He understood the impulse. The interior was everything. The exterior promised high ceilings, marble floors, rooms that opened into other rooms. It was also Daniel noticed deeply quiet, not peaceful quiet, empty quiet, the kind that settled into a place when the person living inside it had stopped filling it with sound. His and Maya's rooms were in the east wing, two bedrooms with a shared bathroom and a small sitting area between them that Claudette told him he could use as a study or Maya's play space.
The rooms were nicer than anywhere he'd ever lived. Maya set her backpack down on the bed and bounced once, testing the mattress and looked at him with an expression he recognized as contained excitement. She was trying to be cool about it, which was very funny given that she was seven. " It's okay," she said extremely casually. " Extremely okay," he agreed.
Claudette gave him the house tour with the efficiency of someone who had given it many times. The K, the medical supply room adjacent to the master suite, the physical therapy equipment room that had been installed on the ground floor, the scheduled medication times the contact numbers for the doctor, the physical therapist who came three times per week, the housekeeper who came twice per week but worked entirely in the parts of the house Sophia didn't inhabit. Ms. Whitmore's routines, Claudettete said, walking him through a printed document that was two pages long. She prefers silence before 10:00 in the morning. She takes her first medication at 7:00 with food.
You'll need to have something prepared by 6:45. She has PT at 9:00 on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. She reads in the evenings. She does not watch television. She does not like the television on in common areas.
Daniel was taking notes. Questions. Does she communicate any preferences about how she wants to be helped? like does she want you to ask before helping or does she prefer you to just Mr. Carter? Claudettete looked at him directly.
In my experience, the best way to learn Ms. Whitmore's preferences is to be in the room with Ms. Whitmore. There is no version of this orientation that fully prepares you for the actual experience. That's honest. I find honesty saves time. He nodded.
When do I meet her? Claudettete looked at her watch. Now, I imagine the door to the main sitting room on the ground floor was open, and Daniel stopped in the doorway because the woman inside had her back to him and was working at an architectural looking desk covered in papers and two open laptops, and she was so clearly in the middle of something that interrupting felt wrong. She hadn't heard him, or if she had, she was ignoring him. He waited.
He was good at waiting. After approximately 30 seconds without turning around, she said, "Either come in or stop hovering in my doorway. It's unnerving." Her voice was nothing like he'd expected. He'd constructed a version of Sophia Whitmore in his head over the weekend.
Formidable, yes, but brittle. Something that had once been powerful and was now diminished by circumstance, like a building that had lost its top floors. But the voice that came out of her was like a blade, sharp, precise, unhurried. the voice of someone who was still entirely accustomed to being listened to. He walked in.
She turned the wheelchair with the practiced ease of someone who had accepted its mechanics, if not its existence. And Daniel Carter got his first real look at Sophia Whitmore. She was strikingly beautiful in the way that some people are beautiful without seeming to try good bones. Dark skin that caught the afternoon light coming through the windows. Natural hair pulled back and held with a pen she'd apparently stuck in it without noticing.
She wore a silk top and the kind of slacks that were clearly expensive in a way that didn't announce itself. She looked, Daniel thought, like someone who had been a CEO. Not in a performed way, in the way that some people carry their history and their posture. She also looked exhausted and angry and like she was very used to hiding both behind a face that gave nothing away. She looked at him the way people look at a piece of furniture they're considering returning.
You're Daniel Carter. Yes, ma'am. Don't call me ma'am. I'm 29. Sorry.
What should I call you? Sophia. She said it like it should have been obvious. And you're what, 30? 32?
She studied him. You look like you've been doing physical work your whole life. Most of it. Good. The last one tried to help me into my chair like I was made of glass and managed to knock my shoulder into the armrest hard enough to bruise.
So, at least there's that. She turned back to her laptops. Claudettete told you the schedule? Yes. Did she tell you the rules?
She gave me a document. The document covers protocols. I'm talking about rules. She still wasn't looking at him. Rule one, don't treat me like I'm dying.
I'm not dying. I'm inconvenienced. There's a significant difference that the last six people who stood where you're standing failed to grasp. He said nothing. Rule two, don't pity me.
I can tell when someone is pitying me within approximately 45 seconds of meeting them. It is the single most useless emotion in the human catalog, and I won't have it in my house. Okay. Rule three. Rule three.
Your child Maya. She paused at the interruption. Your child Maya is allowed in the house on the conditions that she treats this space with respect and doesn't disturb me when I'm working, which is most of the time. I've agreed to having her here, but I want to be clear that I am not interested in being anyone's maternal figure. I have no interest in children.
She doesn't need a maternal figure. She has a father. Something in her expression shifted infinitesimally. But he caught it. Good.
She looked at her screen. You start tonight. There's a medication I take at 9:00. Claudette will show you the schedule. Do you have questions?
He thought for a moment. Yeah. one. She looked at him. What would make today easier for you?
She stared at him for a moment as if the question was in a language she was still translating. Silence, she finally said, "Okay," he said. " I can do silence." He turned to go. " Mr. Carter."
He stopped. " I don't know why Gerald approved you. You don't have any formal training. You have a child and you're looking at me the way people look at something they think they can fix. He turned back slowly.