WATCHING BRAD
Part 200
We had done our best throughout the entire weekend trying to prepare Jeremy for the moment that Brad would have to leave for work on Monday morning. When that moment finally arrived however, when Brad climbed into his truck at seven o'clock and drove away, Jeremy stood beside me near the drive, holding my hand and watching until Brad's truck turned onto the road and disappeared from sight. And then he stood there for a minute or so longer.
I was just about to switch myself into serious ‘Daddy' mode and deal with the situation when Justin, who was holding my other hand, leaned forward and looked around me at his brother. "He promised, Jeremy. Daddy Brad won't lie."
Jeremy continued staring down the driveway for a few moments longer before looking up at me. I thought perhaps he would hold me responsible once again for Brad going away but he didn't. "He'll be home for supper, my Sonskyn," I told him.
Jeremy said nothing in response but his eyes made it clear to me that he had adopted a ‘wait and see' attitude. I suspected he would doubt our words until he saw his Daddy Brad home later that afternoon.
Fortunately, Jeremy became distracted when Terry showed up that morning and he and Justin began telling her all about the fun they'd had the day before running around the back yard and swimming and playing in their ‘underwears'. Dad listened intently as he had the other forty-seven times the twins had related their story since the afternoon before. Mom and Lindsay were quite bored with it, however, and couldn't be bothered listening to it anymore.
The first thing I did when I got to work was to phone the architect and make an appointment to go see him about the changes to the house we wanted to make. I'd taken a copy of the house plans to work with me. I was told that I could see him any time between ten and eleven o'clock. I was there promptly at ten and got in to see him almost immediately.
"My secretary tells me you tried to burn down my bathroom," Trevor grinned as he shook my hand in greeting.
"Actually," I replied without a grin, "your bathroom was practically the only thing left standing."
Trevor's face dropped. "Oh, geez," he said apologetically. "Me and my big mouth. I'm sorry. Was it really that bad?"
I nodded my head. "Pretty-much totalled," I told him.
His face became awash with sympathy. "Shit. That really sucks. I hope you can forgive me."
"Forgiven and forgotten," I told him. "But that's why I'm here. We bought some plans to build a new house but there are a few changes we'd like to make to it. I'm hoping you can do them for us, and we're kind of in a rush."
"So, you don't even have a house now?"
"Nope. We're living with my parents just outside of town."
Trevor became all business then, pulling his shoulders back and taking a professional stance. "Right. Are those the plans?" he asked, nodding toward the cardboard tube tucked beneath my arm.
I handed him the tube. He took it and popped off the lid and began pulling out the plans as he walked toward a drafting table. I followed him. "Right. Let's see what we've got here." He unrolled the plans onto the table and weighted down the corners to keep them flat. His practiced eyes quickly scanned the floor plans as his index finger traced a few of the lines. He nodded his head as he did so. "Nice," he said softly. "Very nice." He turned his head toward me and our eyes met. "So, what do you need done?"
I quickly explained to him that I wanted the stairway changed from a curved staircase to L-shape with a landing at the elbow.
"Easy enough," he said. "Anything else?"
"I want to know how hard it would be to put a small basement under the diningroom here," I explained as I pointed, "and I want to know if this closet under the stairs can be turned into a stairway down. I want the stairway to be wide enough for us to get a freezer down there."
Trevor scanned the plans again. "Yes and yes. Finished basement?"
"No," I replied, "but I want it wired and drained."
His finger scanned the plans and he nodded again. "Right. I can hook you up to the weeping system no problem. The wiring would be up to your electrician. I assume you want the basement head height?"
"At least."
Again he scanned the plans. "I can give you two metres no problem. Any more and it will take a bit of finagling."
"Two metres is plenty," I told him. "It's just for storage."
It was done. Trevor quoted his price and, because of his little gaff earlier, assured me that it was a quick and simple job and he promised to have the plans done for pickup by Friday at the very latest. His secretary would call me if they were available earlier.
