CHAPTER EIGHT
The House that Balkman Built
The Man with the Broken Hand
Oh, she was good. Three days at the hospital, she told Alexander. What she didn’t tell him was that they were three twelve-hour shifts, seven to seven. She had to leave the house by six and wasn’t home until nearly eight. She had to be up at five in the morning. She didn’t go fishing in Lazarevo at five in the morning, and now she was up at five putting on her girdle and nurse’s uniform!
But at least now that Tatiana was working her “part time,” “only three little days” hospital gig, Alexander didn’t have to take the first thing he found. He looked for more permanent work with the homebuilders around Scottsdale. He concentrated on custom builders only: he liked their quality and they paid better. He spent weeks trying to figure out where he would fit best. He didn’t quite know what he was looking for; he would know when he found it. Unlike his crazy wife, he was trying to get away from what he was, not rushing headlong into it.
After receiving half a dozen offers to train to be a framer, a roofer, and an electrician’s apprentice, he finally got two job offers that interested him—from G.G. Cain Custom Homes and Balkman Custom Homes. G.G.’s business was small: five or six well-built homes a year, because that’s what suited serious, laconic G.G., who wanted a living, not an empire. But it didn’t quite suit Alexander, who thought there was not enough living there for him, too. Besides, soon Tania would have another baby and they would have to go back to living on one salary.
That’s when he met Bill Balkman. Balkman Custom Homes was a bigger business than G.G.’s; they built ten true custom homes a year but also some moderately priced template homes and cheap homes for the college kids in Tempe.
Balkman’s office was in his own brand new stucco spec home, built on old farmland on Camelback that he bought from “an old peasant” and subdivided into forty plots.
“The template houses have the highest profit margin,” Balkman said. “I build them cheap and sell them high.” But he was looking for a new custom home foreman as his previous one had suddenly quit for reasons Balkman didn’t go into. What he did go into, with a big wide smile, was how perfect he thought Alexander would be for the job.
Balkman was a talker, a toucher, a hand-shaker, a laugher. He took to Alexander like he was a prodigal son come home. G.G. had been markedly more reserved. Balkman offered Alexander a promise for growth as well as a good salary. When Alexander told him he had no experience as a foreman, Balkman slapped him on the back and said, “Did you say you were in the army? Well, then, you can do anything.”
“Yes, if it involves shooting people.”
Balkman liked that. He was in his early fifties, and had a funny drooping moustache, a well-pressed suit and an easy going manner. Coming around the desk in his panelled, well-appointed office, he shook Alexander’s hand again. “I think we’re going to get along fine, just fine,” he said. “Come down the street with me. I want you to meet my son. He’s my other custom foreman. I think you two will get along splendidly.”
As they stood up to leave, Alexander glanced at Balkman’s wall display of framed degrees and letters from satisfied customers. Next to them a large color postcard of a topless woman was pinned to the panelling. “Viva Las Vegas!” the postcard said.
Alexander said nothing as his neutral gaze met Bill’s. “By the way,” Balkman said, smiling, “I forgot to ask. Are you married?”
“I am,” replied Alexander.
Balkman slapped him on the back again. “Oh well,” he said, “no one’s perfect. But don’t worry—we’re willing to overlook that.”
“I’m not willing to overlook that,” said Alexander.
The builder laughed. “Just kidding. You’ll see. We kid big around here.”
They walked four unpaved blocks to the construction site where his son was working. Balkman was telling Alexander that to be a foreman, one had to be an architect, mixed with a bit of an engineer, a plumber, an electrician, a manager, a hand-holder, and a psychologist. He smiled. “Think you can handle that?”
Alexander didn’t think he’d be a very good hand-holder. Maybe Tania should be a foreman. “Absolutely,” he said.
“And we work hard around here, Alexander,” said Balkman, “but we also play hard.”
Alexander agreed that work and play were both important.
Steve Balkman looked remarkably clean for someone who was supervising a construction site, as if he spent the whole time watching the men from his spit-polished car. Steve was young and well-groomed—spit-polished. The hair was in place, the face was fresh shaven, he was wearing cologne, his fingers looked manicured—well, the fingers on his left hand, anyway, with which he awkwardly shook Alexander’s hand. Steve’s right arm was in a cast from his elbow to the tips of his fingers. Aside from his busted arm, he was a pretty boy, a dandy, all fine and confident and smooth and smiling. Casual, friendly, open like his father. “Good to meet you,” said Steve. “You going to be working for us?”
