Leakage
Christopher makes another trip to Austin. Secrecy becomes normal.
This chapter is part of the serialized novel Between Corners. If you’re new, start here.
Molly and I stared in disbelief at what we were seeing. We were standing about halfway between the therapy center and Burton Road and could see water seeping out of the ground, then oozing downhill toward the road. The ground under our boots was soft.
“What the hell, Charlotte?” Molly said.
I said, “I don’t know – but it explains why the water pressure was so low this morning.”
It was still early morning, and while the sun was not yet hot, I knew it was going to be.
Molly tucked hair away from her face. “We’re going to have a sinkhole here soon – I saw this happen on another ranch near my dad’s place.”
I took out my phone.
“Hey hon…hate to bother you.”
I told him what was happening.
“Oh no,” he said. “That is not good at all. But I can’t help. I’m at least an hour away, over in Blanco with a client.”
The ground burbled.
“Look,” he said. “Can you find the key and shut it off?”
I said, “The what?”
“The meter key – it’s like a steel pipe maybe three feet long, with a T shape at one end and a U shape at the other.”
Right. I had seen that. A few minutes later Molly had found the meter box and pried the cover off. I peered inside. I saw a dial – its red dial spinning like a top. I also saw a square lug. I took the key and fitted one end over the lug and felt it snug into place. Then I held the T handle and twisted.
Nothing.
“Shit – it’s stuck,” I said. “Can you grab it too?” Molly did, and I counted. “One two three – push!” We made a comical grunting sound. But then it budged. “Keep going.” Another hard effort, and the lug turned.
We walked back to where the water had been most visible. What had been coming out of the ground seemed to lessen in volume.
“I think we got it,” Molly said.
“We did. But now we have another problem.”
She looked at me and knew immediately.
“Oh God – no water at the barn.”
We needed hundreds of gallons a day. I called Douglas back and explained the latest hurdle.
He was quiet for a few seconds.
“I got it,” he said. “Call United Rentals. Tell them you need a water buffalo. It’s a tank on tires that holds maybe a thousand gallons. They should be able to deliver one, and that will cover you until we can get the break patched.”
***
At nine the next morning I was again at the edge of the now-drying muddy patch, watching Douglas work. With a digging bar and posthole digger he was trying to at least find the pipe, if not the break. On the fence I saw a red-winged blackbird, possibly hoping we were making a new swamp.
“Huff!” he grunted as he lifted the heavy bar and drove it into the soil. “Huff!” Then the digger – again raising it up before driving it down and as far into loosened soil as he could.
Douglas stopped, took off his hat, wiped his sweating forehead. He started to talk but he was out of breath, so the words came in bursts. “A posthole digger…is the most…evil tool…God ever created.”
I peered into the hole, which looked to be about two feet deep and maybe a foot across. I couldn’t see the bottom – it was filling with water. “There’s water in there – but we shut it off at the road,” I said.
“Yeah – it’s off,” he replied. “This is probably residual water that pooled along the gravel over the pipe.”
Again. “Huff!”
The water pooled again.
“Well hell,” he said. “I give up. Some holes just can’t be dug.” He stuck the bar into the ground, walked to his truck, and sat on the rear bumper. I joined him. He took out his phone, found a number, and dialed. “Time for expert guidance,” he said. I felt my stomach burning.
Then: “Joe – Doug Whitaker. Yeah. How are ya?”
Joe Edwards. A local construction contractor. Everyone knew him. My dad – everyone.
Douglas explained the problem. “Probably three feet deep,” he told Joe. “I think PVC pipe, but I haven’t actually set eyes on it.”
They talked more. Finally: “How much, do you think? Ballpark.” I heard Joe chirping. “Uh-huh. Yeah. Really? Yikes.” More chirping. “Okay – it is what it is. When could you start? Wednesday? Okay. Thanks Joe.”
He ended the call and looked at me. “Well,” he said after a few seconds. “Joe figures maybe $25,000.”
A horsefly landed on my arm and bit before I could slap it.
Oh shit.
“He has to see it first – could be less, could be more. He figures the whole pipe from the road to the barn is bad. It will take two or three guys, a backhoe, a ditch witch.”
“Wow,” I said, my voice catching. I had sixteen thousand in the center’s bank account. I had to make payroll in a week. Buy feed. And pay a vet bill for Lulu – an infected foot.
Douglas folded his arms and kicked a little at the earth. “Okay. Well – we’ll manage it somehow. These things happen.”
But why now?
I tried to slow down. “Do you think Joe is right about the price?”
Doug flicked some dirt off his forearm. “Probably.” Then kicked at the ground again. He stood and picked up the digging bar and posthole digger. “I need to run. You okay here? How is the water buffalo doing?” He pointed to the fat blue tank, parked near the barn.