With that little chore finished much more quickly than I had anticipated, I phoned Terry and told her what I wanted her to do, then went back to work until the appointed time. Terry was waiting in the parking lot for me when I went out and we exchanged keys as we had planned. She handed me the keys to the van and I gave her the keys to my car. The bags she'd packed at my request were on the front seat. She left me there and set off back to Maple Grove where she would drop off my car and pick up her own car, and then she would take the afternoon off - with pay, of course. I drove the van to the soccer camp to pick up Justin and Jeremy. They didn't know it, but they would be spending the afternoon with me. Heck, I didn't even know it until an hour or so before. I was making it all up as I went along.
The twins were excited to see me and came tearing across the soccer field toward me with Justin in the lead. Lindsay came over as well, walking beside Daniel who was carrying both of their lunches. I knelt to meet the onrush and the twins greeted me with lots of hugs and kisses and plenty of excited chatter before Lindsay and Daniel arrived.
"Hi, Dad."
"Hi, Sweetheart. Hello, Daniel."
"Hi, Mr. de Villiers," came his reply.
"How would you guys like to go to dinner with me and the boys?" I asked, still kneeling with my arms still wrapped around the twins.
"We have our lunches here," Daniel said as he held them up.
"You can eat them later," I told him. "Do you have a cell phone to call your parents and ask if you can go with us?"
Daniel just shook his head back and forth. "That's okay. I don't have to ask."
I reached into my pocket for my cell phone and handed it to him. "I'd rather you call and get their permission. Sweetheart, could you show him how to work the phone, please? I'm going to get the boys changed."
As the twins undressed in the back, I sorted out their clothes from the bag Terry had packed and handed them to my sons. Then, as they got themselves dressed again, I talked to Daniel's mother to affirm her permission to allow Daniel to go with us.
Pizza was the unanimous decision so off we went to a place I knew which served individual slices. The kids could select all their favourite toppings. We went to a nearby Dairy Queen for an ice cream dessert after which I dropped Lindsay and Daniel off for their afternoon session at soccer camp. There would be only four more afternoon sessions before the camp wrapped up for the season. With Justin and Jeremy safely buckled in their car seats behind me, we set off for the grocery store and to what I hoped would be a happy surprise for Jeremy.
The twins knelt in the basket of the shopping cart as I pushed it into the store, past the checkout counters at the front, and toward the deli at the far side of the store. There was only one other customer at the counter - a young woman carrying one of the store hand baskets - when I steered the cart around the various shelves of bread and rolls and pastries. I moved the cart beside her and stopped. Brad's broad back was facing us as he shaved paper-thin slices of meat from a slab of roast beef. Justin and Jeremy were too busy peering through the thick glass at the large variety of deli meats and cheeses to notice him.
A young lady, dressed in the same uniform as Brad, was wiping clean the sliding carriage of the other slicer. She was shorter than Brad, but not as short as David. Her hair was long and pulled back in a pony tail. It was only slightly darker than Brad's hair. Like Brad, she wore a hair net on her head and a store baseball-style cap. She quickly finished her chore and approached the counter saying, "May I help you?"
"We're just waiting," I said softly and nodded toward Brad.
She glanced quickly at Brad and a cheerful smile split her face. "Oh, I know who you are. You're. . ."
But I cut her short with a touch of my finger to my lips. She glanced at Brad again, then back to me and touched the side of her nose with one finger. She understood. She then turned her attention to my sons, standing up on her tiptoes so she could see them over the counter. "Oh. Aren't they just adorable."
"Thank you," I replied softly and, just as I did, Brad scooped up the shaved beef from the slicer and turned around to place it on the scale atop the counter, weigh it, pack it in a small plastic bag, attach the price label, and hand it to the young lady with the grocery basket. He didn't notice me standing there.
"Will there be anything else?" he asked politely. His smile was professionally friendly and enough to send a rush of blood into my nether regions.
She quickly replied, "That's all for today, thank you."
But Jeremy had recognised Brad's voice and was scrambling to his feet in the cart even as she spoke. The woman was just taking the package from Brad's hand when Jeremy shouted, "Daddy Brad!!"
The woman beside me jumped, almost dropping her package, but then she quickly composed herself and made her exit. By that time, Justin was also standing up in the cart beside his twin brother. Brad beamed at the kids. "Hi, Jeremy. Hey, Justin." He added a simple ‘hi' to me as well.
