The woman at the house four doors down was standing on her porch steps wrestling with a tangled string of Christmas lights and what appeared to be a circuit breaker panel mounted beside the front door. She was in her mid-70s, small-framed but sharp in the way of people who had never found slowness particularly appealing. She yanked at the breaker. The lights on the porch went dark. Nolan pulled on a jacket.
I can take a look at that if you want," he said from the end of her driveway. She turned and assessed him with the kind of direct efficiency that reminded him of people who had been reading people for decades and were rarely wrong about it. "You're the one who moved in 3 weeks ago," she said. "Took you long enough? "Took me long enough to what?
"To come over," she gestured at the panel. "It's tripping on the northwest strand. The connections corroded. He climbed the porch steps and looked at the panel. She was right.
The contact point on the northwest circuit was oxidized, probably from sitting unused in a garage for a few years. He pulled the breaker, cleaned the contact with the small folding tool he kept in his jacket pocket out of old habit, and reset it. The lights came on. ""You carry tools to job interviews?"" she asked. "Not usually," he said. He hadn't realized she'd seen the suit still visible under his jacket.
Today was unusual. She introduced herself as Judith Keane. She had lived at 1847 Juniper Crest Lane for going on 31 years. She knew everyone in a four-block radius, had opinions about all of them, and shared those opinions without being asked, which she seemed to regard as a public service rather than a social habit. Nolan carried three heavy supply boxes from her car into the kitchen while she directed him on where each one belonged.
She did not offer to help carry them, which he respected. "You don't have family around?" she asked, not unkindly. "They're in Oregon. Last flight out was full," he set the final box on the counter. "I'm used to it.
"Used to it?" she repeated in the tone of someone filing that information away under concerning. I'll be fine, he said. I've got things to do. What things? He couldn't immediately name any.
Judith folded her arms. I'm having Christmas Eve dinner tonight, at 6:30. There will be food enough for twice the people who are coming, which is a consistent problem I've never managed to solve. That's kind of you, Nolan said. But I don't want to impose on your families.
You're not imposing, I'm inviting. I appreciate it, but that was the invitation, she said. The next thing I say won't be an invitation. Nolan looked at her for a moment. I'll bring something, he said.
Don't bring wine. My nephew brings wine and it's always too expensive and nobody enjoys it because we're all afraid to drink it. Bring something we'll actually use. He spent the afternoon doing three things. He unpacked the box of kitchen items he'd been avoiding since moving in.
He called his sister in Oregon and talked for 40 minutes about nothing in particular, which they both needed. And he stood in the grocery store wine aisle for 6 minutes before remembering Judith's instructions and going to find sparkling cider instead. He bought pecan cookies because they were on the display near the register, and they looked like the kind of thing that would disappear quickly at a party. By 6:15, he was standing in his kitchen holding a bottle in a bakery box and wondering if he was making a mistake. He had nothing against the woman.
She had been warm and funny and relentlessly practical. But he was tired in the particular way that comes after an interview you already know you've lost. And the idea of spending an evening performing social normalcy in a stranger's living room had a certain exhausting quality to it. He went anyway. He told himself it was because he'd already said yes.
He told himself the walk would do him good. He told himself a lot of things. He rang the bell at 1847 Juniper Crest Lane at 6:28 p.m. The door opened and warm light and the smell of something roasting spilled out into the cold air. And Nolan stepped inside and then he stopped. She was standing beside the Christmas tree on the far side of the room.
No blazer, no conference table, no assistant hovering two steps behind her with a tablet. Camille Rhodes was wearing a cream cable-knit sweater and holding a tray of stuffed mushrooms and talking to a man Nolan didn't know, and she looked entirely like a person at home in the world, until she turned her head and saw him, and her expression went through surprise, recognition, calculation, and something harder in about the span of a second and a half. Nolan felt the bottle in his hand suddenly weigh more than it should. Judith materialized beside him. You made it.
Give me those. She took the cookies and the cider with the efficiency of a woman who had been hosting for decades. Come in. It's cold. Camille crossed the room.
She moved with the same directness she'd had in the conference room, but there was something different in it now. Tighter, less measured. She stopped a few feet away and looked at him the way she had looked at him that morning, except this time there was something underneath it that hadn't been there before. "What are you doing here?" she said, low enough that only he could hear. Before he could answer, Judith appeared again with two glasses and a complete lack of concern.
"Camille, this is Nolan Mercer. He just moved in down the street. She handed them each a glass. He fixed my porch lights today and he didn't complain once, which puts him ahead of most people I know. She looked between them cheerfully.
"Do you two know each other? A pause that lasted exactly long enough to mean something. "We've met," Camille said. Judith accepted this without elaboration and moved back toward the kitchen. Camille waited until she was gone.