Part Four

 

There are some TNR cats that Kevin decided he can’t bring. It seems like everyone in the complex feeds them, and they’re fine. They don’t want to be trapped, and Kevin is going to miss them, so he might go back to check on them. 

As for what the investors are doing with the place, I’m not sure. In the row of five townhouses that it was in, two were vacant and two were being rented by young families with small kids. Kevin was baffled how you could rent a place out that had bad foundation problems and pipes. I said they probably just gave it all a temporary fix. Kevin didn’t think they could do that. Then a couple days before closing, the investor said he was sending “his building people” to check the place out.  Kevin said they mentioned just slapping plywood up there on the ceiling and painting over it. I said yup, that’s probably what they’ll do. The doors that are off the hinges will just be temporarily fixed, and probably the pipes will be the biggest issue for them. I could be wrong. I think they’ll just paint over everything and rent it out for about $1500 a month. The foundation in a shared wall unit cannot really be fixed without messing up your neighbors’ foundation even more. All five owners have to be on board with fixing the whole building. On top of that, the HOA will give them hell, but the investors have a legal department that seems to know how to handle HOA’s. Maybe the investors want to eventually buy all four other units?  In my real estate class, I know there are strict laws about approaching someone to ask if you can buy their house. I don’t remember the details- I’d have to look it over to be sure. 

In the end, I don’t know what their plans with the place are. I’m glad Kevin got out of it. Not going to lie, I also like him treating me like a queen because I connected him with these people. And yes, I know that unlikely to last “forever”. 

Everything is moved into the guest house now, and as we “put stuff up”, I’m starting to realize how much of a difficulty I’m finding it to live with a man again. Evita’s father was the only partner I ever lived with. We got married in 2004 and divorced in 2010. Of course my last relationship was long distance. I stayed with him while I was there, but of course we never lived together. 

I’m finding myself extremely nervous about every little thing. I keep asking Kevin, can I put scotch tape with the bag clips, can I put my fridge magnets on the front of the fridge, can I put all our extra sundries in a plastic drawer unit because that’s what I always do, and so many other little bitty things. I kind of broke down when it was time for dinner and I heated up some vegetable croquets. I put them on a paper towel in the microwave and literally asked him if that was ok. I wondered, he might be “anti paper towel in the microwave” for God knows, whatever reason. Who knows. He seemed bewildered. “Yeah that’s fine”. He said. I asked if he wanted me to put it on a plate, but deep down I didn’t want to dirty a plate when we were so busy. He was like, either way is fine. He honestly didn’t care. 

It’s because Evita’s father was so extremely nitpicky about every little thing. I seemed to have forgotten how I would do one little minor thing a certain way, and he’d correct me in a pissed off manner. It’s been 14 years, so I just didn’t remember- until I started assuming Kevin was the same way. Kevin is not. I just have to tell myself, they’re different people. Kevin isn’t anal. Now that my daughter is almost 17, I wonder if she goes through the same crap with her dad’s nitpickiness as I did when I was married to him. I thought to myself, when she moves out and gets her own place, she’ll probably be amazed at all the things she’s able to do without her dad there. I felt like that in 2010. 

After the croquets in the microwave, I had to take a break. I went to Walmart and got a few things that we needed and just browsed the Easter stuff for a while to decompress. Off topic, but Walmart has cute clothes right now too.