Tiny House on the Road Read online

  “How’s that working out for you?”

  Vivien wondered if Bale was being sarcastic, but he looked genuinely concerned.

  “I don’t really know yet,” Vivien said. “I just started my own business. I’m a professional organizer.”

  “And oracle.”

  “They go together,” Vivien said, warming to her subject. “After Starbeams, I worked for the Kloset Kompany. Two Ks. We organized stuff.”

  “What kind of stuff?” he asked.

  “Oh, you know, the usual—closets, attics, basements, paperwork, wine.”

  “Wine?”

  “Yes,” Vivien said. “I organized a man’s wine collection right before I came here.”

  “That sounds pretty interesting.”

  “It was, but most of the time it was the same old, same old. You can’t just keep your fingers crossed that a wine collection is going to come along every now and then.”

  “I guess not.”

  “So, I decided it would be cool to travel around, instead of staying in one city,” Vivien said. “I put a new spin on the whole business model. I’m going to provide personalized service. I’ll take on a client, they’ll explain their problem and I’ll see what they need right away. That’s why I call myself the Organization Oracle.”

  From the look on Bale’s face, Vivien could tell he wasn’t a fan of her new name.

  “I was also thinking of calling it ‘Vivien Orlando! I put the O in Organization.’”

  “I think the Organization Oracle is a great name,” Bale said.

  He smiled at her. Which was very different from laughing at her. She smiled back.

  “I can’t find your paperwork,” Bale said, throwing up his hands. The stacks of binder-clipped papers settled into place after being disturbed by his quest.

  “It’s five contracts down in the left-hand pile…well, the right-hand pile for you,” Vivien said.

  Bale stared at her for a second, then thumbed through the stack. Five contracts down and there it was. The final contract for Vivien Orlando.

  “That’s a miracle,” Bale said, holding up the contract and staring at it. He smiled at Vivien. “You really are an oracle.”

  Vivien shrugged shyly.

  Should she tell him she’d seen her name, recognizable even upside down while he was frantically flipping through his untidy stacks?

  “Maybe I can hire you,” Bale said, looking around his cluttered office. “I could use the help.”

  “Thanks,” Vivien said sincerely. “But I’m headed to New Mexico to my first client as soon as I pick up the house.”

  “New Mexico?” Bale said, sounding impressed. “Sounds exciting.”

  “The lady who is hiring me lives in a place called Casa de Promesas,’’ Vivien said, knowing she shouldn’t be giving away anything so confidential, but wanting to up the “exciting” ante.

  “House of Promises,” Bale said, now looking for a pen among the rubble of his desk. “Sounds like a good omen.”

  She knew she shouldn’t give away any of her organizing secrets. But she liked Bale and wanted to make up for her little subterfuge about spotting her name. She offered Bale a little advice.

  “You should use color-coded binder clips,” she said. “I mean, you use paper clips anyway, so why not sort them with various colors? One color for advertisement, one for bills—that sort of thing.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Bale said. “I bought a label maker to use on black binder clips, but…”

  “But,” Vivien said, “you never get around to actually making the labels.”

  “Exactly!” Bale said.

  “If you want to take it one step farther,” Vivien said, eyeing the wall behind his desk. “You could paint that wall with magnetic paint. They have magnetic binder clips, you know. So everything would be off your desk, but easy to reach and—”

  “And not put away in a filing cabinet,” Bale said, staring at the wall as if he’d never seen it before. “Because as you’ve probably guessed…filing is never going to happen.”

  “One thing about getting organized,” Vivien said. “It’s not one size fits all. You’ve got to know what you’ll stick with. You know what I mean? You have to know who you are.”

  “Funny you should say that,” Bale said, finally locating a pen. “I say the same thing about living in a tiny house. You really have to know who you are before you take it on.”

  Remembering what she’d learned in her college course on Start Your Own Business and Soar!, Vivien quickly added, “I can call you when I’m finished in New Mexico. Maybe we can work something out.”