"Sharon, this is my husband, Ted," he proudly told the store clerk standing beside him, "and these are our sons. This one is Jeremy and this one is Justin."
Sharon's hand stretched over the counter, offering it for me to shake, which I did. "It's so good to finally meet you," she said politely. "Brad's told me all about all of you." She rose once more to her tiptoes and looked over the counter. "Your daughter not with you?" she asked.
"No. She's at soccer camp," I explained. "I thought the boys would like to see where their other father works. I hope you don't mind."
"Oh, of course not," she said with a wave of her hand. To Brad she said, "I'll clean up for you, Brad." To us, she said, "It was so nice meeting you."
"The pleasure was all mine," I smiled.
Brad leaned his arms against the countertop looking down at the boys and smiling. "How was soccer?"
Justin replied, "Fun!" but Jeremy said, "Can I stay with you?"
"I'm afraid not, Champ," Brad told him. "I'm working and you're not allowed to come back here."
"Okay," Jeremy mumbled with undisguised disappointment.
We had to step back a bit then and wait as Brad tended to a customer. Jeremy's eyes were locked on him, watching his every move and marvelling anew at a process he had seen done many, many times. Somehow, though, it was much more interesting to him as he watched his Daddy Brad doing it.
As we waited, Sharon peered over the counter and distracted Jeremy long enough to ask, "Do you boys like pepperettes?"
The boys looked at me. "Do we, Daddy?"
"I don't know that they've ever had them," I told Sharon.
She slid open the glass door behind the counter, grabbed a pepperette and broke it in half, handing each of my sons one of the pieces. They thanked her in tandem. Jeremy's attention immediately returned to Brad as he absentmindedly munched on his half of the pepperette. Justin, on the other hand, took one tentative bite and chewed slowly, then spun around to face me with a very satisfied smile of approval on his face. He held out his pepperette for me to take a bite. I returned his smile of approval.
We didn't stay much longer after that. Brad had work to do and so did I. I had only taken Jeremy there so he could see for himself that Brad hadn't abandoned him yet again. Ultimately, when Brad came home for supper later that afternoon as he had promised, Jeremy's ‘wait and see' attitude disappeared and didn't return.
Before we left the store, I bought some honey ham (which Brad sliced for us), some pre-sliced Swiss cheese, some cheese rolls from the bakery department nearby, a small tub of margarine, and a squeeze bottle of mustard in case the twins started feeling peckish later in the afternoon. Oh, and I bought a dozen pepperettes to wash down the sandwiches.
Justin and Jeremy played quietly on the floor of my office with the toys I'd asked Terry to pack for them. Twice, when they thought I wasn't paying attention to them, they snuck out of my office and skedaddled to JWs office to get a treat from his candy bar drawer. I'd already talked to him about keeping their sweet treats to one bar to share and he said he would. The last thing I needed was for them to be bouncing off the walls in my office and around the shop.
David joined us for supper that evening. He'd spent the day working in the back yard at the house with Mark and had brought a change of clothes so he could accompany me and Brad when we went to hire Grant to build our new house. I'd called Grant on Sunday before David and Brook went back home to Toronto. We set up the appointment to meet at Grant's house at eight o'clock.
We arrived at the scheduled time to iron out details and to make the final arrangements. We would also discuss a few concerns I had, the most important of which was a question I had once asked of Grant and used his response as an excuse for not building the big house. I asked the question again, hoping that his response might change to the affirmative. "Are you sure you can't finish the house by Christmas?"
His response was immediate and abrupt. "Yes," he said, his head bowed slightly. "I'm sure."
My heart sank and my shoulders sagged. "I was really hoping you'd be able to so our kids would be in their own home for Christmas."
Grand just smiled mischievously and looked at me from beneath his bushy eyebrows. "Well, now. I didn't say they wouldn't, did I?"
I was stunned and confused. "But. . . but you just said. . ."
"I know what I just said, Ted," he added, cutting my sentence short. "I told you I couldn't finish your house, but I didn't say anything about not getting you inside it in time for Christmas."
