LITMIR.BIZ

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of conversation in the next room stopped abruptly.

      There was also silence on the other end of the phone, but the man recovered quickly, sounding a tad defensive. “Look, if you don’t want prospective buyers to come see your house—”

      “No, it’s not that.” I couldn’t afford to turn them away. How could I possibly make two monthly house payments? The mere thought prompted me to plead, “Please bring them by. But you have to understand that I wasn’t expecting to show the house today.”

      “Oh, so there haven’t been many visitors?” Oh, so there’s not much interest and we can whittle down the asking price?

      “Plenty! Just none scheduled for today,” I clarified. “I have a few people over, and you didn’t give us much notice—”

      “We don’t want to disturb anyone,” he interrupted, back to the smoothly polished salesman’s voice with which he’d started the conversation. “We’ll have a quiet look around, and you and your guests will hardly notice we’re there.”

      I got off the phone wondering how much of his estimated ten minutes were left and whether or not I should try to shoo the ladies out of the house. But they weren’t exactly in an age demographic known for speed and agility. Besides, it would look odder for people to view the house with empty folding chairs in the living room and a sideboard of half-eaten snacks than for them to just walk through while we concluded the jewelry show. Heck, if the potential buyers didn’t want the house, maybe I could still talk them into a faux black pearl bracelet.

      I quickly updated the ladies, letting them know visitors would be walking through but that we should carry on as scheduled. I didn’t have to worry about wrangling the dog outside because I’d already let her into the sunroom before the jewelry shindig, but I did rush back to my room to check on the kids. God bless ’em, they were behaving perfectly. Ben was sitting in his play area flipping through a board book about fire trucks, while Sara was cuddled with Ellie on my bed, focused on her movie.

      She barely glanced in my direction. “Is your party over, Mommy?”

      “Not yet, but there are some people coming to see the house.”

      “Do we have to leave again?” She did look at me then, annoyance clear on her young features. “I haven’t watched my favorite song yet.”

      Though she’d stopped viewing potential buyers as The Enemy, she resented her life being disrupted for the convenience of others.

      “Nope, just stay back here in Mommy’s room. Don’t even get off the bed, okay?”

      Her brown eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “What if I have to use the bathroom?” The way she was always looking for loopholes, I figured she had a brilliant future as an attorney.

      “Why not go use it now?” I suggested. “Hurry, because they’ll be here soon.”

      I went back to the living room, suspecting Mrs. Winslow would try to cut me out of my half of the profits if I didn’t actually spend a few minutes helping her. I was explaining, as per the instructional brochure, why jewelry should be the last thing you put on before you go out when our doorbell rang. The Realtor let himself in before I got there, however. Either he’d only rung the bell to prevent startling anyone or he’d remembered after doing so that I had guests and didn’t want to interrupt.

      Behind the agent, there was a harried-looking couple who wore matching we-stopped-being-able-to-tell-floor-plans-apart-twelve-houses-ago expressions. They had three kids in tow. I wasn’t sure this house had enough space for a family of five, but the youngest child was a girl who appeared to be about four, and I suspected she’d appreciate the girlish decor in Sara’s room, hopefully causing her to remember this as a house she liked. In case they gave the four-year-old a vote.

      Yeesh, I really was desperate.

      “Hi. Come on in, and please look around,” I invited. “Don’t feel like you’re imposing, just take your time.”

      I barely resisted the urge to tack on, And we have some lovely blue topaz earrings that would match your eyes, ma’am.

      The four-year-old made a beeline for the refreshment table, only to be scolded by her father, at which point she burst into tears. The middle child, a boy wearing a black T-shirt and a scowl that made me recall every time my dad had ever teased, “Your face is gonna freeze like that,” declared, “I don’t like this house. It smells funny.”

      I chose to believe that any odor came from the combined eight or nine perfumes and numerous arthritis relief creams of my guests.

      The Realtor cleared his throat, meeting my gaze. “Um, kitchen’s this way, is it?”

      I nodded, but they hadn’t yet turned the corner when there was a cry from the back of the house. The realty party froze in place as I strode toward the hallway.

      Sara catapulted out of my room, screaming, “Snake!” She was moving with astounding speed for someone who had Dora the Explorer panties down around her knees beneath her denim skirt.

      I met her halfway, scooping her up and probably giving her a wedgie as I hurriedly tugged her undies into proper place. “Are you all right?”

      She nodded. “But there’s a snake, Mommy!”

      In all the time we’d lived in this house, we had never once had a snake in the house—if we did, Tom was smart enough not to tell me about it—so why now? Why today? This was way beyond simple Murphy’s Law. This was more like Murphy’s Magna Carta. I instinctively muttered a phrase under my breath that I sincerely hoped Sara hadn’t heard.

      With Ben still at the back of the house, I jogged down the hall, not acknowledging the buzz of alarmed comments behind me. “Where was it?”

      “In the bathroom.” Her voice was shaking. “I was sitting on the potty, singing ‘Catalina Madalina,’ and I looked down and seen it. Saw it.”

      “Okay. I’ll take care of it.” How?

      Maybe it was just a little bitty garden snake, the harmless kind that could be tossed outside. Not that I particularly wanted to get close enough for tossing, but as the only adult in the family, these things fell to me. And if it isn’t harmless?

      Ignoring that thought, I lifted Ben out of his pen and set him down in the hallway, letting him crawl for freedom. Save yourself, son. Sara, dragging Ellie by the trunk, followed me so closely that if I stopped, she’d bang into me.

      “Stay back,” I told her as I approached the master bath. When I glanced at her to make sure she understood I was serious, I saw that the Realtor and the family touring the house were all hovering in the bedroom doorway. The preteen daughter looked as if she might lose consciousness. The sullen boy was actually smiling now. Figured.

      There was no closet in my bedroom, but the bathroom was spacious enough to make up for the deficiency—equipped with the standard toilet and sink vanity, a shower/garden-spa tub and a walk-in closet with its own lights. I’d better find the damn snake, because I didn’t relish wondering if it would slither out at me every time I opened the closet door for the next week.

      The Realtor cleared his throat—a habit of his, I’d noticed. “So why again are you trying to get rid of this house?”

      “We’re selling the house because I accepted a job in Boston,” I said, wondering what part of my tense body language made it look as if now were a swell time to chat. “Sara, where did you see it?”

      “Under the sink. It’s green.” She was climbing up on my bed as she answered, her eyes wide.

      Green. Most harmless garden snakes were green, right? I peeked into the room, my gaze coming to a screeching halt when I saw the thin green line across the tile, curling slightly. It was only a couple of inches long, but it disappeared beneath the edge of the vanity, so I wasn’t sure how much more there was. I executed a leap that would have qualified me for National Champion Long Jump status and then reached into my closet for a shoe box, dumping

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