She'd probably figure out the drill or call someone else's or leave the curtain rod in the box for another 6 weeks, which honestly seemed fine. He picked up toolbox from the garage and knocked on her door. She opened it in 3 seconds like she'd been nearby. I thought you forgot, she said. I was dealing with my truck.
I know. I heard Marcus leave. She stepped back to let him in. Thank you for coming. Seriously, I've been looking at that box for 2 months.
2 months? Don't judge me. I'm not judging you. He stepped inside. I'm observing.
Her house was the same layout as his same builder. Same decade, but it looked nothing like his. Where Darius's living room was functional and clean and carefully organized in the way a man's home looks when he's managing everything alone. Clare's was full of texture. Fabric swatches on the side table.
Paint chips fanned out on the kitchen counter. A half-finished mood board leaning against the wall by the window. Stacks of design magazines in a basket by the couch with sticky notes bristling out from the pages. It looked like the inside of someone's mind. Living room window?
He asked. Living room window? He opened the box. Looked at the hardware. Looked at the window.
Looked at the wall anchors she'd already attempted to install, which were in the wrong position by about 2 in. He said nothing about the wall anchors. He got the stud finder from his toolbox. I already found the studs, Clare said. Okay, I used a magnet.
He paused. A magnet? That's a thing. You can use a magnet to find the nail heads and then you know where the studs are. That's not He stopped.
It's approximately a thing. It worked. I can see that. He said, looking at the holes in the wall real clearly. She pointed at him.
See, that's rude. I didn't say anything. Your face said something. He pressed the stud finder against the wall, started scanning. Your marks are off by 2 in to the left.
I told you the magnet worked. The magnet found something. I'm not sure it was a stud. Clare sat down on the arm of her couch and watched him work with her chin propped in her hand. You're very confident for a man who came over here voluntarily on a Saturday.
My truck wouldn't start and I had nothing else to do. And yet here you are saving my curtain situation. I'm hanging a curtain rod heroically. He looked at her over his shoulder. She was smiling, not the polite smile she used when they talked across the driveway.
A real one, the kind that reached everything. He looked back at the wall. "Get me the screws," he said. 20 minutes later, he was on the ladder she'd found in her garage, a six-foot aluminum step ladder. Third rung missing, which he noted and which waved off.
And they had settled into a rhythm of bickering that felt strange only because it felt so comfortable. "It's crooked," Clare said. "It's not crooked. I'm looking right at it. You're looking at it from an angle.
I'm looking at it straight. You're standing 3 ft to the left of center. Come stand here." He pointed at the floor directly below the rod. She walked over, stood where he pointed, tilted her head.
Okay, it's close. It's level. I used a level. Where did you even get a level? My toolbox.
Who carries a level in their toolbox? Someone who hangs things straight. She laughed. Not a polite laugh. A real one.
The kind that surprised her. And for just a second, Darius let himself feel what it was like to make a person laugh like that. Then he finished securing the bracket, descended the ladder, and they unfolded the two curtains together a deep charcoal linen that she'd had folded on the couch for apparently 2 months and slid them onto the rod and stepped back. The room looked better, dramatically better. The curtains grounded the whole space, pulled the gray in the rug up to eye level, made the window feel intentional instead of forgotten.
Clare stood with her arms crossed, nodding slowly. Okay, she said. Those are really good. They're curtains. No, I mean the placement, the height.
You hung them high and wide. She looked at him. You've done this before. I've done most things before. Interior design, HVAC, but I've rented spaces.
You hang curtains high and wide, and the room looks bigger. It's not complicated. She was looking at him with an expression he couldn't quite read. Not quite surprise. Something more specific than that.
What? He said nothing. She turned back to the curtains. I'm just She seemed to reconsider. Nothing.
He picked up his toolbox. I'll fill those old anchor holes on my way out. You've got some spackle somewhere. Bathroom cabinet. Bottom shelf.
He started toward the hallway. Darius. He stopped, turned. Clare was still standing in the center of the room, but she wasn't looking at the curtains anymore. She was looking at him.
Her arms were uncrossed now. Her hands were in her pockets. She had the posture of someone who had made a decision and was standing inside it. "Close them," she said. "When you're done," he went very still.
"Not the stillness of a man who doesn't understand, the stillness of a man who understands too clearly and is deciding what to do with that." He looked at the curtains. They were undrawn, hanging open on either side of the window. The afternoon light coming through the glass and cutting a bright rectangle across her floor. He looked at the window itself, the street outside, a neighbor across the way pulling into his driveway.
Another walking a dog. Why? Darius asked. His voice was level. Careful.
The way he kept his voice when he was in a situation where the wrong word could change everything. Clare glanced toward the window because everyone around here watches everything. He crossed the room slowly. He gripped the first panel. He pulled it across.
Then the second, the light changed. The room went quieter, not dark, but dim. The kind of afternoon dim that makes a room feel like it belongs to the people in it. He turned around. Clare was watching him.