Driftwood: The Runner

Chapter 2

I was in my studio, hard at work, allowing my imagination to run wild as I listened to the Little Mermaid soundtrack. My fingers moved skillfully as the stroke of my watercolor paintbrush put the finishing touches on Ursula's costume for the upcoming new Broadway musical: Mean Girls, starring Disney's most notorious villains, Grimhilde Cruella deVil, Maleficent, and Ursula.

My favs.

I looked up and stared at my five Tony Awards for best costume designs by 'Genevieve Tyler.'

"Millie," I heard my house matron, of sixteen years, say as she knocked on my door.

"Yes, Lenora?"

"There's a man out there that would like a word with you in regard to some freelance renovation around the house."

I was only half listening but pressed my fingers to both temples in annoyance, anyway. I would much rather be left alone, creating my highly esteemed Broadway stage-wear.

"You gotta admit, Millie," Lenora continued "the place could use a bit of work. Your parents haven't had this place done up in what? Fifteen? Twenty years?"

"Well, it isn't exactly their problem anymore, is it?" I snarked, irritable.

My parents handed the deed of Greenland Plantation over to me when I turned eighteen, three years ago. Rock and Annette Rose felt no reason to keep it, themselves since they're never here.

But I am.

And I have no intention of changing that anytime soon.

I looked back down at my most recent costume design for Ursula. I decided that since her original ensemble was a black dress with a sweetheart neckline, that I'd recreate the look by sketching out a fitted black mermaid gown with the same bodice and a sheer violet overskirt.

I was proud of myself.

"That's good Millie," Lenora peeked over my shoulder. "Ursula?" she guessed.

"Right."

"I'm so proud of you, Rosebud," she said, maternally before kissing the top of my head. "Now go see that nice young man downstairs."

For a second, I'd forgotten about my new intruder. Why can't he just leave me alone?

"What does he want again?"

"He says he needs work to pay for his car or something. I honestly forgot, myself. Just talk to him. He seems like an upstanding man. Not bad looking either."

I stood up from my workstation, smoothed out my black fitted sheath dress, and slipped on my nude pointed toe heels before clicking and clacking out of my studio. I heard Lenora shut my door as we descended my glorious staircase.

As my hand rested on the railing, it wobbled slightly and only then that I thought perhaps I could get this man to fix that as well as the loose floorboards and peeling wallpaper.

Admittedly, my place looked like a decaying dungeon. On the outside, the ruins could be credited to the occasional teen who likes to toss bricks through my windows or a group of delinquents who find the destruction of someone else's property amusing.

There was no excuse for the deteriorating interior. Credited to my carelessness.

"Did you happen to get this man's name?"

"Something McKellan."

I opened my heavy front door to find my porch empty. I would have asked Lenora if she'd imagined this man had I not seen a rusted pick up blowing smoke at the end of my driveway.