2019-11-12 - Now Hiring: Handyman

November in Gray Harbor is about as miserable as it gets most of the time, but today! Today is that rare beast, a day when it's not drizzling, raining, or otherwise being awful. So the staff of Addington House are busy taking advantage of it: there's a small tour group making their way through the main house, given heaps of interesting factoids by the guide, but otherwise, it's obviously a day for tidying, mending, repairing, and otherwise prepping the house for the holidays to come. The interior smells of lemon-scented furniture polish, Pine Sol, and busy-ness.

Patrick is overseeing the hanging of a new valance in the front of the house, and it's not going well. The maid really isn't the right person for the job, and neither is he, so they're just griping at each other till he finally declares, "Just leave it. Go clean something." This is why his return-call to Matthew was to the tune of 'when is the soonest you can come by Addington House?'

An ancient but well cared for pick up truck pulls up outside the house, and a man in oil and paint-stained work clothes gets out. He pauses, considering the house, before he approaches slowly, hesitating before he speaks, offering a quiet greeting, "Need a hand there? Hi, I'm Matt, you're expecting me, I think?" His accent is local, and his expression is friendly, open, with twinkling brown eyes.

Most people change a lot in twenty years. Patrick Addington is no exception. But he's recognizable as the same kid from high school, a year ahead of Matthew, and he sweeps the other man with a quick look while he leans the unhung curtain-rod against the nearest wall. Hands now freed to offer a shake, he crosses over with a quick smile. "Harriman? It's been a long time. Come in." Already inside or not, he makes a gracious gesture to suggest coming in properly, the invitation open. "It's Patrick. Addington. How are you? How have you been?"

The grin that Matt shares is lopsided, inducing a dimple, and the brown eyes twinkle. He hesitates for a moment before accepting the other's hand to shake, but his handshake is firm, and he adds a nod to it. "Nice place, Patrick." He follows, his gaze moving over the building, noting the workmanship that went into it. "Been alright. Just got back into town..." The details of that are brushed over, "You?"

"Nepotism is a beautiful thing." Patrick smiles and shrugs shamelessly in the aftermath of the handshake, lifting his eyes to the house with a passive pride: he likes it, but he's not attached to it (yet). "We'll break the house's abiding rule and sit on the furniture, I think," while he leads through the foyer into a formal sitting room, whose antique furniture is behind some of those velvet rope things. Which he proceeds to ignore and gesture to some nice chairs where rich old Addingtons sat way-back-when. "I didn't know you'd left." A carefully worded statement that invites Matthew to supply details or not, his call. As for Patrick: "I've been back a few weeks. My aunt was..." Pick a nice word. "...insistent."

The snort of laughter from Matt is more relaxed, as he follows the other man, "Always the best for those of us it helps out." The amusement in his voice is obvious, and he hesitates to reply as he takes a seat. "Yeah, college and a job. Got a nice job, wife, lost both." He brushes over the headlines swiftly, offering a rueful grin, before he moves swiftly on. "Insistent, huh. How is she?"

An upnod at the abridged version leaves Patrick asking only, "So is it better to have loved and lost...?" His palm teeters, like he's not so sure for his part, then drops to the arm of his chair. "Do you want some coffee? Water? Gin-and-tonic? And she's, oh, the same as she always has been. Margaret expects that she shouldn't even have to say jump, we should all be at her beck-and-call at all times." There's not even any venom in his voice about it, just amused acceptance of this as his life. "Fortunately, she seems to be happy to leave me to my own devices, now that she's got me here."

Matt grins, shakes his head, replying to the question, "Coffee if you've got some." He hesitates before he replies ruefully, adding slowly, "Cheaper to not have loved at all." He leans back in the chair, his grin broadening as he listens to the news of the Aunt, acknowledging the amused acceptance there, "Paying the piper?" He hesitates, and then leans forward, resting his elbows on his thighs, considering the room they are sat in. "This is a gorgeous old place, Patrick..."

"Liz. Liz?" Patrick looks irritated briefly when this 'Liz' doesn't immediately materialize, but she comes along presently - a brisk, middle-aged woman who gets told they'd like coffee, and skitters off to fetch it. "Nepotism," Patrick adds with wry humor once she's gone.

Back to the conversation at hand, though, he laughs with dark humor at the 'cheaper' comment. "I'll have to take your word for that. My wallet is happily unmarried, even more happily un-divorced." He looks around again after that, nodding. "It is. And it's generally been well-kept, but it needs some work. There's none of that paper that stops weeds under the flowerbeds, for example, and the fountain-pump is essentially an antique, and..." The impression is, this list is really long.

Matt is trying not to laugh at Patrick's humour, but the smile shows in his eyes, and the crinkles appearing there despite his efforts. The comment at the relationship status is met with a rueful grin, and Matt replies lightly, "I'll keep my wallet in my pants from now on, trust me." Then he sobers, glancing around, listening to the list, his eyes and expression turning thoughtful. "Up keep is never ending then."

"Among other things?" What Matthew will be keeping in his pants, Patrick means. But he glosses over the question with a quick smile, like there's no need to answer that, he's just being snide. Ahem. He mhms about the upkeep, tacking on, "Plus, we're trying to fill in the event schedule, which requires changing decorations, managing the landscaping, et cetera. We have a few gardeners and what-not on staff, but it would be nice to have a reputable handyman to take up some work on contract, if you're interested."

