Fading With Time

Chapter 9

Plots and Plans

                After Elizabeth returned to the living room put together and ready to tackle the project, she found Jan making a list of her own.  Wandering over to see what she was up to Elizabeth was interrupted by knocking at her door.  Jan shrugged her shoulders not knowing who it was either.  With slight trepidation Elizabeth answered it breathing a sigh of relief when she saw Dewy on her porch.

                “I brought a crew up to fix your back door and put in temporary steps.  When you have time, I brought along a rough draft of the outbuilding for you to look over as well.”  He stated holding up a paper roll for her to see. 

                “I’ve got some time now if that works for you.  Jan and I have a project of our own to get started but we haven’t begun yet.  If it’s not going to take too long I can take a look before we get busy.”  She offered earning an eager smile in return.

                “Sure thing, just let me get the guys set up and I’ll be right in.” 

                “Sounds good.”  Elizabeth made sure to keep her tone professional when talking to him.   She didn’t think he would make a move on her but not personally knowing him herself it was better not to test her theory.  If she set clear boundaries at the start hopefully there wouldn’t be any further complications where he was concerned.  Of course, it also helped that Jan was there as well.  She felt a little less uncomfortable dealing with him and his crew since she wasn’t alone.  Heading back over to the couch where Jan had set up a temporary office for them she explained what was going on.

                “Sounds good.  Better to get it out of the way now than be interrupted when we’re in the middle of everything.”  Jan conceded making Elizabeth feel better about delaying the project start.

                “Exactly what I was thinking too.  So, what are you up too?”  She asked curiously, leaning over to take a look at all of the papers strewn over top of her coffee table.

                “I’m making a list of everything we will need to set up to keep a steady pace.”  Jan told her handing over the paper with her list of items.  Elizabeth looked it over impressed with how much she had gotten done while she had been getting ready.  Picking up a pen she added her own notes of things she would need as well before handing it back to Jan.

                “Where are we going to set something this big up?”  Jan asked absently as she looked over Elizabeth’s additions to the list.  Elizabeth flopped back on the couch in frustration mentally going over her houses layout to see what would work.  The second floor would have been perfect but at the moment it was cluttered with all the unworked pieces from the attic.  The studio she had set up in the second room on the first floor was too small for both of them to set up in.  Jan fell back against the back of the couch next to her staring at the ceiling above them.  The two of them sat in quiet contemplation before Jan sat up with a smile lighting her face.  “What about the attic?” 

                “The attic?”  Elizabeth thought about it for a moment realizing Jan was right.  It had more than enough room for the two of them to set up everything they would need.  “That’s actually a pretty good idea.”  She admitted bringing out a smug smile on Jan’s face.  Elizabeth laughed at her just as Dewy came into the room.

                “Is this a bad time?”  He asked looking at the two women and the mess of papers in front of them.

                “Not at all.  Let’s have a look at what you’ve come up with.”  Elizabeth waved him over as Jan excused herself to make a phone call.  Elizabeth watched her curiously but turned her attention back to Dewy when he took Jan’s vacated seat.  Rolling out the paper he was careful not to disturb their work as he did so.  Elizabeth leaned over the paper looking over what was on it.  In truth she didn’t really understand what she was looking at.  While she got the general jist of a building most of it made no sense to her.  She said as much making Dewy laugh.

                “Here I’ll go over everything.”  He offered and began the task of translating his blueprint to something she could understand.  By the time he was done they had made a few changes here and there to the design.  They had decided to have one large area where all the furniture coming in would be stored for now.  She would later use the room for exercise equipment.  Transforming the main room into a top of the line home gym.  Originally there were going to be two other rooms, but Elizabeth decided that perhaps four would be better.  The idea had come to her when she had thought about the set up they had going on the second floor of her house.  She could use one room for each person’s belongings.  One for her dad, one for her brother, one for what would hopefully be her mother’s things, and one for anything she had left behind when she had moved out herself.  She had also decided to make one full wall that would run down the east side of the building a wall of windows.  That way each of the four rooms would have plenty of natural light to see by and would add aesthetics to the rooms they would become later.  She knew she wanted one for a steam room and one for yoga, but she was still undecided on the other two.  She would have plenty of time to decide as she went through things though.  She was honestly more excited for the home gym/spa that the girls could all use than she was for the pending memories that would be there soon.  Just as Dewy was rolling his blueprint back up Jan came back into the room.

                “I’ll get to work on this tonight.  It’ll take a couple of days, but we should be ready to get started on it then.”

                “Sounds like a plan.”  Elizabeth walked him to the door before coming back and telling Jan all about her future plans for the building.  Jan nodded her approval telling her that she would end up with the girls coming over more than she could handle once it was done.  Elizabeth didn’t think it would be possible but kept her thoughts to herself.

                “What were you up too?”  She asked instead interested to know who Jan had been talking to.  Jan laughed at her but gave in.

                “I was enlisting Clayton for the day.  He’s off today and we’re going to need help getting everything up that ladder.”  Elizabeth looked at her for a moment before shaking her head at the teasing light glittering in Jan’s amber orbs.

                “He told you about the box incident didn’t he?”  She accused setting off a round of giggles from her friend.

                “It may have come up.  Although it did make it easier to get him to agree to help us when he feared you might take out one or both of us.”  Elizabeth snorted in indignation at the thought.

                “That’s not fair.”  She pointed out causing Jan to raise her hands in surrender.

                “Hey, I’m not going to argue if it gets us someone else to do the heavy lifting for us.”  Jan pointed out.  Elizabeth sighed in defeat.  It would be nice if they didn’t have to spend the whole day getting equipment up in the attic.

                “Fine.  I give up.”  Jan smiled when all of a sudden she grabbed Elizabeth’s hand.  A slightly evil glint light up her eyes.

                “Should we really worry him?”  She asked making Elizabeth rise an eyebrow in question.  Instead of answering her Jan pulled her from the couch rushing the two of them into the makeshift art studio.  “Let’s move some stuff up to the second floor and make it look like we’ve started without him.”  She offered.  Elizabeth was about to argue but then she thought about almost being hosed on her front steps.  She had never gotten him back for that either.  Idea’s of flying boxes came floating through her brain.  A smirk pulled at her lips.

                “I’ve got a better idea.”