the split of her parents. She had determined that solid, unexciting Harry was exactly the kind of man to pin those kinds of hopes and dreams on.
She had known him. She had known he woke up at precisely seven-ten every morning. She had known he would always order grilled cheese at the university cafeteria. She had known he preferred the news over The Big Bang Theory. Angie had thought that what she had shared with Harry was intimacy and that it would lead her directly to the safety she craved. She had thought their entire lives were predictable enough to make her comfortable.
But in that boat, sharing a spoonful of ice cream with a near stranger, she had felt as if she was digging into the tip of the iceberg that was intimacy. She had felt exhilarated by the potential for danger, not afraid of it. In fact, the exhilaration was in part because, for the first time in far too long, she had not been afraid. She had been the opposite of afraid.
She had been fearless.
And she knew that feeling of being fearless was not going to go willingly back into its box.
She glanced at a clock. It was really too late to do anything and yet she felt too energized by her encounter with Jefferson to go to sleep. She unpacked the groceries and put them away, smiled at the video of Wreck and Me. If she left it out for him to find, would he watch it?
Still filled with a restless kind of energy once the groceries were stowed, Angie decided to make some blueberry muffins.
“If he gets nothing else from my stay here, he will be able to see there is life beyond bean burritos,” she muttered to herself.
* * *
Three days later, Jefferson felt like a prisoner in his own house, marking x’s on his wall. He was well aware that in the course of human history, three days was a very short time.
But in the context of having Angie aka Brook Nelson under the same roof as him, it was a torturous eternity. In his efforts to avoid her, she had driven him underground. He’d always enjoyed working at night; now it felt compulsory.
But despite seeing her only occasionally—her crazy hair hidden under a babushka obviously of her own invention, her legs looking long and coltish in shorts and skirts, T-shirts clinging to her, the sweat beading on her neck, the cobwebs sticking to the rubber gloves she always wore—there was no pretending she was not here. Even though she seemed to be avoiding him just as scrupulously as he was avoiding her, the house smelled different since she had arrived.
If it was just the smell of cleaning supplies and fresh air, it would not have been so disturbing. But no... Her scent—faintly spicy, clean, feminine—clung like a faint vapor in every room she had been in. Which, as far as he could tell, was all of them, except this room and his bedroom.
Also disturbing was the noise. If it was just the noise of the vacuum cleaner and the dishwasher and the washing machine and dryer, it probably would not have been so disturbing. But, though she was probably not aware of it, the more involved she got in some task, the louder she hummed.
Christmas tunes, of all things. “Jingle Bells” and “Here Comes Santa Claus” and “Silent Night.” On more than one occasion she had burst into bloody song and it had stuck in his head—Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Claus, right down Santa Claus lane—long after she had moved out of hearing.
The problem was she sounded so happy that he could not bring himself to tell her to stop. Even though he was avoiding her with all his might, on those occasions when he could not avoid bumping into her, Jefferson could see the tension she had arrived with had eased from her.
She was still easily startled—he’d come up behind her one day while she was vacuuming, and his eardrums were still ringing from the scream—but was losing that terrified, hunted look he’d first glimpsed on her first day when the pinecone had dropped on her car.
It was not just that the house was undergoing a transformation, which it surely was. Dust was disappearing. Cobwebs were being banished. Floors were emerging from under a layer of grime. Windows were, one by one, beginning to shine.
The biggest transformation was in his kitchen. The day’s mail was neatly sorted. Every surface was gleaming. Every dish he left there in the dark of night was swept away. The fridge had real cream in it for his coffee, and milk for the selection of cereals that had appeared. There were single-serving containers of yogurt, and lettuce and tomatoes. There was a selection of drinks. There was fresh fruit in a bowl on the counter.
Best of all—or perhaps worst of all, depending how you looked at it—were the meals that she left for him. Though the heat was climbing into the nineties and was over one hundred again, once, every day she had the oven on for something.
The rich smells tantalized him even before he took his nocturnal journey down to the kitchen to see what she had done. Muffins. Fresh bread. Cookies. Last night, she had left him a roast chicken dinner.
Tonight she had left a steak, and a tinfoil-wrapped potato with careful instructions how to grill it.
He set down her note, aware he felt like a wild animal being lured in by the promise of food. His anticipation for what she would make for him grew every day.
If she wanted to discuss things with him she left him a note. He was uncomfortably aware that he was looking forward to the notes as much as the food. He looked around for today’s and found it next to the stack of other ones.
He went through the old ones, aware he was smiling. Hers...
Have you got a ladder I could use outside?
His...
DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES GET ON A LADDER.
Would tomorrow be a good day to put the furniture out on the deck for an airing?
DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES TRY TO MOVE THAT FURNITURE BY YOURSELF.
I have a system figured out.
NO.
Tonight, he read her response to that, aware he was looking forward to it.
I’m going to put the couches on dishcloths, like coasters, and slide them across the floor. Must you write in all caps like that? It’s disconcerting.
NO, YOU AREN’T, he scrawled with great enjoyment. AND YES, I MUST WRITE IN ALL CAPS. I FAILED PENMANSHIP IN SCHOOL.
He hesitated. Too much information? Stop analyzing everything. Admitting he’d failed penmanship in school was not the same as admitting he’d had a terrible row with his wife, and she had gone out into a storm...
He shook that thought off. A gentleman would offer to help Angie move the furniture.
But no, the two weeks minus the time elapsed would be so much easier to get through if he stayed on his path of avoidance. It was good, anyway. He was way ahead of schedule on the Portland project.
He went out to the deck and lit the barbecue as per her instructions. He stood there for a moment, taking in the dark surface of the lake, the lights across the way, the night sounds. It occurred to him it had been a long time since he had felt something like this: just simple enjoyment.
It occurred to him, even
