The first thing to hit her was the smell.
Natalie tenuously walked up the wooden steps at the edge of the covered porch, grayed and a little splintery from too many years in the elements; or at least, too many years without care. The gutters along the roof were heavy with brown leaves and rotting twigs, weighing down at the edges. The boards that didn’t creak threatened to crumble under Natalie’s flats. She was careful to avoid the softest spots as she tip-toed to the faded pink front door, peeking in the slim windows that bordered each side.
When she opened the door and passed over the threshold, it was like stepping back in time. Memories assaulted her with each breath, her nose filled with the stale and familiar air… This was Gram’s house. The lavender quilt hung over the back of the ancient overstuffed loveseat, the basket of crochet hooks and yarn sitting beside the candy bowl on the spindly little end table her great-great grandfather had made. The baby grand piano had a thick layer of dust on the lid, and the place clearly needed a good sweep and Swiffering, but it still smelled like her.
Like a mix of lemon shortbread and old paperbacks.
She walked into the parlor and set her oversized purse on the wooden rocker, beside the thin fleece airline blanket her Grandmother had stolen from Delta back in the 90’s on her trip back from India. That thought made Natalie scan the room for the little Buddha statue she kept on the bookshelf, and the incense burner on the mantel.
She started to slip off her shoes, and then thought better of it. Who knew how dirty or splintery this floor was? It probably hadn’t been refinished in close to 20 years. So instead she wiped her shoes on the mat by the door and padded over to the magazine rack by the window. She checked the top drawer- and there it was: frankincense and myrrh incense cones and a jumbo box of matches.
She picked out a cone and placed it in the tiny, bronze lamp over the fireplace, lit one of the matches (it took a few tries), and held it to the cone until the tip glowed red. She shook out the flame, blew out the ember, and closed the lid once the smoke began to lilt out of the tip.
“There you go, Gramma,” she said, “Namaste.”
The spicy smoke mixed with the scent of old books and lemon cookies, and Natalie blinked back a tear.
The second thing that hit her was how weirdly clean everything was. Dusty, sure. She’d been expecting that. But Gram had always been pretty messy- waiting days to fold clean laundry and letting dishes pile up and fill the sink before stacking them in the ancient dishwasher. Natalie wasn’t even sure if that dishwasher worked anymore. It was the same one that had been there the last time she visited… how long ago was that?
Long enough to need a new dishwasher, she was pretty sure.
Regardless, it looked like Nat was going to be staying here for a while, so she decided to make herself at home. She reached into the cabinet above the stove for the tea kettle. Everything was just where she remembered it was. Plates, bowls, the little Looney Tunes tumblers Gram had saved that used to be jelly jars, all stacked and put away as if nothing had changed.
But everything’s changed, Natalie thought to herself, eyes glazing over as she waited for the water to boil. Gram was gone- passed peacefully in her sleep after a long and happy life. I wonder who cleaned this place? Did they know I was coming?
She held her head in her hands over her mug. Gram’s tea collection was looking a little bare, so instead of her favorite blueberry green tea, she settled for a wildberry zinger that had likely been in there for a decade or so. Guess I’ll add a grocery run to my list of things to do.
She pulled out her phone to check her email. It had been a long drive from California… 4 days of almost non-stop driving. But she wasn’t about to leave her car across the country and be stranded in the middle of bumfuck Maryland. She had forgotten how convoluted the country roads were around here. How did anyone find their way around this state? Once you got off the highway, it was nothing but corn fields and general stores and silos.
She considered herself lucky that Gram’s house wasn’t too far in the middle of nowhere. The tiny village of Ringold (she couldn’t even really call it a town) was a little farming community sandwiched between Hagerstown and a small branch of the Appalachian Mountains. She even had service out here, even if it was only a couple bars. She’d have to get the internet hooked up in the next few days so she didn’t have to rely on her hotspot the whole time.
Her inbox was already approaching triple digits even though she had caught up before leaving the hotel that morning. She checked the time. 4:30 pm… that was 1:30 in Los Angeles?
Damn. Barely past lunch and they already were hounding her. Before she left the city and the music management agency she worked at, she had negotiated a plan with her boss that allowed her a “work from the road sabbatical” of sorts.
