving in will send the last of it packing.” She smiled at us. “Negativity can’t remain where there’s clearly love.”