Matt's grin flashes on, the comment received in good humour, and a nod is given in reply. "Believe me." Then he accepts the new information, listening seriously, clearly making a mental list. "You got it, I'm interested. I'm just trying to get this off the ground, so any work you toss my way will be welcome." He can be serious, he can be businesslike. "We can agree an hourly rate if you want, or a monthly retainer with a cap?"

Despite that they just sat down, Patrick still offers, "Do you want to take a walk around and see what you're up against before you sign off on this? The house is..." He looks for the right word, eyes trickling here and there before they finally return to Matthew's. "...an entity unto itself. There are a lot of memories. A fair few of them are awful. And I prefer to get that out in the open for people like us," SHINIES!, "before they find it out the hard way."

Matthew nods, his lips twitching at the offer. "That sounds sensible." He hesitates at the recognision of his issues, reluctantly saying, "Mine isn't strong, nothing that useful." But he does rise to his feet, preparing to take the tour, his expression tightening at the open discussion of the issues. The man is clearly not at ease with the world as it is. "Let's do this then."

What's funny is, just when they get up, Liz returns with the coffee tray, so she just stands there, staring at them from behind her glasses.

Patrick ignores her, rising and leading through the sitting room to the foyer, putting on his tour guide voice. "The house was built in nineteen-oh-five. Interestingly, the architect was a man named Christopher Wright, who purportedly wound up hanging himself in the attic on the day construction was complete. They say his body stayed up there for a month before the Addington children found him one very hot afternoon. It was quite grisly." This story may or may not be true. But Patrick seems to enjoy telling it. "The problem is, the entire house is full of all of these things with their feelings attached to them. Come, I think piano in the ballroom really epitomizes the problem."

Matt gives her a slow grin, one that creates that dimple again. "Thanks. Just going to look around, be right back..." He follows Patrick, listening intently, his expression sobering. "That sounds charming..." The murmur is soft, wry, but his expression lacks that humour now, a tension sliding into his body. The tension in his shoulders, a tightness around his eyes and mouth, these all speak to an anxiety about this.

Long-suffering Liz says nothing, just shuffles off to put the coffee tray somewhere else and resume whatever he work is.

Patrick leads through the front of the house and into that elaborate ballroom, pausing a moment to let the thing have its dramatic effect, this big, classically-decorated room, with the antique grand piano tucked into the far corner. He's quiet on the long walk across the floor, coming to stand next to this piano with a fingertip hovering above the polished lid. "I don't care for doing these things, the touching and the feeling, but I'm trying to catalog the relics in this place, so." His hand retracts and he folds his arms across his middle, nodding to the bench in front of the piano. "Better to show than tell. See what happens."

Matt's steps behind him are carefully paced, the step of a man considering his options, facing up to something. "Nice piano." The words are quiet, and he hesitates before he steps forward. This is definitely a man bracing himself for something, the tension in every line of his body, his shoulders taut, and that easy smile is missing from his face as he reaches out to touch the piano as if it might bite. Then he closes his eyes, placing a palm flat on the lid, like someone pulling the plaster off in a single yank.

Patrick, quietly, "'Nice' is one word for it."

Matthew's hand is still for the first moment he touches the piano, his face stiffening and then paling. His breath is sharp, an intake as if someone has punched him in the gut, and his eyes fly open, staring blankly ahead of him. He freezes like that for a long moment, the time passing in moments for others, ending only for him when he yanks his hand back, stepping away from it as if the piano itself had burnt him. "Jesus." The word is spoken on a gasp and he turns away, turning to recapture some semblance of control over his expression. The humour, when it surfaces, as it always will with Matthew, is strained, "Damn, that is a heart breaker."

"Mhmmm," agrees Patrick lengthily, running the back of his knuckle across the glossy top of the piano, knocking it twice, then dragging his hand away so it returns to being folded around his arm, which remains crossed over his midsection. "The whole house is filled with things like this. Some worse than others. There's a lamp in the master bedroom that - " But he sucks in a breath, clipping off that tale with a polite 'never mind' kind of smile. "You see what we're up against here? Repair all the things, keep the house in well-polished order, but be careful what you touch."

Matthew lifts his hands, rubbing the top of his head, the gesture almost a stretch, before he replies, the humour in his voice forced, "Yeah, it really is a place full of character." The smile he puts on his face sits there, all alone in its efforts to create the impression that he is just fine, thank you. "I can see that. Well, you just get to pay the danger bonus then. Ain't nobody afraid of no house..." The attempt at humour is as flat as a pancake, and he knows it, but puts the effort in anyway, the knowledge written in his eyes.

Danger bonus. Patrick smirks. "I'm sure we can fit that in the budget somewhere." Since the piano has done its parlor trick now, he suggests further strolling. It's a nice old house, there's plenty to cover, so they may as well wander through and see all the shit that's wrong with it. Somewhere along the way, they can talk terms - which, ultimately, Patrick seems to care less about the cost and more about having someone that can do the work and understand the potential dangers that come with this old house. Handshakes at the door!