Fast & Loose by Elizabeth Bevarly (the giving tree read aloud .txt) 📕

“It doesn’t matter,” he told her. “I need a place to stay. Whatever you have to do to get this house for me, do it. At this point, I’ll take what I can get.”

Two

LULU FLANNERY SCRIBBLED ANOTHER INSTRUCTION ON a hot pink Post-it note and slapped it onto her cable remote control, trying again to recall the precise moment when she’d lost her mind. Oh, right. Now she remembered. It had been the second her friend Eddie told her she could get five thousand dollars for renting out her house the two weeks before Derby. It had been bad enough that she’d succumbed so quickly—and easily—a few months ago when he told her she could get fifteen hundred renting her place out for three days. Now she was agreeing to do it for two weeks.

Greed. It was a heinous little bugger.

However, at some point during the frenzy of housecleaning she’d performed over the last two days to leave the place spotless for whoever would be staying here for the next two weeks, she’d begun to have second thoughts. And then third thoughts. And then tenth thoughts. And then one hundred and fifty-seventh thoughts.

Everything she owned was in her little Highlands bungalow. All her personal, intimate…stuff. Sure, she’d locked up what few valuable items she had—valuable being a relative term, anyway, since they were mostly relative to the term worthless. The actual cash value of Lulu’s valuable possessions probably only totaled around four hundred dollars. But the sentimental value she carried for things like her grandmother’s pearl choker and earrings and her mother’s autographed photo of Dean Martin—even though, alas, it was autographed to someone named Buddy—far outweighed any monetary value that might be assigned such things.

That was beside the point.

The point was that Lulu was about to rent out her home to a total stranger who had no vested interest—financial or emotional—in it. Hence the flurry of note-writing she’d undertaken since waking that morning. She’d wanted to make sure her unknown guest or guests didn’t abuse or misuse—or, okay, use—the things she didn’t want them using. But she’d done her best to be polite when saying “Mitts off,” and had taken great care in just how she phrased her instructions.

The note on the cable remote, for instance, said, “Remember, there are no more late fees at Blockbuster, and it’s only four blocks away. Walking is so good for your heart!” The last thing she needed was to be billed for a bunch of pay-per-view movies she didn’t even get to watch herself.

“It’ll be fine, Lulu,” Bree Calhoun said as she tugged closed the zipper on the bag Lulu had packed for the two weeks she’d be spending with her best friend. “Remember, Eddie said there’s a thorough screening process that all his clients have to go through. He’s not going to let some jerk rent your house. He’ll only rent it to the finest of families.”

Lulu threw her a disbelieving look. “Please, Bree. If it meant collecting a commission, Eddie would rent my house to the Manson family.”

Bree made one of those okay-you-got-me shrugs. “Five thousand bucks is five thousand bucks,” she said. “Even after Eddie’s commission, that’s like six months’ worth of mortgage payments in two weeks’ time.”

Good point, Lulu thought.

“Plus,” Bree added brightly, “you get to enjoy the pleasure of my company for two weeks. Not to mention all the luxuries of Casa Calhoun, including, but not limited to, my vast collection of Orlando Bloom DVDs and all the Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches you can eat. Life just doesn’t get any better than that.”

Lulu smiled. It would be fun bunking with Bree at her apartment, she had to admit. It would be like when they were kids having sleepovers. Except this time they could stay up past midnight watching TV without their parents yelling at them to go to bed, and they wouldn’t have to sneak sips of Cella Lambrusco from the bottle in the refrigerator door. After all, it would be so much more mature and tasteful for the two of them to watch Pirates of the Caribbean in their underwear while drinking Bellinis.

“Just let me leave a few more notes for my prospective renter,” she said, “and then we can drop off the keys with Eddie.”

Bree shook her head with enough emphasis to send her long black hair flying. “Lulu, you’ve already left about five hundred notes. Your prospective renter is going to have trouble finding the coffeemaker as it is.”

“Oh, the coffeemaker is off-limits,” Lulu said as she nudged an errant russet curl from her cheek and tucked it behind her ear. Unfortunately, it fell forward again, refusing to be contained with the rest of the dark auburn mass she’d tied back with a scrap of black fabric. Her T-shirt, too, was black, and short enough to keep coming untucked from the waistband of the faded jeans that rode loosely on her hips. “I stuck a note on it saying it was off-limits, too.”

Bree rolled her Caribbean blue eyes. Like Lulu, she wore jeans and a T-shirt, though hers was dark red and sported the logo of her favorite brand of beer. “You can’t have the coffeemaker be off-limits,” she said. “That’s inhuman. We the people are entitled to the pursuit of life, liberty, and a cuppa morning Joe.”

“I don’t think that’s in the Bill of Rights, Bree.”

“Well, it sure as hell should be.”

Lulu sighed. She supposed her friend was right. Which probably meant…She screwed up her features a little as she said, “So then I guess I should take the Post-it note off the fridge, too, huh?”

Bree gazed at her blandly for a minute. “I think you’re missing the point here, Lulu. When people rent a house, they kind of expect to have use of certain amenities. Like, say…oh, I don’t know…the appliances. I mean, it’s one thing to lock up your jewelry and