floors underneath. Maureen had brought most of their house plants from California, even the ones she knew wouldn't survive the winter, and once the palms and ficuses were in place, once the spider ferns and hanging baskets were positioned in the corners and near the windows of the various rooms, the house looked 100 percent better.
It was Barry who discovered the sealed envelope in the master bedroom.
He was in the process of painting the inside of the closet and was dusting off the top shelf before applying his brush to it when he suddenly stopped and said, 'What's this?'
Maureen looked over from where she'd been painting the window frame next to the bed. 'What?'
He walked over, carrying a sealed business-size envelope. It was covered with a layer of dust and addressed to 'New Homeowners.' She took it from his hand. There was definitely something inside, a document or letter, and she held it up to the window, trying to see if the backlight would illuminate the envelope's contents.
'What do you think we should do?' he asked.
'I don't know. You think this was meant for us?'
Barry shrugged. 'We are the new homeowners. Although this thing definitely looks like it's been sitting around for a while.'
'Let's open it.' She ripped one end of the envelope and used a fingernail to pry open the stubborn paper. Inside was a note on plain white stationery, black ink in a man's sloppy, hurried hand.
We are not leaving voluntarily, the note said. You need to know that.
We are being forced out of our home. It could happen to you, too. For your own protection, write down EVERYTHING!! Names, dates, witnesses.
They're doing it, they're keeping track of all of it. Don't think they aren't. You'd better, too.
Don't let them see this letter. Burn it after you read it.
The note was neither signed nor dated, and Maureen looked up at Barry as she finished reading the message. It was confusing and didn't make a whole lot of sense, but the obviously earnest and paranoid tone gave it urgency and immediacy despite the layer of dust on the outside of the envelope. The feeling within her was one of unease. 'What is this?'
Barry shook his head, baffled. 'I don't know.'
'I don't think it was meant for us. It's obviously been sitting up there for a long time.'
'Maybe kids left it. You know, when we were little, my sister and I
buried a fake treasure map before we left Napa, hoping that whoever dug it up later would think it was real and try to search for the treasure.
Maybe this is something like that. A prank.'
'Maybe,' she said doubtfully.
'Well, what do you think it is?'
'I have no idea. But it seems totally serious to me. I don't mean that we should take it seriously, but it seems like whoever wrote it was dead serious and was trying to get across what he thought was important information.'
Barry took the note from her, glanced over it again. 'What do you think we should do with it?'
'Throw it away,' Maureen told him. She knew it was stupid, knew it was superstitious, but the idea of having that scribbled warning sitting in their house spooked her a little. 'It's old, and it's not even ours.
There's no reason to keep it.'
Barry nodded. 'Yeah. You're right.' He wadded up the envelope and note and tossed them both into the plastic garbage sack in the middle of the floor.
'Weird,' he said, walking back to the closet. 'Very weird.'
Other than that, the remodeling proceeded smoothly. The combination of high altitude and manual labor tired them out and led them to bed each night well before their usual time of eleven, but their days were full, they got a lot of work done, and gradually the house began to take shape.
Outside, they cleared brush, trimmed dead branches off the trees, and planted flowers and shrubs that Maureen bought at Corban's only nursery, a mom-and-pop operation adjacent to the Shell station. Under the lower deck, Barry found not only a working wheelbarrow but part of an antique plow, which Maureen strategically placed in the patch of dirt next to the driveway in order to give the front of the house a more rustic look.
It was their third Friday in their new home, and they'd been working on the sloping section of the lot on the north side of the house and were returning from one of their numerous trips to the dump when Ray Dyson flagged them down. The old man was walking down the hill as part of his afternoon constitutional, and Barry slowed the Suburban, rolling down his window. 'Hey, Ray.'
The old man nodded. 'Barry. Maureen. I was wondering if you two would like to come by for dinner tonight. Liz and I would love to have you.'
Barry looked over at Maureen, who glanced down at her filthy clothes, at the work gloves she'd tossed on the floor. She shook her head.
Barry smiled. 'I don't think so. Some other time maybe.'
'Come on. It's not anything formal. Hell, come as you are and wash your hands in our sink if you want. There's no standing on ceremony with us. It's just that Liz is making a batch of her spaghetti sauce, and we thought it'd be nice to have you guys over.' He looked at Maureen through the open space between Barry and the steering wheel.
'Save you from having to cook tonight. No work, no dirty dishes afterward. Come on. It'll be fun.'
That did sound tempting, she had to admit, and when Barry looked back at her once again, she nodded. 'All right.'
'Great! What time can we expect you?'
'What time do you want us?'
'Six?'
Barry nodded. 'Sounds good.'
'You know which house is ours, right? The redwood one you can see from your driveway. Twelve-twelve Ridge Road. Number's on the mailbox.'
'We'll find it.'
'See you at six, then.' Ray nodded to them, waved, and continued his walk down the hill.
Barry had been planning to start on a stump that needed to be dug out, but the afternoon was getting late and they were both tired, so they went inside to clean up. Maureen took a bath in the downstairs bathroom while he took a shower upstairs. He finished well before she did, and when Maureen emerged dressed and refreshed, she found him lying on the couch dead asleep, CNN blaring loudly on the television.
She quietly grabbed a few magazines from the coffee table and went upstairs to read on the deck, letting him rest.
They left the house at quarter to six. Barry had wanted to drive, but there was the beginning of a beautiful sunset, and Ray's house was close, less than a block away. 'You have to get out of that California mind-set,' she told him. 'There's no reason to drive everywhere. Especially on a gorgeous day like today.' She motioned west, toward pink clouds that ringed the setting sun.
'You're right,' Barry admitted. 'Habit.'
Even after all of their yard work the past week, both she and Barry were pitifully out of shape, and they were huffing and puffing as they walked up the hill to Ray's house. They slowed the pace for the last couple of yards, trying to catch their breath, and finally stopped to rest at the edge of the Dysons’ gravel driveway.
'Jesus,' Barry said. 'This altitude's a killer.'
Maureen took his hand, pulled him forward. 'Come on. My throat's dried out. The sooner we get in there, the sooner we can get something to drink.'
Ray had stopped by a couple of times to chat while they were working in the yard, but this was the first opportunity for either of them to meet his wife. Liz Dyson was a petite elderly woman with a sophisticated demeanor who seemed an odd fit with the earthier Ray, but after only a few minutes with the couple, Maureen could see how the two complemented each other, and she thought them a good match.
After some obligatory introductory chitchat, Liz brought glasses of wine, and Ray led them all on a tour of the