  “Sounds good,” Bale said. “Want to go see your house?”

  Vivien nodded, too overcome to speak. She was giddy with possibilities.

  Maybe she was going to soar!

  Chapter 2

  The idea of a party after so long was exciting. Humming “Happy Birthday,” Priscilla Workman pierced the cupcake’s chocolate frosting with a pink-and-white candle. She studied the cupcake. It was lopsided and the frosting hid the fact that half the top was burnt, but nobody would know that. A birthday was as good an excuse as any to rummage around in the pots and pans that had been a fixture in the house since her grandparents built it, back when Sandstone as well as its better-known neighbor, Taos, were still sleepy New Mexico towns just starting to earn their reputations as arts colonies.

  It had been a busy day. She’d already laid out her mother’s good china, linen, and silver in the dining room. It was a rare treat to use the formal room. Not like the old days, when there seemed to be a party every weekend. Of course, back in the late 1940s and ’50s, when she’d been growing up, parties weren’t a lot of trouble. There had been plenty of servants. But Priscilla didn’t mind doing the work herself. Taking care of the house was getting harder with each passing year, but now was not the time to think about that. It was time to serve dessert!

  Priscilla lit the candle with a long wooden match. She didn’t like the look of her hands—at seventy, years of gardening had taken their toll with age spots, but she was grateful her fingers were still strong and steady. She blew out the match and cupped the flame protectively. She walked carefully toward the dining room, singing “Happy Birthday” softly, so she wouldn’t blow out the flame. She stepped lightly over Clay, her rambunctious boxer-mix. Priscilla had obviously bored him with all the party preparations and he was now snoring in the doorway.

  With the table in sight, she sang more forcefully.

  “Happy Birthday, dear Priscilla! Happy Birthday to you.”

  She put the cupcake down on the single plate and sat down. Smiling at the memories that sat in the other eleven empty chairs, she made a wish—the same wish she’d been making for fifty years—and blew out the candle.

  Chapter 3

  As Vivien followed Bale and Thor through the lot, she wanted to stop and examine every tiny house they passed.

  “That’s really pretty,” Vivien said, as a purple-and-green Victorian caught her eye.

  “Thanks,” Bale said. “I’ve always loved the Victorians in San Francisco. I thought a scaled-down version would be awesome.”

  Vivien smiled. Even though it was built on a trailer bed, the tiny house had all the complexities of the painted ladies of the Bay Area: delicate, lacy trim and intricate woodwork.

  “That platform built on a roof is called a Widow’s Walk,” Bale said, pointing to a tiny porch at the top. “It implies that a woman will have an unimpeded view of the sea while she waits for her husband, who might never return.”

  “That’s a downer,” Vivien said.

  “I didn’t come up with the name.” Bale laughed. “I just build them. The Widow’s Walk has to be installed once the house gets to a permanent location.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Height restrictions on the
highway,” Bale said.

  “Then why not just leave it off?”

  “Because then it wouldn’t be the design I wanted to create.”

  She loved the fact that Bale was so passionate about his work.

  “What inspired you to make this one?” Vivien asked as they walked by a log cabin.

  “There’s just something really inviting about a tiny log cabin. You can just imagine it anywhere,” Bale said.

  “Some people think tiny houses are just a passing fad.”

  “I wouldn’t build them if I thought that,” Bale said. “I think they’re here to stay. There are a lot of reasons people buy these. Some want to get out from under a huge mortgage. Some people don’t want to be tied down. Tiny houses spark the imagination.”

  “That’s for sure,” Vivien said, remembering the moment she decided a tiny house would fit perfectly into her scheme of becoming a traveling organizer.

  She’d been crunching the numbers, trying to envision moving from city to city, finding an apartment each time, furnishing it sparingly from thrift stores—and then when she’d secured her next job, selling everything and doing it all over again in the next town.

