“Right…” Lucius swallows hard and returns to the door frame once more. “Well, I’ve found a place. A job that we might be able to do together actually. It will take a lot of work, but I think we can handle it. After everything we’ve been through, it’ll be easy.”
Now it’s my turn to fold my arms and turn fully toward him. “And what is this ‘easy’ thing that you’re beating around the bush about?”
“Well...I’ve found an apartment complex that’s up for auction,” Lucius explains. “The starting price is an absolute steal, and there’s unlikely to be any competition for it. I’ve got a friend, the owner of the company I interned at last summer, and he’s willing to co-sign on a loan for me and act as a guarantor.”
There’s so much information to digest that I don’t know where to start. My watch beeps, signaling that I really need to be walking out the front door right now.
“What do you think?” Lucius asks, spreading his arms in question. “Yay or nay?”
I shove my arms in the sleeves of my jacket and brush past him into the hallway. “What do I think? I barely know what’s going on.” I drop onto the sofa in the small living room and yank on my sneakers.
“Well, ask me some questions. I’ll answer anything you want to know,” he says, perching on the arm of the sofa.
“I don’t even know where to start,” I admit, untying my shoe and starting over from scratch. I don’t think I’ve ever been so flustered that I’ve forgotten how to tie my laces. Apparently, looming life choices is at the top of the list of things that rattle me. Just above airhorns, but below people face-timing in the middle of the grocery store.
“Can we talk about this when I get home tonight?” I rise from the sofa and dart into the kitchen. Thankfully, I had the foresight to prepare my breakfast shake last night and pop it in the freezer. It’s been defrosting on the counter since I woke up, and it’s absolutely perfect right now.
“The auction is this afternoon,” Lucius says, standing up straight. “I just found out about it yesterday, but you were...out...and you said you wouldn’t be able to check your texts until after. So I figured I’d wait until you came home...”
So that’s why he was passed out on the sofa when I slipped back into the apartment at two AM.
“I’m sorry.” I sigh, shaking my head slowly. “I’m still not used to having someone waiting up for me. My old roommate and I just sort of came and went whenever.” Casey moved out a few months ago and is well on his way to a storybook life now. I held off on getting a new roommate because I knew Lucius would be home soon.
Surprisingly, the few months of solitude weren’t as miserable as I’d thought they’d be.
Then again, I’m rarely home long enough to notice how quiet the apartment can be sometimes.
“Okay, just...bullet points then,” Lucius says, taking a deep breath. “Apartment complex, outside the city center. Up for auction at a crazy low price. I’ve gotten a friend to agree to help me with the loan. We buy the place and run it ourselves. Auction is today. Questions?”
“Yeah, about a million of them,” I scoff. “I don’t...I can’t...this is such short notice.” I start moving toward the front door with my shake and car keys in hand. I look back at Lucius and see him standing in the middle of the living room with a listless expression. Ever since coming home, he’s been going to non-stop job interviews and digging through every single newspaper listing for job opportunities. He’s been trying to play it cool, but it’s clear that he’s been getting a little demoralized. Every time I walk out the door, as the sole breadwinner now, he seems to get a little worse.
I have so many concerns. So many reservations. This feels rushed. What do we even know about running an apartment complex? Why is it up for auction? Why is it so cheap? What strings are attached to this loan? And those are just off the top of my head.
But…
“I trust you, Lucius.” I stop long enough to look him in the eye and offer him a sincere smile. “Whatever the future holds, we’ll face it together. Like we’ve always done. If this is what your gut is telling you to do, then let’s do it. I’ll follow you anywhere. You know that.”
Lucius’s expression brightens, and his brows lift. “There’s nothing we can’t do together, Lee. This is the opportunity we’ve been waiting for. I can feel it.”
2
Lucius
I’m an idiot.
I wake up with that thought on my mind just about every day. On the rare occasion that I wake up thinking about something else, I’m quickly reminded of my idiocy when I look at my surroundings.
Mattress on the floor, water-stained ceiling, and a layer of sweat so thick that it’s like I just stepped out of the shower.
I drag myself to my feet and look around my meager dwelling. Pale morning light streams in through the windows and illuminates the “bedroom” that I’ve been occupying for the last three months. Not for the first time, I regret dragging us into this mess.
That regret doubles when I emerge from the shadows of my bedroom to find the front door open and Leon standing just outside. He’s got a propane stove set up on the patio and is busily preparing breakfast, just like he has every morning since the power was turned off.
“You should add any dirty clothes you’ve got to the basket in the living room,” he says when he notices me. “I’m going to make a trip to the laundromat later today.”
I swallow the lump in my throat as I nod mutely.
The sound of construction echoes across the courtyard outside. I don’t have to look to know that the guys I hired to do dry rot repair are already hard at work on the East building. Thankfully, once they’re finished, all the structural issues should be handled for all three buildings. We might actually be able to move this project forward.
“The electrician’s already been by,” Leon says as he adds a few strips of bacon to the pan he’s using. “He said they’re nearly finished rewiring the North building. He brought the breaker boxes up to code, and they’re just buttoning up the last few things today.”
“Perfect.” I smile, my mood brightening a little. I knew going into this that the apartment complex I purchased sight-unseen would probably have some issues. And I knew there was likely some disrepair, but I hadn’t anticipated the level it would be at. Rats in the walls, dry rot, outdated and damaged wiring, leaky roofs, and more had plagued every inch of the building. The worst part was that people were still living in the three buildings when I bought it.
The extent of the repairs needed to fix everything meant they couldn’t stay, so I was forced to evict them all. That’s when I realized I might not be cut out to be a landlord. It really sucked. But they likely would’ve been evicted no matter who bought the place. The city had wanted the whole thing torn down. The bank wanted to sell it to a developer who was going to push it over and put in a condo or McDonald’s.
No one expected someone whose intent was to breathe new life into the old building. And it was definitely an old building. According to the city records, it was built when the city was first being established. It served as an early boarding house for people passing through the area and had evolved into an apartment complex by extension of that.