paying to cross the threshold, not earning money for doing so.
Emmy hopped out of the car and glided to the front door. I scurried behind her, so busy watching the tiny birds hopping from tree to tree that I tripped over the step. Klutz. I grabbed a pillar for support as Emmy fitted a key in the lock. Would the inside be as spectacular as the outside?
The answer was yes, but for all the wrong reasons. I gasped and covered my mouth as Emmy threw the door open.
“Holy freaking fudge.”
Emmy gave me a lopsided grin. “Yeah, something like that. I’ve got desensitised to it over the years.”
“What? How?” I had no other words.
Every available surface had something dumped on it, and the floor had to be two feet deep in junk. A narrow path led through the hallway to the horrors beyond. I trailed behind Emmy as she picked her way through with the care of someone crossing a minefield.
The kitchen sink held a pile of washing up, and from the look of the mummified remains, it had been there since the last century. Pizza boxes were piled three deep on the coffee table in the living room, and the number of assorted takeout containers indicated a culinary tour of the world.
The master bedroom was just as bad.
“What’s that pile in the corner?” I asked.
“I think there’s a laundry hamper under there somewhere. That’s just the start of it—when the pile got as high as him, Nick started throwing things into the room next door. And the one beside that. And the one after.”
I held up my hands. “Okay, okay, I get the picture.” I took another look around, just in case my brain had malfunctioned and misrepresented the piles of chaos. It hadn’t. “How does he live like this?”
She sat on the edge of the bed, the only visible piece of furniture in the room. “He doesn’t, not really. Occasionally he sleeps here or grabs takeout and sort of…picnics, but mostly he’s away working or he stays at my place.”
Her place? Maybe she wasn’t his assistant then? Ah. She must be his girlfriend. I made a mental note not to let any derogatory comments slip out, although Emmy seemed less than impressed with the house herself.
Even so, I couldn’t help asking, “B-b-but how... How could he let it get so bad?”
Emmy pursed her lips and stared past me for a moment, considering her answer. “There was an incident a few years back. He lost interest in the house, and tidying fell off his to-do list.”
That must have been some incident. “What about clothes? How does he find anything to wear?”
“If he’s in a hotel, they do his laundry. Sometimes it gets done over at mine.” She shrugged. “Otherwise he just buys new stuff.”
Wow. He buys new stuff. Just like that. “Oh my gosh. I’m not sure I’d even know where to start.”
I had visions of me driving around in one of those trucks you see at garbage dumps, shovelling everything out of the way. A bubble of laughter threatened to escape, and I quickly smothered it with my hand.
Emmy grimaced. “I was afraid that you might say that.”
I know she warned me it was awful, but nothing could have prepared me for how bad it was. Even watching Hoarders. And this house was huge—I’d be like an ant trying to move a mountain.
But I really, really needed a job, and this dumpster fire of a mansion would guarantee employment for a very, very long time.
“I suppose I could tackle one room to start with, then work my way through.”
Emmy arched a perfectly plucked eyebrow. “You’ll do it?”
“How much would I get paid?” Not that it mattered. I couldn’t afford to be picky.
“How about seventy?”
Seventy dollars a day. If I worked six days a week, that made four hundred and twenty dollars, so seventeen hundred dollars a month. That would definitely pay the rent, food, and utilities, but there wouldn’t be a lot left over towards all the medical bills. Dare I try my luck?
“I’ll do it for eighty.”
“Done. When can you start?”
Huh? She didn’t even come back with a counter offer? I’d only been hoping for seventy-five. Still, Momma always told me not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and that was two hundred dollars a month extra for me.
“Uh, anytime? Tomorrow?” I didn’t have any shifts scheduled at the café until next week, and the boss had a pile of résumés behind the register from people