“Great,” I said. “That was a fantastic idea.”
“If it empties, I can tow it and refill it for you.”
My shoulders ached from hauling buckets earlier. “Thank you,” I said.
Then he said, “Okay. What time you coming home?”
I planned out the day. Feed the horses. Haul more water. Muck out stalls. In the heat. Could I even stay open. I didn’t know now.
“Probably around three,” I said.
He got in the car and looked at me. “Don’t worry, Charlotte.” I waved as he drove off. He waved back.
I turned and walked slowly into the barn. I took a minute to clock the smell – hay, manure, saddle soap. I knew Douglas had his bell – the Grand Canyon. But this was mine.
At Monarch’s stall I stopped for a minute. His head had poked out to see if I had a sugar cube. I did – of course. “Hey there,” I said, stroking his nose after I’d given him the sugar cube. “What are we going to do? That’s a lot of money.” He shook his head and whinnied softly. “Is that so?” I said, laughing a little at last. “Well, I’ll think about that!”
I was sitting at my desk with a bottle of water when my phone rang. I looked at the screen and felt a bump. It was Christopher. I answered. I heard noise in the background. “Where in the world are you? What am I hearing?”
“I’m east of you – Bastrop,” he said, over a racket I now identified as a bulldozer or a backhoe. “There’s a huge culvert that blew out on one of the federal co-op roads. We’re trying to figure out how to make a permanent fix. Rain is a constant problem.”
That’s Texas.
“When did you get into town?” He had texted me that he would be flying down but hadn’t given me a date. He said, “Yesterday. In town for a week, maybe more. Staying in a Best Western here, just off 71. It’s grim.”
I laughed. “Oh – no hot tub?”
A sound. “No – goddamnit. That would be nice.”
I suddenly yawned.
“Do you think you can come over and see us? I’m sure Douglas would like that. Did you bring your violin tools?”
More construction noise.
“I did indeed.”
It got quieter, like he’d stepped away fifty feet.
“Well, maybe this weekend. Sunday. You can look at my violin, then I’ll make something for dinner.” I wasn’t sure how that would land. With Douglas.
“That would be great. The food scene here is grim, to put it mildly.”
I knew the town. “I’ve heard that.”
Something dawned on me.
“Hey, Christopher,” I said. “Do you work on water lines at all?”
“Sometimes. Why?”
“Well, I have a bad water leak at the center. The main to the barn broke. Douglas called a contractor, but he said twenty-five thousand dollars, which I don’t ha…uh, it’s a lot of money.”
A horse whinnied softly behind me. Daisy. Now it was her who wanted my attention. Of the three horses, she was the one who really tracked me.
“Twenty-five thousand?” he said. “Christ – these contractors. What does the work entail?”
I rolled my shoulder to get rid of some of the ache.
“As near as we can tell, the line is three or four feet down. I have one break, but the whole line could be about to fail. Joe – the contractor – wants to replace it from the road to the barn. I…I just can’t afford that right now.”
“That’s a ten-thousand-dollar job, Charlotte. Max. There is no reason to replace the whole line. Fix the leak – that’s all.”
I stopped breathing for a few seconds.
“What?”
Daisy’s eyes were tracking me. I found a sugar cube, went to her stall, and gave it to her, Then I stood and stroked her neck.
He said, “Yeah – that is way too fucking high. It’s a simple job.”
I gripped Daisy’s halter. But she still leaned against my hand. She had large brown eyes. Soft.
“Well – that’s what the guy Douglas talked to said.” He said something I couldn’t make out over the equipment noise.
“What are you doing for water now?”
“I have a…a water buffalo. For now. But I have to lug water around, and the people in the house are using buckets.” Daisy nuzzled me. Sweet, sweet horse.
A diesel engine revved in the background.
“Look,” he said. “Look, Charlotte. That estimate is bullshit. He is ripping you off.”
That seemed harsh. “But it’s someone Douglas knows. And trusts. He’s local.”
“Local, yeah right,” he said. “Just a sec…”
I heard distant voices – he had held the phone aside and was talking to someone. His foreman? Monday?
More machinery noise. Then he was back on the line. “Look, Charlotte, my crew is a half hour away. They have some down time on Monday and I can get them over there. They’ll eat this job for lunch.”
“Wait,” I said. “What? This is private property.” That didn’t seem right. I looked at the water buffalo – that cost money too.
“Don’t worry about it. You’re on a county road, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then that leak is a hazard to infrastructure. We fix that stuff all the time. It’s not a problem.”
I hesitated. “But the line… the contractor said it’s all going to go.”
“He’s full of it,” Christopher said, his voice lower. “You have one break. We’ll sleeve it, pressure test it, and you’ll be fine for years. Don’t get scared into digging a twenty-five-thousand-dollar hole in the ground.”