“Don’t know yet.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know? Of course you are!” Balkman boomed with another hearty slap on Alexander’s back. “I won’t take no for an answer. When can you start? Because we’re breaking ground tomorrow just around the block, and I might as well baptize you by fire.”
Alexander made note of the attempts at military analogies.
“Stevie, Alexander was in the army, like you.”
Alexander took a long look at Steve.
“Steve was stationed in England,” Balkman said proudly. “He was wounded in the leg, not seriously, thank God, and came home because of it. Only saw action for four months.”
“Pop,” said Steve, “I was wounded in friendly fire, behind the lines. Some guy got careless with his weapon. I never saw any action. What about you, Alexander? See any action?”
“Here and there,” Alexander said.
“Ever wounded?”
“Nothing serious,” he said, the words themselves forming a neurotransmitter electrical connection that shot across the billions of synapses of his brain, down the spine, firing pain right into the closed fist of a hole in his lower back. One question, instant memory, and this in Phoenix!
Balkman suggested that Alexander might want to take a few courses in structural or civil engineering at Arizona State College in Tempe. “A degree in architecture is very useful in this business. My Stevie is thinking of going, too, now that the war is over. Aren’t you, Stevie?”
Alexander wanted to point out that the war had been over for four years.
And Steve said in a tired voice, “I’m thinking about it, Pop.”
“I think college is a very good idea,” said Alexander, taking out his cigarettes. Balkman flicked on the light for him. “My father wanted me to become an architect.”
“You see!” a beaming Balkman exclaimed to Steve.
“Where’s your old man now?” asked Steve.
“He’s not around anymore,” said Alexander, without a flicker even in his cigarette.
“By the way,” Balkman said to his son, sounding much less friendly, “the building inspector called me this afternoon, all worked up because he waited for you for an hour and you never showed. He had to leave for another appointment. Where were you?”
“I was there, Pop. I thought our meeting was at two, not one.”
“It clearly said one o’clock in the appointment book.”
“My book said two. Sorry, Pop. I’ll meet him tomorrow.”
“See, the problem is, he can’t tomorrow. He can’t till next week. It’s going to delay the ground breaking and cost us two hundred bucks to smooth it over with the plumbing and the cement crew who were ready to start. They gave up other work, and now I have to explain it to the homeowners…” He shook his head. “Ah, forget it. I’ll have Alexander meet with the building inspector. I’ll give him this project to work. Alexander, so you think you can start tomorrow?”
Alexander took the job. Words of engineering and architecture courses, of responsibility, of learning the house building business from the ground up, images of Bill Balkman congenially patting his back whirled in his head.
A thought flowed through that perhaps he should’ve talked to Tania first, but he was certain of her approval from twenty miles away.
Steve asked him to go for a quick drink. At Rocky’s down on Stetson in Scottsdale, they sat behind the bar and ordered beers, and Steve said, “Boy, Pop must really like you. He never hires the married ones.”
Alexander looked at him puzzled. “How many single men can he find after the war?” he said. “I’d guess not many.”
“Well, I’m single,” said Steve, grinning, “and it’s after the war.” He sighed. “I got engaged last year.”
Alexander was pleased that Steve had no interest in discussing the war with him; made it easier not to have to lie. “So what’d you get engaged for if you’re sighing?”
Steve had a good laugh over that one. “I did it because all I heard was when, when, when,” he said. “So I gave her a ring, and now that keeps her quieter. Not quiet, but quieter. You know what I mean?”
Alexander took a drink of his beer and didn’t answer, drumming his fingers on the bar counter.
“I’m only twenty-four, Alexander,” said Steve. “I’m not ready to settle down yet. You know? Haven’t sowed all them wild oats yet. When did you get circled?”
“At twenty-three.”
Steve whistled. “Were you still in the army?”
“Of course.”
“Wow. Alex—can I call you Alex?—I’ll tell you, I don’t know how you did it. Married at twenty-three and in the army? What about the oats?”
“All sowed beforehand.” Alexander laughed, raising his eyebrows and his beer glass. “All sowed beforehand.”
And Steve laughed right back, clinking with him. “Well, at least we understand each other. Man, the girls are everywhere, aren’t they? Restaurants, clubs, hospitals—I met one the other week at the hospital—you’ve never seen anything like her.”
“Speaking of hospitals,” said Alexander, “how’d you bust your arm?”
“Oh, I was an idiot. Tripped on a ladder at one of the houses and fell.”
Steve’s shoes and clothes didn’t look like he’d been up any ladders. Maybe that was why he fell.
“I keep telling Pop I’m not cut out for this business,” Steve said merrily, “but he doesn’t want to hear it.” He alternated swigging his beer and smoking his cigarette. “Which is why I am so flipping glad you came along. You’re taking a lot of pressure off me, frankly.”