  She was installing movable shelves in a kitchen pantry while still working for the Kloset Kompany. She peeked out of the pantry to see the woman who owned the house watching a TV program on tiny houses.

  The woman turned to Vivien and said, “These are cute, but I could never live in one.”

  But I could, thought Vivien.

  “So, you’re headed to New Mexico….” Bale interrupted her thoughts.

  “I was hired by an old lady,” Vivien said.

  “Old like forty?” Bale teased.

  “Oh, no!” Vivien said. “Super old…like seventy. I placed some ads in real newspapers around the country. I figured there were a bunch of people out there who needed help decluttering who wouldn’t be looking online.”

  “Good thinking.”

  “It was my mom’s idea. She still reads the newspaper,” Vivien said, before being distracted by another tiny beauty. She pointed to a bright yellow number with a sun deck on its roof. “What about that one over there? That looks amazing!”

  “Customer demand,” Bale said. “I’m always listening to my customers. One thing they all say is you use the outdoors so much more when you live tiny. So a rooftop deck seemed a no-brainer.”

  Vivien was so caught up with the fantasy of living in each and every one of the houses she saw, she almost tripped over Thor. Bale had stopped walking and was standing in front of what Vivien assumed was a tool shed on wheels.

  “This is it,” Bale said, with a hint of pride, smacking the side of the shed. “Our smallest house!”

  “Wow,” Vivien said, staring at the miniature home complete with shutters and a bright orange roof. “It’s tiny.”

  “That’s sort of the point,” Bale said.

  “I know,” Vivien said. “I just thought it would be…a little bigger.”

  “If this isn’t the perfect fit for you, we have other styles and sizes,” Bale said. “So let’s just take a look inside and we’ll work from there. Trust me, I know Shrimpfork isn’t for everybody.”

  “Shrimpfork?”

  “That’s the name of the model,” Bale said. “You’re probably too young to remember a TV show called Dallas. It was about a Texas family. They lived in a gigantic house called Southfork. It tickled me to call this little unit Shrimpfork—it’s so much the opposite of that big old mansion.”

  Vivien stayed rooted to the spot, unable to make her feet move. Had she really bought a sixty-four-square-foot home? Looking at the house on Bale’s website, it looked ideal—small enough to tow behind her little truck, but with a loft, big enough to accommodate her and her meager possessions. She’d rationalized that her living space would be a testament to her skills as the Organization Oracle.

  But still—sixty-four square feet!

  She realized having doubts might cast a shadow on her oracle-ness, so she smiled brightly at Bale.

  “Let’s take a look,” she said.

  Bale opened the front door. Thor scrambled up the two wooden steps and shot inside.

  “Thor,” Bale called inside. “Get out here!”

  At the mention of his name, Thor stuck his head out the front door, giving Bale the blankest of his blank expressions.

  “That’s okay,” Vivien said. “He isn’t bothering me.”

  “No, he needs to come out,” Bale said, tugging gently on Thor and guiding him down the steps. “There isn’t room for all of us in there.”

  Vivien took a deep breath, and then climbed inside.

  There’s no room for a dog?

  She could take in the entire place with one glance. She decided to concentrate on each section of the house, hoping that would make it seem bigger. Ri5x7

  ght in front of her was the euphemistically named “kitchen,” which was positioned on the far wall (although no wall could be considered “far” in this place). The beautiful black-and-white granite countertop she’d picked out months ago was only a three-foot slab. The smallest sink she’d ever seen was set in the left side. There was one white cabinet on the wall, with a microwave the size of a shoebox mounted underneath. Beneath the countertop was a built-in mini-fridge, a drawer, and a shelving unit with two shelves.

  “The shelving unit comes out and has a wooden butcher’s block on top,” Bale offered. “I call it the chopping block.”

  Vivien smiled. She tried to pull the shelving unit out, but it refused to budge. She looked to Bale for guidance.