I hesitated. “How will you account for this?”
“It’s damage mitigation. It’s a case where my guys actually help people.”
Then he said, “Give me the street number. Consider it done.”
The air felt cooler.
“Really?”
“Yeah – really. We’ll make it right.”
I gave him the number. Then I gave Daisy another scratch.
“Christopher,” I said, suddenly needing to brush a finger across my eye. “Wait – how?” My God. “How do I thank you?”
A beat. “Oh – don’t worry about it.”
I drove home on Highway 71, the road dipping and rising past clumps of oak and juniper, hemmed in now and again by white limestone cliffs. For a time, the Ranger seemed to float; I rolled down the window, felt the heat, let out a deep breath. Pink came on the radio. “Close your eyes and leave it all behind,” and for a few seconds I sang along. I missed seeing a cattle truck coming – it was blowing off dust and hay and a burst of it came through the open window, settling on the dashboard after I closed the window. Words drifted– I guarantee it – and a jackrabbit darted across the highway. My heart jumped.
I shut off the radio.
After I got home and cleaned up, I had a glass of wine and watched news while Douglas finished dinner. Enchiladas, filled with chicken and white Mexican cheese, in a green sauce made from fresh tomatillos, serrano chilies, stock, cilantro. It tasted so good.
But he was cross from the start when I told him Christopher had called. He put his fork down sharply and looked at me. “No,” he said. “I didn’t know he was around. We haven’t talked since he was here last. I remember he said he might be back, but that was it. And why is he calling you?” He reached for the saltshaker, knocked it over.
“It was out of the blue. He’s down here for work and will be around this weekend. He asked if he could come by and work on my violin.”
His fork stabbed a chunk of tortilla. “In my shop.”
I tried to judge his tone.
“Yes – but just for a little while. He’ll help you move your things and then put them back.”
I smoothed the tablecloth.
“I don’t want him touching a thing of mine in there. Not a hammer or a stick of wood. Understood?”
I took another bite of enchilada, felt my shoulders starting to ache again.
“It shouldn’t take long, and then dinner,” I said. “It’s the least we – I can do for him.”
His fork clinked on the plate.
“OK – he can use the shop. One hour. But then he leaves.”
Something was off. “What is going on? You two are friends.”
He didn’t answer right away.
“He was a jerk when he was last here.”
“He was?” I said.
He said, “Yes — he was. I’d forgotten some things about him.”
Was he talking about the water line? Or the patio? I thought about that moment. Christopher close beside me, examining the violin bridge. His voice low when he left. You look amazing. How warm my face felt.
Had I encouraged that?
I took another sip of wine.
“Well…” I said. “I’ll keep dinner simple. I’ll roast a chicken. I promise – there won’t be a thing for you to do. And I’m sorry you two have split a little. You had been so glad to see him.”
I re-filled his wine glass.
“And…” I started.
I swallowed.
His head tilted.
“What?”
“He has a crew here. He said they can fix the water break. To protect the county road. He said they do it all the time.”
His fork went down and his eyebrows bowed. “Wait, wait – slow down. He will do what?”
I heard the tone, but kept going. “I…I told him about the water leak. About the cost Joe mentioned.”
“Okay. What of it?”
I thought of carrying more buckets
“He thought it was too high. He hires contractors all the time.”
Douglas gave me a long look.
“Is he implying that Joe is ripping us off? Because that is bullshit. Joe is as honest as the day is long.”
We heard a thump from outside. Douglas stood and went to the window, peered out. “It’s just Jack,” he said. Then came back to the table and sat. He leaned to one side with one hand on his hip, the opposite elbow on the table.
“Charlotte,” he said finally. “I didn’t think you were this naïve.”
The fence wire I had fixed. Things dad told me. Horses and horses.
“How am I naïve? I’ve been around ranches my whole life. People do favors for each other all the time. This is like that.”
Douglas’s hand formed a loose fist. He banged it softly on the table. “Charlotte,” he started. “Charlotte, for fuck’s sake. He is stealing Forest Service money to fix your stupid little water line.”
He picked up his glass.
I couldn’t let this slip away.
“Christopher said it’s damage mitigation. Infrastructure protection. He does this kind of thing – he knows a problem when he sees it.”
Now his eyes were hard.
“Charlotte,” he said. I held his gaze. “That is the biggest load of horseshit I have ever heard.”
His fork swirled on the plate, picking up tomatillo sauce, then into his mouth. Chewed for a few seconds and swallowed.
I watched him.
“If you say so,” I said. “But this is my business. My property. He offered to help – and I am taking that help. You – you don’t understand what a relief this is.”
He coughed.
“Fine. But this will bite you later. Let him fix the water line – and your violin. Feed him overcooked chicken. Then he leaves.”
He took another bite.
“And you call Joe.”