Sweet Harmonies (6 page)

Amanda shrieked and laughed until Justin put
her down, and then they shared a long and happy kiss.

“
Hmmm...” Ryan chuckled, turning to
Karina, “If that’s the prize for chivalry around here, I think I’d
better help you down!”

Karina winked, “Hey, play your cards
right...” she teased, and they both laughed.

Sam reached for the big sliding door of the
van, but Ryan stopped her. “In all seriousness,” he said, “let me
get out first. It’s quite a step down.”

And with that, he got out ahead of the three
ladies and helped them each down in turn. Karina was last, and as
she climbed out, he waggled his eyebrows at her, which had the
desired effect of making her laugh. It was a glorious sound, like
the tinkling of piano keys, like birds singing in the early morning
light, like pure silver ringing ever so delicately against cut
crystal. He knew at that moment that the rest of his life would be
measured - not in weeks or months or years - but rather in the
intervals between moments when he heard that intoxicating
laugh.

“
OK!” called Lauren, glancing over the
papers attached to the clipboard she was carrying, “Let’s gather
up, everybody. We have a lot to go over.”

“
Yes, sir!” Sam called crisply, as she
jogged over to where Lauren was standing. When she came to a halt
at her destination, she stopped and smartly saluted.

Lauren looked at her blandly, not
impressed.

“
Sorry,” Sam said, chagrined. She
leaned slightly toward Ryan and said, in an exaggerated whisper she
pushed out of the side of her mouth, “Lauren doesn’t like people
fooling around when she’s ready to get down to
business.”

Lauren raised an eyebrow, “One hundred
percent correct,” she said, nonplussed, and then looked around at
the assembled group. Sam, Karina, and Ryan were paying attention,
but Amanda and Justin were still fooling around - laughing,
tickling, chasing each other, and just in general having a good
time.

Sam cleared her throat loudly and yelled over
at them, “Excuse me! J’Amanda! Cut the horseplay, we’re
waiting!”

Karina looked at her quizzically,
“J’Amanda?”

“
Yep,” Sam replied, looking pleased
with herself, “It’s like Bennifer, or Brangelina. It’s their names
smushed together.”

“
It’s a portmanteau,” Lauren
supplied.

“
A what?” Sam asked.

Lauren grimaced and conceded, “It’s two names
smushed together.”

Karina laughed, “It’s not exactly a
combination of their names. It’s really just Amanda’s name with a
‘J’ in front of it.”

Sam shrugged, “I thought Justanda didn’t have
quite the same ring to it. How about Amustin?”

Lauren said, “How about we go over the
schedule?”

Amanda and Justin ambled up to the group at
that moment, still giggling and flushed.

“
OK, lovebirds,” Sam teased, “Are we
ready to get started now? Lauren’s been waiting for
you!”

“
Sorry, Laur,” Amanda
laughed.

Lauren raised her eyebrows at the assemblage,
but was wearing the faintest hint of a smile. “OK, now let’s get
started, then - no more nonsense,” she said in a mock-stern
tone.

“
What’s up first?” Karina
asked.

“
Well, first of all, here are maps of
the interior of the house. Each room is marked by name. Each box
should have a corresponding name, and each piece of furniture
should be tagged with a corresponding room name, as
well.

“
When we go inside, I’m also going to
be putting up signs in all of the rooms that correspond with the
name of the room, so it’s clear. You guys should just walk through
the house at first, familiarizing yourselves with the layout, the
way that it feels in real space. Commit as much of it to memory as
possible. It will save time when we’re hauling the boxes later, if
you don't have to stop and consult the map before carrying each
individual box to its destination.”

Ryan leaned over to Karina and said, “Wow,
I'm impressed. She really has this whole system mapped out.”

Karina smiled proudly at Lauren and replied,
“I know, she's really amazing at stuff like this. She's the most
organized and on-top-of-things person I've ever met.”