Now I was stunned and confused and completely baffled. "I'm sorry. I don't understand," I told him bluntly. "How?"
Grant leaned back into his chair and sucked in a deep breath before speaking again. The corners of his lips were still curved up in that mischievous little grin. "The builder I intend to use won't be completely available to do any serious building until well into September. Maybe even early October, depending on the weather. Until then, he can only send in a skeleton crew which can at least get the foundations poured. Cam charges a bit more than usual, but his work is exceptional and he's worth every single penny extra. His father started the business just after World War Two in 1946 and Cam's been running it since the early eighties.
"Now, when it comes to building houses, they can do miracles on television, like that show with the loud-mouthed git in the droopy jeans who builds a house in a week, but we don't have the luxury of thousands of people helping us. There's no way we can build your house by Christmas, especially with winter coming on, but there's a way to get you inside by then if you're willing to put up with a bit of inconvenience and pop for the few extra grand it would cost."
I looked at Brad and his eyes told me he was with me all the way. To Grant, I said, "Yeah. Sure. Tell us what you need."
Grant stood up and exited the room, returning shortly with his copy of the floor plans. He unrolled them onto the table. "Here's what we do. We concentrate on the downstairs and finish it enough for it to pass inspection and be livable. Then we temporarily close off the foyer at the front livingroom and from the laundry room to the stairway, here and here." He drew his finger along the lines to show us where he meant. Effectively, he closed off the foyer and made the upstairs accessible only from the front door. "You'll have to enter and exit the house through the garage and laundry room or the back door for awhile but, as long as you have all the amenities on the ground floor - kitchen and bathroom - we can treat that floor as your living space and the unfinished upstairs as a reno. So, you'll be living downstairs while we're working upstairs. They'll probably still be doing some finishing downstairs, too. Painting. Trim. Stuff like that. That's where the inconvenience come in, but it shouldn't be too bad. When the upstairs is finished, we tear down the temporary walls and do the finishing work there."
"Is that legal?" Brad asked.
"Ask your father that question, Brad," Grant said. "He'll give you the same answer as I would. As long as the living space passes inspection, it's perfectly legal. It wouldn't be any different than building an addition to your house."
Grant answered my other questions and assured me that he could and would build me a house which was better than minimum code. He also assured me that he would make it as fireproof as he possibly could as long as I was willing to pay the extra money that it would cost. When he told me approximately how much the improvements would add to the budget which, in the grand scheme of things was practically negligible, I felt I would be failing my family horribly if I didn't go with the best. I'm sure, if the people were told the cost, they would gladly pay it to have a better and safer home.
We sealed the deal with a handshake. Signatures would come later when the contracts were properly written up. Grant would build our new house for us. He'd already been working ‘behind the scenes' as it were and he assured us that work would begin in earnest very soon.
David ingratiated himself to Grant after that as we sat together at the diningroom table enjoying fresh cups of coffee. He quickly drew Grant into a discussion of differing building codes between Canada and the United States and convinced Grant to share his photo album of his building accomplishments. By the time we left for home and sent David on his way back to Toronto, he had the name, address, and phone number of the construction company which Grant was going to hire to build our house. Both Brad and I got a huge hug and kiss on the lips for doing little more than introducing David to Grant. David, it seemed, was one step closer to seeing his dreams fulfilled.
‘Soon' came much faster than I expected. The very next afternoon, Grant phoned me at work.
"Is the house ready for demolition?" he asked.
"What?" I said. "Already?"
"Saturday morning," he replied, "if it's ready."
"I suppose it's as ready as it's ever going to be," I told him. "We just have to dismantle the hot tub and deck."
"Can you get it done by Saturday?"
I assured Grant that it would be done. I did that with my fingers crossed, hoping that David would be able to get it done for me.
Meanwhile, Brad and I scoured the apartment listings throughout the week and found only five new listings in our school district. We dismissed three of them immediately merely from their descriptions and made appointments to see the other two. One was extremely reasonably priced and more than adequate in size, but a small apartment complex was under construction right beside it. We left it on our list as a remote possibility if we couldn't find anything else. We didn't even get inside the door of the other one when Brad and I showed up for viewing. The woman was already there waiting for us.
