The InstaLler

Kelle Clarke

We hire him to install a fence that will surround the swimming pool. He shows up tan, in a pair of loose cargos, keeps saying he charges a helluvalot less than the big companies. We keep saying price isn’t our biggest concern, safety is. I get that, he says, nodding once, twice, tells us he has three kids at home under five. Believe me, he says, I get it.

Day one, he makes small red chalk x’s where he plans to drill into the pock-marked cement tracing the pool’s perimeter. He squints in the sun. I watch him through the kitchen window, crawling on his hands and bare knees, a pencil in his mouth, chalk on the sidewalk. Later, my husband will check his work using a tape measure, chalk on his work khakis. 

Day two, he arrives early, takes a seat on the diving board, pulls a sandwich from his pack. 

“It’s fine,” my husband shrugs, watching him through the kitchen window. “A man’s gotta eat.” 

He shows us fence colors, suggests a sandy shade to blend with our desert landscape. “You’ll barely notice it’s there,” he says, holding the fence sample, fingering its coarse fabric. “We don’t mind knowing it’s there,” I say. “We want to know it’s there.” 

“Of course,” he says, “but it will blend in nicely.” Paint-drips in his beard, sandwich-bits at his lips.

Day three, he starts to drill. Hunched over like a camouflage rock, blending in with our landscape. He presses his cheek against the sidewalk, staring sideways to watch the drill move in and out of the ground. 

I watch him through the kitchen window while rinsing my toddler’s sippy cup, running smushed oatmeal and peas into the garbage disposal, pouring ice cubes into my already cold coffee. I imagine floating in the pool, eyes shut, while he works beside me, both of us sweating in the sun. He drills and drills.

By late afternoon, he’s gone off course. No more red x’s. He’s moved outward from the pool. 

 “He’s drilling all over the place!” I call my husband at work while spilling crayons across the kitchen table to distract our daughter, awake now from her nap and staring at the man outside drilling hole after hole. Everywhere.

Our house, a fortress of baby-proofing, each cabinet and toilet flusher and doorknob a Mensa-challenge, a riddle in a mystery in an impossible-to-open/lift/slam/crush/maim puzzle. All I’ve ever wanted is for her to be safe. 

“What do you mean all over the place?” my husband asks, distracted.

“I mean, not where they’re supposed to be,” I say. “Not by the pool at all.”

I look out the window and sure enough, he’s by the covered patio now, adjacent the outdoor bar, drilling into the cement next to the bonfire pit. 

“What the hell is he doing?” I say.

“Why are you asking me?” says my husband. “Go outside and stop him!”

He’s wearing headphones. I’m not going out there,” I say. “You need to come home.” 

“Okay, listen. Hang tight. I’ll call him.”

“Why is this happening?” 

The holes are piling up. The cement will all have to be replaced. 

He stops drilling, removes his headphones, sets down the drill, and answers his phone, his mouth unmoving, soft pink lips still clutching a pencil as he listens to my husband on the line. He nods. Looks up, directly into the kitchen window where I wave, stupidly, wishing I’d closed the blinds. Wishing we still had our pitbull. Not an aggressive bone in her body, but boy, could she bark. She was my excuse for closing blinds when the exterminators came, the cable repairmen, the pizza deliveries, the trick-or-treaters. She didn’t trust strangers. 

He gets up, cement dust clinging to callused knees, coarse leg hair. He stretches, holding the drill high in the air while he makes a starfish with his limbs, his shirt lifting to expose his slim, taut stomach, hard as cement, tan as his arms. He finds me still watching and waves, then points to the back door. Sweat darkens the pits of his green t-shirt. He points at his crotch with the drill, indicating he has to pee. Jesus Christ. I look to see if the door is locked. It isn’t. Why hadn’t I closed the blinds? I offer a stupid thumbs up and he lets himself in. 

“I got a little carried away out there,” he says. We look out at the yard together, covered in so many holes.

“It happens,” I say, scanning the space between myself and my daughter, my daughter and the front door, his body and my own. “Bathroom’s that way.” I point.

But he just stands there, eyeing the sweat on my coffee mug, the sweat on my forehead, holding his drill like a handgun, dripping cement dust on my clean kitchen tile. 

Kelle Schillaci Clarke is a Seattle-based writer whose stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Los Angeles Review, LEON Literary Review, Gone Lawn, CHEAP POP, and other journals. Her work has been nominated for Pushcart and Best of the Net awards, and she was recently awarded the Pen Parentis Fellowship for 2021-2022. She can be found on Twitter @kelle224 and at her website: www.kelleclarkecreative.com.