Lauren continued, “The movers will be
handling the furniture, obviously. I will be directing that
process. You all can start on the boxes, which are in the second
truck. The lighter ones should be on top. I should be finished
directing the movers by the time we reach the heavy boxes, which
may require more than one set of hands per box. I think that's
about it. Any questions?”

Sam, raising her hand, said, “So, we
basically bring the boxes in and put them where they go?”

Lauren cocked her head, unimpressed, and
deadpanned, “Pretty much.”

“
I think we can handle
that.”

Lauren shook her head, “Unless anyone has a
real question, let's head on in so you all can start familiarizing
yourselves with the floor plan.”

The group bounded toward the front door,
eager to get a look at Karina's new house. Only Lauren, Sam, and
Karina herself had seen the inside, and Sam had only seen it in the
dark.

As they made their way up the front walk,
Amanda jumped onto Justin's back so that he was carrying her
piggy-back style.

“
Hey, no fair!” Sam cried, “You're
blocking my view!”

As the group entered through the heavy, wood
front door, however, this turned out to be a completely invalid
concern. The entryway opened directly up into the cavernous living
room, with its vaulted ceilings and wall of glass three stories
high. The view was stunning, and panoramic, rolling mountains of
deep forest green pine trees, dotted here and there with groves of
fiery red and yellow aspens. The entire town of Hope Falls was
visible in the valley below, looking like a quaint miniature model
train set from this height and distance. Completing the tableau
were the brilliant blue accents of rivers, creeks and ponds which
dotted the landscape.

All of their breaths caught in their throats
and they were rendered momentarily speechless by the sheer power of
the beauty they were witnessing, even the two who had seen it
before. It was the kind of view that you could never really TRULY
get used to. You could see it a hundred times a day for fifty years
or more, and yet every time you walked in the room, some little
part of you would thrill at the sight, the way you did when you saw
it for the first time.

As the group began to disperse throughout the
house, looking at their maps and correlating their positions in the
real space of the house, Ryan fell into step beside Karina.

“
This house is amazing!” he said, awe
tinging his voice.

Karina looked embarrassed. She wasn't a
person that flaunted her wealth generally, but between this view
and the recording studio, she hadn't been able to resist the pull
of this extravagant home.

“
Yeah, I guess I'm not a starving
artist anymore,” Karina joked self-consciously.

Ryan looked at her quizzically, “Are you an
artist?”

Karina gave him a puzzled look, as if unsure
what to say next, as if she were trying to work out if he was
joking or not. She said slowly, “Um...I'm a musician...”

Their conversation was cut short by the
rumbling of two large moving vans pulling up outside of the house,
a sound which drew the rest of the crowd back to the entryway.

After that, much to Ryan's regret, there was
very little time for much of anything in the way of conversation.
When he had pictured this day in his mind as he was falling asleep
the night before and plotting out his plan earlier this morning, he
certainly hadn't imagined seemingly endless hot, sweaty, trudging
trips through the enormous square footage of her house, carrying
boxes containing what seemed to be countless fine possessions.

No, he had seen visions of he and Karina
making genial little trips back and forth between a U-Haul truck
and a small cottage-style cabin, laughing and chatting and horsing
around, like some sort of romantic comedy musical montage
scene.

He'd even imagined them bending over to take
drinks from a garden hose and ending up playfully splashing each
other with the water.

He was glad that he hadn't spent too much
time and effort mapping out his courtship plan beyond today. He had
been thinking along the same lines as he would have thought when
figuring out how to best court a girl from his small hometown in
Montana, and he could see now that those techniques might not be
the same ones that would work on Karina.

Truthfully, he felt kind of stupid for not
having realized this earlier. Now that he'd seen this gorgeous
mansion she lived in, he could see the indications of her big-city
sophistication in every small detail about her. The luxurious sheen
of her lustrous black hair, the graceful curve of her swan-like
neck, the poise with which she moved and spoke. All of these
indicated someone with sophistication.