She was smiling when she greeted us, but looked around me and Brad, one side and then the other. "Oh, dear," she said. "I was hoping to meet your wife."
"I don't have a wife," I told her.
An undeniable look of confusion fell over her face. "But you said you were married?"
"We are," Brad said.
Her look of confusion melted into a look of disgust and abhorrence. "I'll see you burning in Hell before I rent this apartment to you!" she said.
"You can't do that," I told her. "It's discrimination."
"So, sue me!" she shouted and slammed the door in our faces.
Had it been worth the bother, and had I thought it might possibly teach the woman a lesson, I might have done so. Fortunately for her, I had too many more important matters on my plate at the moment to worry about her ignorance and attitudes and archaic beliefs.
Thursday evening, with help from Barry and Nathan and David, we carried the empty, heavy hot tub over the stone wall into the Hayes' backyard where it would stay until we figured out what we wanted to do with it. David and Mark had already completely dismantled the deck and fence and it now lay in neatly-bundled piles behind John's house
The house was ready for demolition.
Bright and early Saturday morning, my entire family drove into town for the big event. We took lawn chairs with us and set them up on the lawn in front of Brad's parents' house. Everyone came to watch - Barry and Nathan, David and Brook. Grant, of course, was there to supervise everything. He wore his white ‘supervisor' hard hat and had brought matching miniature hats for the twins. Their eyes flew open wider than I'd ever seen them go and they screamed in delight when Grant handed them over. Justin and Jeremy wore them with great pride and refused to take them off for any reason. Bill and Warren, who had got caught up in traffic just outside of Mississauga, arrived later in the morning. Even Terry came by to watch and help Mom and Bernice with lunch.
The huge flatbed truck carrying the large demolition backhoe arrived shortly after nine o'clock. The twins watched intently from where they sat on the grass at the property line as the workmen set up the heavy-duty ramps at the back of the flatbed. The gigantic machine was fired up and slowly began to roll down the ramp on its caterpillar treads. It dug deep, mangled trenches into the grass as it crossed the front lawn, ultimately taking up station near the burnt-out shell of our house.
"What is it doing, Daddy?" Justin asked as he climbed into my lap and settled himself in position so he could watch the proceedings. To my right, Jeremy climbed into Brad's lap. Our friends and family all sat or stood around us. A few neighbours and passers-by had gathered as well by this time, observing from their chosen vantage points on both sides of the street.
We'd already explained to the kids that the house would be torn down that morning. Lindsay understood what that meant, but it was apparent that Justin and Jeremy didn't. "They're going to smash it all apart with the big machine so we can build a new house."
"Like when we break the Lego houses?" Jeremy asked from his perch on Brad's lap.
"So we can build new houses?" Justin added.
"Yes," I said. "Just like that."
We talked amongst ourselves as Grant did what he does best until he stepped back near the street. The chatter was soon drowned out by the sound of the mighty machine as the engine roared to life. I held my breath as the arm of the backhoe stretched and lifted high into the air. The bucket hovered over the roof, its jaws open wide and ready to devour the final link to our past. Time seemed to stand still as a million memories my life in that house flooded through my mind in a single instant. A huge lump formed in my throat, threatening to choke me and my stomach turned flip-flops inside me. My heart raced and pounded within my chest.
And then. . .
With a might roar and a mightier crash, the bucket came down onto the roof, smashing through it as if it were made of Tinker Toys and reducing the roof to splinters. The huge arm continued unrelentingly downward, tearing through the wall with a crunching sound that sent shivers up and down my. It raised into the air once more and the machine rotated slightly before the bucket ripped through our house once more.
Again and again.
Justin lifted his hand from his lap and waved with his fingers. "Goodbye, house," he said sadly before laying his hard hat-clad head against my shoulder.
By lunch time, the remains of the house were being loaded onto a continuous succession of dump trucks and being taken away for disposal.
By the time we went home to Maple Grove that evening, I owned a huge hole in the ground.
To Be Continued
I thought it was a Lightning strike!!! 
