The house itself was sitting empty, a monument to their lives, but Rick could not bring himself to move back into the house. The house was currently going through a complete renovation. It was almost finished, only the painters remained. Rick hoped he would be able to live within those walls when it was finally completed.
After completing his normal number of laps, Rick pushed himself to do another ten. If he was going to have to compete with Sasha, he was going to have to get his body into much better shape than it was now. Five years of law school and work had softened his body; not that he was in bad shape, he was in decent shape, but he wanted to be ripped when he finally stood next to her on the night of their wedding.
That was it wasn’t it; he was really an old-fashioned kind of guy. He came from a religious family, who attended church weekly, and would not think of pre-marital sex. To his way of thinking, however, that was a little harsh. He had already pushed that boundary to the breaking point. He was no longer a virgin; he had thought she was the one, the woman he would live the rest of his life with. But that dream had shattered a long time ago. He had had other relationships, but none had lasted.
Now he was faced with a dilemma; Sasha had been born in Russia, the communists had driven God and religion from the land. The party had become the religion of the land and the president, their god. What would Sasha think of him and his religious upbringing. Would she even understand his need for his faith?
He quickly dressed and drove to work. He started his day thinking about his future. It all depended upon Sasha. It was time to push forward, to venture into new territory. But first he had a doorway to complete.
After he finished his daily work list and took care of any problems that inevitably landed on his desk, he told Debbie that he was leaving for the day, but could be reached in the maintenance shop.
By six o’clock that evening he had the frame taken apart, all set to be reassembled on site, the door hinge plates properly mounted, all that was needed was to lift the door into place and to insert the pins. The exhaust fan had been cleaned and lubed, it was all ready to be mounted on the door. He had all the hardware he would need and any tools he could think of needing.
He took a quick shower and changed into a fresh set of work clothes, grabbed a quick bite to eat at a pizza place down the block from the shopping center and by 8:15 he was knocking on her backdoor. When she opened the door, she smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
“Everything all set?”
“Yes, I’ve got everything in my truck.”
“Do you need me to help you with anything?”
“No, I can manage everything by myself. The hardest part will be lifting the assembled door frame into position. I will assemble the frame on the floor in the hall and stand it right up into position, drill the anchor holes into the block and bolt it into place. Then it’s just a question of hanging the door and installing the hardware and the fan. When I’m done, I’ll put my tools away and clean up here.”
“I’m going to grab a bite to eat and then I’m going to see a movie. I haven’t been to a movie in ages.”
“Good for you, you deserve to treat yourself once in a while.”
“Alright, I’ll go out the front and lock the door behind me, this way you’ll be locked in and safe. Why don’t you stop by tomorrow for coffee, then you can show me how it all works.”
“Ok, see you at seven tomorrow.”
Rick quickly brought in the frame pieces, screwed them together, walked the frame upright and used duct tape to hold it in place while he used his plug-in drill with a long masonry bit to drill six holes through the frame and into the cinderblock walls. Then he drove home the carriage bolts that held the frame to the wall. With a caulking gun he filled in any gaps between the frame and the wall. The door went in easily and when he placed the last of the pins in the hinges it closed effortlessly. Now it was just a matter of the installing the doorknob in the predrilled hole and making sure the doorplate was in the right position to hold the door snuggly in place. The last part of the installation was to secure the fan to the back of door. With that completed, he knelt at the bottom of the closed door and tacked the electrical cord to the face of the bottom edge of the door leaving enough play for the door to operate smoothly. Working his way from the closed door to the corner of the wall and around the corner to the electrical outlet, he tacked the cord to the baseboard and plugged it into the lower socket of the outlet. The fan worked perfectly; he could feel the breeze coming from the front of the shop.
Rick had told her that he would have a switch that she could use to turn the fan on and off, but that he would have to do another day. For that he would have to have access to the electrical panel. When Sasha had first left the building, he had checked to see if her office door was unlocked. Of course it was locked.
Now he had a dilemma. He really wanted to check out her office, just to make certain that she was indeed living in the building. He had his ladder strapped to the overhead rack of the truck. It would only take him a few minutes to pop up one of the drop ceiling panels, hoist himself over the office wall and drop down into her office.
‘You already know she is living here. You’ve seen her car here late at night and in the same spot early the next morning. You would be invading her privacy. And what if you left some incriminating evidence behind; how would you explain yourself. How would she feel about you then? Worse still what if she walked in on you while you were in there snooping around?’
He had finished bringing out the last of his tools and was just sweeping the bits of cinderblock and dust, that were scattered on the floor, into a dustpan, when he felt, more than heard that he was no longer alone. Turning quickly, he found her leaning against the frame of the hallway door.
“Don’t mind me, I was just admiring the view. Everything all done?”
“Just about, the only thing I have left is to install the wall switch; but for that I have to have access to the electrical panel which is in your office.”
“Show me how it works.”
“Ok, just let me toss this dirt outside and I’ll re-open the transom window. I’ll be right back.”
Rick walked to the back of the parking lot, emptied the dustpan into the desert landscaping, walked back to the truck and tossed the dustpan and broom into the truck. He was just about to untie his ladder when a sixth sense told him that that would probably be unnecessary. He walked back into the building just in time to watch Sasha stepping down from the chair she had placed in front of the door. He smiled and shook his head; then watched as she slowly walked towards him. She was back lit by the glow of the parking lot lights. Her hips swayed slightly as her silhouette came out of the darkness and into the light of the back hallway.
“Please get yourself a step-ladder. I don’t want to come here first thing in the morning and find you on the floor.”