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    Eugene and the Box of Nails
    Eugene and the Box of Nails
    Eugene and the Box of Nails
    Ebook85 pages1 hour

    Eugene and the Box of Nails

    By Jaime Samms

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    About this ebook

    Every time it seems like things are looking up for Eugene Kraft, disaster hits. Bankruptcy, a bigoted sibling, and a back-breaking accident have all left him with little money and less faith in the universe.

    His last-ditch effort at peace is the small lakeside property where he is building a tiny house from recycled materials. If he can get it livable before the cold sets in, maybe he’ll be okay. Hopefully Cullen, the foreman on the construction site next door, won’t notice Eugene pilfering discarded materials from his dumpster.

    When Cullen stops by to talk to Eugene, he’s sure the gig is up—but all Cullen wants is a date. Can two things go right in Eugene’s life? At first it seems possible. Projects on Eugene’s house are getting completed by what he dubs “construction elves” while he’s off site. But like Eugene predicted, his good fortune can’t last, and soon he has a tough choice to make: give up his home… or the man of his dreams.

    A story from the Dreamspinner Press 2017 Advent Calendar "Stocking Stuffers."

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDreamspinner Press
    Release dateDec 1, 2017
    ISBN9781640803169
    Eugene and the Box of Nails
    Author

    Jaime Samms

    Jaime Samms is a plaid-hearted Canadian who spends the too-long winters writing stories about love between men and the too-short summers digging in the garden. There are dust bunnies in the corners of her house—which she blames on a husky named Kai. There are dishes on the counter—which is clearly because teenagers! There is hot coffee in the pot and the occasional meal to keep her from starving—because her husband is remarkable and patient. A multi-published author whose work has been translated into French, Italian, and German, Jaime delights in the intricate dance of words that leads her through tales of the lost and broken hearted men she writes about to the love stories that find and mend them. And when the muse is being stubborn, she also makes pretty things with yarn and fabric scraps because in her world, no heart is too broken to love, and nothing is too worn or tired it can’t be upcycled into something beautiful. All it takes is determination and the ability to see life a little bit left of center.

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    • 3/5
      A little christmas-y, crafting-y story. Supposed to be warm and uplifting but turned out to be flat and ... boring. Had potential but it feels like the author lacked imagination or time or will to build it up to a proper story.

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    Eugene and the Box of Nails - Jaime Samms

    Table of Contents

    Blurb

    Dedication

    Text

    About the Author

    By Jaime Samms

    Visit Dreamspinner Press

    Copyright

    Eugene and the Box of Nails

    By Jaime Samms

    Every time it seems like things are looking up for Eugene Kraft, disaster hits. Bankruptcy, a bigoted sibling, and a back-breaking accident have all left him with little money and less faith in the universe.

    His last-ditch effort at peace is the small lakeside property where he is building a tiny house from recycled materials. If he can get it livable before the cold sets in, maybe he’ll be okay. Hopefully Cullen, the foreman on the construction site next door, won’t notice Eugene pilfering discarded materials from his dumpster.

    When Cullen stops by to talk to Eugene, he’s sure the gig is up—but all Cullen wants is a date. Can two things go right in Eugene’s life? At first it seems possible. Projects on Eugene’s house are getting completed by what he dubs construction elves while he’s off site. But like Eugene predicted, his good fortune can’t last, and soon he has a tough choice to make: give up his home… or the man of his dreams.

    For my sister-in-law, Jenn. She totally knows why. Happy Christmas, I wrote this in July. You’re welcome.

    Thanks to Mary for keeping me on the straight and narrow, i.e., nonkinky path, this time. We did it! (Bears don’t count.) Thanks to Grant for answering 1001 construction questions, complete with napkin diagrams, price quotes, and building code violation warnings.

    IT WAS heart-stoppingly cold outside. Eugene hopped from the step of his trailer to the ground. The heavy metallic clank startled a crow up from the fire pit, its cantankerous cry echoing too loudly inside Eugene’s head. Sunshine glared down, and Eugene wished for just one snowy, overcast day. At least that would be a relief from the unrelenting cold. A quick glance around his minuscule front yard quashed the thought, though.

    Devoid of anything resembling grass or, heaven forbid, a flowering plant, the space looked more like the worst areas of the construction site next door than a yard. He was—or wanted to be—a landscape contractor, for goodness’ sake. But like the shoemaker’s kids, his yard was the last to receive attention and it showed. Nothing to remind him how close it was to Christmas. He should think about that. Even a pine tree in a pot or a garland on the trailer could hold a few strings of lights—brighten the place up.

    This is depressing. He scowled at the crow, who clucked at him from an overhead wire. What would you know about it?

    The crow cawed. Loudly.

    Shut up.

    Grumbling under his breath, Eugene tucked his hands under his armpits and shuffled across the hard-packed ground. Pink morning sunshine skittered off the ice filigrees surrounding the reed stems edging his nearby pond. Less than twenty yards away, a small trickle of water spilled over the rocks and down to the lake in a miniature waterfall. The sound grounded him, and he smiled.

    Never get tired of that, he decided, and eased a breath out. He watched it swirl away in the morning air. The lake should have been frozen by now, but weather changed, he guessed. Really, he should be glad there was no snow yet, even if Christmas was only a month off. He still had a lot of work to do to get the place winter-ready.

    The dwindling pile of salvaged two-by-fours tucked up under the trailer mocked him. He was close to completing the framework for the timber walls that would define his home. He had just enough long timbers left to erect the last outer walls; so he would have to be judicious how he measured and cut. He didn’t have any room for mistakes.

    As he stood there, the crow returned to sift through the ashes of his fire. It was a wasted effort on the bird’s part. Eugene was careful not to leave food refuse around, or he’d be overrun with seagulls and other enterprising city wildlife.

    It did remind him that if he was going to check the construction site’s bin, he’d better do it quickly, before the first workers arrived. He didn’t really think his early-morning thievery went unnoticed, but as long as no one saw him, no one seemed inclined to say anything. It wasn’t like he was taking anything they planned on using. It was all in the garbage already. He was recycling. Reducing his carbon footprint.

    Scavenging. Whatever.

    Determined, he pulled his gloves from his back pocket and hustled down the path leading through the five feet of scrub brush that separated his lakefront postage stamp from the site next door. At the top of the hill, he could look down on the house undergoing renovations. It was roughly twenty times the size of his modest five-hundred-square-foot-ish floor-and-a-half plan. Where his neighbours had opted to blast out half the mountainside to create a flat space large enough for their monstrous dwelling—right on the beach—the bulk of Eugene’s land remained vertical.

    Sure, the beachfront portion of his yard was about twenty feet straight down a switchback stairway, but the upside was that he enjoyed an unobstructed view over the lake and would never be bothered by unpredictable water levels.

    Not getting the work done, Kraft, he muttered to himself, and set out down the stairs.

    At the bottom he had a quick look around, but the site was still quiet. Reeds crackled and whispered along the shore between his beach and theirs. Mist lifted in ethereal veils off the water. Somewhere in the bush at the foot of his cliff, a small animal rustled through papery oak leaves. The quiet was amazing, given he was less than a ten-minute bus ride from downtown.

    A distant horn reminded him he wasn’t the only person up and about, and that he had a mission. He headed for the bin, which, if he wasn’t mistaken, was a good fifty feet closer to the property line and the bottom of the stairs than it had been yesterday. It was

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