Chapter 5

As I'd predicted, Davey made first string on the football team. That meant that almost every Friday night found Margie and I at the game, home or away. By the end of October, they'd only lost once so chances for playing for the AA championship looked pretty good. Davey's wizardry on the field was spotlighted in our local rag nearly every week.

But with Margie teaching, me working late hours on a new contract and Davey being at home on school nights, opportunities to wrestle under the sheets were becoming fewer and fewer. We kept making up excuses to be together and frankly, some of them were pretty lame but somehow Davey didn't seem to be any the wiser. Either he wasn't paying attention or he really didn't care or he was dim. None of those seemed especially likely.

Things took a sudden turn in November during a particularly severe cold snap. The overnight temperature had dropped to sixteen below and a lot of the community simply wasn't ready for it. Plumbers could practically name their own price as water pipes froze and burst around town (not that they didn't charge enough on a normal day). Ski season was already underway so the resorts were top priority.

My house did just fine but Margie's didn't. It was an old place to begin with; built around 1910. When she got home from school, she could hear water running somewhere and began dashing around trying to find it. When she flipped the basement light on and headed down the stairs she saw at least a foot of water flooding the basement floor. She was smart enough to call the city shops rather that a plumber, knowing the water would have to be shut off at the meter and getting a plumber right away might be next to impossible.

It was impressive how quickly they responded. There was a city truck there within fifteen minutes to shut off the valve. I arrived a few minutes later and waded around in the icy cold water looking for the break. It turned out to be one of the more common causes for a pipe rupture; nobody had unhooked the garden hose from the outside spigot. There was a two-inch split in the old black pipe just inside the wall of the foundation.

As I continued to look around the place, I could see that there was a lot more work needed than just the plumbing. The wiring was ancient. When I explained to Margie that her old family home needed to be re-plumbed and rewired from scratch, she was not a happy woman. The hundred-year-old place was probably in need of a total restoration and that meant she had to make a decision about whether she wanted to keep it or sell it.

"Well shit!" she hissed. "I want to keep it of course but what the hell are Davey and I supposed to do while all that's going on?"

I took her face in my hands and kissed her forehead. "You're supposed to move into my house. You're looking at probably four or five month's work so it's for sure you can't stay here while they're tearing into the walls and ripping out old pipes and wires. If you're going to all that expense, you'll want a new kitchen and all new baths as well. Look, I have a good friend who's a reliable contractor. I'll call him and have him come out and give you an estimate. Meanwhile, why don't you get yourself and Davey packed up and we'll get you settled into your new digs. If you decide to go with the restoration, we'll put the rest of your stuff in storage."

"Damn, I wasn't ready for this!" She started to sniffle and buried her face in my heavy sweater to let off some frustration by way of a few tears.

"I know it's disappointing, Babe," I said as I held her and rubbed her back. "But frankly, I'm looking forward to sharing my house with you and Davey. It'll be just like we're a family. Hell, we already have the same last name since you took back your maiden name and changed Davey's."