“Well, always glad to help out,” Alexander said, shaking Steve’s hand, and getting up to go. He couldn’t wait to tell Tatiana.
They celebrated that night with a late dinner and champagne after Anthony had gone to bed. “I’m sorry I didn’t talk to you first about it,” he said, “but it just felt so right. What kind of feeling are you getting about them?”
“What, from twenty miles away?” They smiled. “If you’re happy, I’m happy, Shura.” She was lying in the crook of his arm, but looking at him thoughtfully. “What did you say the name of the company was again?”
“Balkman Custom Homes.”
“Balkman, huh,” she intoned. “Must be a common name around here. I’ve heard the name before.” She frowned.
Alexander was flying high, wired and excited. He told her about going to college starting January. “I’m going to get Richter to help me get a GI loan to pay for the tuition. Yes, yes, I know it’s a loan, but it’s Richter, it’s for my degree, and it’s worth it. What do you think?”
“It’s wonderful,” Tatiana said, kissing his chest scar under her mouth.
“And after I figure out what I’m doing, I’ll build a house for you.” He put his palms on her. “With these bare hands. So start thinking about what you want your dream house to look like.”
“I’m still thinking about what I want my promised potato countertop to look like,” she said, pressed into him.
The next morning Alexander left home at six thirty. He spent all day with Balkman. He met with the building inspectors and city construction supervisors, he met with the two architects, with the plumbers, foundation layers, electricians, roofers, plaster and brick and stucco guys, painters and cabinet makers, the crown molding guys and the door crew. He sat in on a meeting in Balkman’s office with prospective home buyers, he smoked three packs of cigarettes, he barely ate, and he came home at nine in the evening, starved and too tired to speak.
But at home he fell into the kitchen chair and Tatiana served him chicken stew in red chili wine sauce over onion rice, with warm bread; she lit his cigarettes and poured his drink and then sat with him on the quiet couch and caressed his head until he fell asleep and she had to wake him to come to bed.
She told him that on the three days she also worked late, Francesca gladly agreed to take Anthony home with her after school in return for a little money and Tatiana teaching her English.
“You teaching her English?” said Alexander. “You don’t see the ironies there?”
“I see ironies everywhere,” said Tatiana.
On Friday Steve asked Alexander out for a drink with another foreman, Jeff, who worked on middle-income houses in Glendale, and Alexander went and didn’t get home until eleven. Saturday he worked all day into the evening. Balkman asked him to come in for a few hours on Sunday, but Alexander said no. “I don’t work Sundays, Bill.” On Monday, Bill asked him to stay late to sit in on a meeting with prospective clients. On Tuesday, he had an early morning meeting, a lunch meeting, and another late meeting. The painter quit over a pay dispute, so Alexander had to finish painting one of the houses himself.
Leaving home early, coming home late, he was exhausted but exhilarated. And he liked Steve and Jeff. When they got a few drinks in, they turned into Lewis and Martin. Balkman trained Alexander himself, donning dungarees and going on the construction sites. One day over lunch, Balkman mentioned the training seminars where they learned about new construction materials, techniques, developments in air conditioning and roofing. “A few times a year, we go to these various conventions, builders’ shows. In Las Vegas.” Balkman paused significantly, his smile broad. “The foremen learn a tremendous amount, and the boys play a bit after a hard day’s work.”
“I’m sure they do.” Alexander smiled back.
“One’s coming up in two weeks.”
Alexander put down his fork. “Bill, I won’t be able to go.”
Balkman nodded sympathetically. “I know—married men have a harder time getting away. Have to smooth it over with the missus? I understand. Tell her it’s just for a weekend.”
“Yes, Bill. But in two weeks, I have to go to Tucson for the weekend. I’m a commissioned reservist for the United States Army. I give them two days a month.”
Bill also put down his fork. “A reservist? Oh, that’s going to be awkward. On the weekends?”
“Two days a month. Weekends seem easier.”
“Saturdays are our busiest day, Alexander, you know that.”
Alexander didn’t point out that Bill wanted him to be in Las Vegas on a Saturday. “I know. I’ll make up the work. I’m not going to let you down. But I have to go.”
“Is this going to be an ongoing thing?”
Alexander squinted. “As opposed to what? The ongoing Las Vegas commitments?”
“But a commission means you can resign after a certain time, can’t you?”
“Resign my commission?”
“Just think about it, is all I’m asking. You’re going to be very valuable to my business, Alexander. I want to give you every opportunity to succeed.”