  “There’s a lock on the wheels,” Bale said, lifting the lock with the toe of his well-worn workman’s boot. He slid the tiny chopping station back and forth to demonstrate its mobility. Smiling at Vivien, he added, “This doubles your counter space.”

  Vivien nodded, hoping she looked encouraged.

  “Check out the bathroom,” Bale said. “It’s a great space-saver.”

  Vivien pivoted and walked past the area she assumed must be the living and dining room. It was no bigger than the five-by-seven throw rug she’d almost tossed because she wouldn’t be needing it. She was now grateful she’d kept it. It could be used as wall-to-wall carpeting. Bale was standing in front of the bathroom, requiring a little dance to get around him in the tight space. She peeked inside. She wasn’t quite sure of what she was seeing and, again, turned to Bale for explanation.

  “It’s a two-in-one shower-toilet combination,” he said.

  Vivien tried to envision using the shower as she studied the toilet set right in the middle of it.

  “There’s enough room behind the toilet to stand, if you aim the showerhead correctly,” Bale said as if reading her mind.

  Vivien studied the bathroom, trying to figure out what—besides space—was missing. She realized what it was. “Where’s the sink?” she asked.

  “No room,” Bale said. “But you’re only about five steps from the kitchen sink, so that shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “I guess that’s true,” Vivien said, envisioning the tiny amount of counter space being taken up with her toothbrush and makeup.

  “Check out the loft,” Bale said as he indicated a ladder by the front door. “I think you’ll be surprised how much room there is up there.”

  Vivien hoped so, considering how unnervingly small she found the downstairs. She stared at the ladder that projected into the room.

  “This takes up a lot of floor space,” Vivien said, touching the industrial looking ladder.

  “My thought exactly,” Bale said, striding to the kitchen. He grabbed a large yellow-and-orange oblong box and waved it at her. “That’s why I made this.”

  “It looks like a giant yellow remote.”

  “That’s because it is a giant yellow remote,” Bale said.

 
He aimed it at the ladder, which seemed to come to life like Frankenstein’s monster. It vibrated, it crackled, it hummed—then suddenly the ladder started to rise. Vivien stared open-mouthed as it lifted up toward the ceiling, folded itself in half and appeared to sit on the ceiling.

  “That was amazing,” Vivien said, genuinely impressed.

  “I figured Shrimpfork needed all the floor space available. Even a straight hanging ladder to the loft blocked the kitchen,” Bale said. “It took months to perfect this, but I have to admit—it’s pretty cool.”

  “I don’t recall anything like that in our design plans,” Vivien said, beginning to fret. “It looks expensive.”

  “It is expensive,” Bale said. “The larger tiny houses, pardon the oxymoron, give you much more space to create things. But I figured if I could get a ladder to work in sixty-four square feet, I could make it work anywhere.”

  Vivien nodded aggressively, but bit her lip to keep from yelling out: I can’t afford a levitating folding ladder!

  “I used this place as the test model,” Bale said. “It’s yours—at no extra charge.”

  “It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen,” Vivien said, as the burden of cost flew off her shoulders. “Can I try it?”

  “Sure,” Bale said, handing her the remote.

  Vivien frowned at the device. Remotes were not her strong suit. When she graduated from high school, her father, who managed a large electronics store, gave her an entertainment center so complex she couldn’t use it. When she made her announcement that she was moving into a tiny house, her father’s main concern was how she could possibly get along with just an iPhone and laptop. She never told him that as soon as she realized she could get Netflix on her laptop, she’d totally abandoned the entertainment center. When she’d dropped off the electronics at her parents’ home during her downsizing, she felt guilty about her subterfuge. But she knew the entertainment center was in more appreciative hands.

  “It’s pretty intuitive,” Bale was saying as she studied it. “Up and down arrows. That’s it!”

  Vivien pressed the “down” arrow and the ladder settled gently on the floor. She was about to press the “up” arrow, just to see the ladder in action, but Bale put his fingers on her wrist to stay her hand.