“Where will you even be? Do they have internet in Maryland?” Her boss had asked her.
“I’ll be close to D.C. I can check up on bands coming through the 95 corridor. Not only that, I’ll still be able to email out advances with venues and manage expenses remotely- tour managers do it on the road all the time!” She had assured him.
Natalie was decidedly NOT a tour manager though. She had been an assistant talent manager at Green Lit Management for 7 years now, and was very much an in-office employee. At an agency as big as Green Lit, Assistant Managers had their own artists to manage: smaller national bands, openers for top 40 artists, college rock groups. But her main job was keeping her Manager happy.
Managers at Green Lit were practically rock stars themselves. When she had first gotten to L.A., she was fresh out of college with an arts management degree and living paycheck to paycheck as a barista. Landing an internship at Green Lit was a huge deal for her- she loved music and had wanted to work in the industry her whole life. But she hadn’t realized how out-of-her-league she would be at the office. The first time she made a Starbucks run down the street, she had been handed the office company card, and had been sent around the office to get the orders of all 30 employees. Together, the orders totaled over $300 dollars, and none of the staff had batted an eye when she returned, balancing a leaning tower of trays and paper bags, grimacing as she handed over the receipt to her boss.
“Just give those to Lindsay,” The Manager had said.
Lindsay, the Queen of the front desk, handled petty cash and office expenses. Every day, Natalie would collect the company card from her, make a coffee run, charge hundreds of dollars to the account, and hand it back with the receipts. Twice a day. Just for coffee.
She didn’t even want to know what they all spent on lunch.
At first, the whole world had been daunting. Coming from outside D.C., she wasn’t completely unaware of how the 1% lived. But being an assistant to one of them was a whole other level.
Seth, one of The Managers and her boss, was not used to thinking for himself. At least, not when it came to basic, everyday things. He was a brilliant businessman and Angel Investor: he had a hand in a dozen different Silicon Valley startups, and would fly back and forth from L.A. and the Bay Area twice a week sometimes to check on his various investments. Huge bands came to him when they wanted to play the Super Bowl. He was positively brilliant.
Just… not when it came to the normal stuff.
She scanned the subjects of the emails filling the inbox on her phone.
What’s my coffee order for intern?
Where do I keep my edgy blazer?
Meeting mom tonight- what wine does she like?
Which dry cleaner is the good one?
After 7 years assisting the same Manager, she had become some strange, sexless hybrid of a wife and mom to him: she knew his schedule, office, and preferences inside and out. Sometimes she even knew what he was thinking before he did. He had not been happy about her leaving the office for an “unspecified” length of time to settle the affairs of her Grandma’s estate. Eventually she had had to point out that in seven years, she’d only ever taken two sick days, and one week of vacation time. She was owed some time off, she reasoned, and she would still be accessible if it was an emergency.
She shuddered when she heard a ping, and scrolled up to the top of the inbox and saw the most recent email.
CALL ME - URGENT
She pressed the phone icon next to Seth’s name in the messenger app, biting her lip as it rang. This couldn’t be good.
“THERE you are, Nat. Where have you been?” Seth demanded in his inexplicable British accent.
“Sorry, Seth, I was driving all day. I just got to the house.”
“Good. Can you log on and work out some issues that Blind Bigots are having with their advances? The intern is useless.”
One lucky intern had recently been promoted to the unfortunate position of “helping out around the office” while Natalie was on the east coast. Basically, Temp Natalie. Apparently it wasn’t going well.
“I don’t have WiFi set up here yet, but I’ll see what I can do. When do you need the new advances?”
“ASAP. First show is tonight.”
Shit. Most venue offices close at five, and Blind Bigots are starting their tour in Chicago… Natalie did some quick math.
She had just under an hour to get the new paperwork sent out and in inboxes in time for the shows. And even then, she was pushing it.
“Got it.”
“And please tell the intern what my lunch order is from Tae Kwon Dim Sum. He got me FRIED dumplings yesterday. FRIED.”
She rubbed her temples.
“Will do.”
“Talk soon, Nat.”
He hung up. Nat looked at her now cold tea, and glanced once more at the clock.
Settling in would have to wait while she found a McDonald’s with WiFi.