He was a farm boy, when it came down to it.
He'd been crazy to think that he'd ever be able to impress someone
like this with his normal M.O. This might take some serious
creativity.

Ryan smiled.

He was up for it.

Chapter 4

Karina did not feel like this moving day was
shaping up to be all she had hoped for it to be.

I mean, sure. Her things were getting moved
into her house. And that was important. Some might even say...the
entire point of a moving day? Yes. She realized she was being
petulant.

But, in the corner of her mind she had hoped,
really hoped, that it would morph into her and Ryan sneaking off
into little corners of the house, stealing moments, teasing and
flirting and...she let her mind wander onward from there.

And in that respect, the day had certainly
started out strong. She had been getting definite vibes from Ryan
in the van. They had rendered her speechless initially, as a matter
of fact. She had begun to feel her hopes and wishes about the day
becoming stronger and more validated as the drive over to the house
had progressed.

When they had been standing in front of the
house getting the instructions from Lauren, as well. He hadn't been
sending the vibes of the same overtly FLIRTY variety at that point,
rather he had been sending a definitive “camaraderie” message. They
were on a team, they were a little group of two, a subset of the
larger group. That sort of thing. She had flirted enough to know
that this was one of the levels of good flirting, however. The
“sexy, seductive” style of flirting gets old if it's one-note. The
best flirters vary up their game with lots of different FLAVORS of
flirting.

From what she saw of Ryan up to that point,
he was an absolute champ.

But then they had started the actual moving,
bringing boxes into the house.

And...damn him...he'd been doing nothing but
bringing boxes into the house all this time!

Yes, sure, when they passed each other in the
halls or out by the truck, he'd give her a radiant smile, or wink
at her. A few times, she could swear he was even flexing his
substantial (and perfectly formed, she might add) muscles for her
benefit.

But, overall, he was just picking up boxes
and carrying them into the house.

She narrowed her eyes. OK, fine, then. If
that's how he wanted to play it, maybe she was just going to have
to take matters into her own hands, and move things along
herself.

She smiled to herself as she leaned over and
checked her hair in the side mirror of the moving van. Oh, yeah,
she told herself, not one to engage in false modesty – even sweaty
and dusty, I still look damn good.

She waited, trying to look natural, until
Ryan came marching back out to the truck.

She smiled brightly at him.

“
Hey, Ryan,” she said, tilting her head
coquettishly, “I wonder if you could help me with
something?”

He smiled back brilliantly, and she had the
most insane urge to actually squint her eyes against the 1000-watt
glare of his perfect grin.

“
Sure, of course,” he replied, “Your
wish is my command.”

OK, she recognized with satisfaction, the
flirting's back. I'm on the right track.

“
Here's the thing,” she said, “I'd
really like to get my studio set up as quickly as possible, and
it's kind of a two person job. Since you are a musician, would you
mind coming and helping me out with that?”

His face lit up with interest, “No, I don't
mind at all! That would be great! I'd love to get a look at your
equipment, as a matter of fact.”

There was an awkward silence and then they
both burst out laughing.

“
I really didn't mean that the way it
sounded,” he said, through bursts of hilarity.

“
No worries,” she teased back, “You can
check out my equipment any time.”

Sharing a good laugh seemed to break the ice
between them, and Karina found herself slightly less paralyzed by
the tension she felt in his presence. She led him through the house
towards the studio, which was located in the back west corner of
the first floor.

“
Seriously, though, as horrible as that
sounded before, the truth is that I'd really like to see what you
have in your studio. In a small town like this, it's such a
coincidence to meet someone else who is really into music. I really
thought I would be alone in that when I came here, like I was at
home.”

“
Oh, I know,” Karina said, “I don't
think I've ever met anyone else in Hope Falls that shared my
passion for music. But – and I don't mean this to seem arrogant in
any way, believe me – but, didn't your grandmother tell you that I
lived here?”