Yes, a lot. some. Darnell sat at the wobbly table and looked at the photograph on the refrigerator. Not the honey photograph, which Natalie had printed and framed and put in her apartment, but a different one. A photograph Ava had taken on her own using Caleb's phone, slightly tilted, slightly blurry, of Natalie and Caleb standing in the kitchen, making something that had not turned out well. Both of them looking at whatever had gone wrong with expressions of identical assessment.
Ava had printed it and put it on the refrigerator with a magnet shaped like a sun. Darnell looked at the photograph for a while. She fixed the pasta problem. She's improving. That's hers.
What? That expression in the photo. I've seen you make that face at broken equipment. She's making the same face. Darnell looked at Caleb.
She fits. Caleb poured bourbon. Don't. I'm not doing anything. I'm making an observation.
Make it quietly. How serious is it? We're taking it slow. How slow is slow? Slow.
Slow. The way things go when both people are terrified and trying to be honest about being terrified. Darnell was quiet for a moment. Is she good to Ava? Caleb looked at the photograph.
She sat on the floor of Ava's room for an hour when Ava had a fever in December. She fell asleep in the chair next to the bed. I found both of them at 2:00 in the morning. Ava asleep in the bed. Natalie asleep in the chair with one hand on the edge of the mattress.
Darnell didn't say anything. She didn't plan to fall asleep. She would have been embarrassed if I'd woken her up. She just she was there and she stayed. He looked at his glass.
That's the whole thing. She's learning to stay. Darnell looked at the table. And you are you learning to let someone? Caleb was quiet.
I'm trying. He said Diane know she made you promise. I know, Darnell. I was there. Then stop treating the promise like a burden and start treating it like a gift.