Chapter Twenty-Four
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Painting the cabinets was almost as terrible as sanding them, and I wouldn’t recommend the task to anybody unless they were already unhappy. Luckily, I was, so I took to it with gusto.
Macon kept us fed, and we worked as we listened to another audiobook—the new Louise Erdrich, which was great until the pandemic showed up in the story, and then we had to take a breather.
Those wounds were still too raw. But the main plot involved a woman who worked in a bookstore, so Macon asked if I’d given any more consideration to the idea of opening my own.
“I haven’t considered anything except your cabinets,” I said, which wasn’t true, but the bookstore fantasy was nearly as agonizing as wondering if anybody would ever love me enough to want to marry me, or if I would ever love somebody else enough to want to marry them.
We worked the whole weekend, and by the end, I had even convinced Macon to lose two cabinet doors and leave some open shelving on either side of the window above the sink. This required painting the insides of those cabinets, too, which we didn’t have time for.
“I can come over after work tomorrow,” I said.
“Tomorrow is a late shift.”
“Wednesday, then. I can finish this, and you can get back to the garden.” He tried to protest, but I interrupted.
“I’ve seen the anguish in your eyes whenever you catch a glimpse of those weeds.
” I was teasing him, but I also felt a critical need, a neediness , to return.
To keep going. With reluctance, he agreed.
He didn’t feel good about doing a fun job while I was doing an un-fun one.
I assured him that I did not consider getting bitten by mosquitos to be more fun.
It was nearly midnight on Wednesday when I finished the final coat. “I can come back tomorrow,” I said, “and put the hardware back on.”
“Another late shift,” he said, distracted because he was reading the paint can.
“Fuck. Friday. I’ll do it then.”
“This says we need to wait a month for the paint to cure.”
It was late, and I was exhausted. It was impossible to imagine any news more devastating. I burst into tears for the first time since becoming a shell, and he laughed. He actually laughed!
“I’m sorry,” I said, taking in the mess of kitchen items crowding and scattered across his dining room. Edmond had continued to move things around, and the piles weren’t tidy anymore. “I didn’t mean to do this to you.”
“Do what? Give me free labor? Make my kitchen beautiful?”
I kept crying.
His laughter died as if his heart were breaking, too. “Oh, Ingrid.”
“It’s been so hard.” I didn’t understand where this outburst was coming from.
And then Macon did something that he hadn’t done since before the pandemic. Something I had been wanting desperately. He hugged me. I was surprised by the tightness of his grip. By the strength of his arms. I melted into him and cried against his shoulder.
“Okay,” he said, but he didn’t let go. “You’re gonna be okay.”
“Can I come back?” I blubbered.
I felt him laugh against me. “Yeah.”
“On Friday?”
“For as long as it takes.”
They were the exact words I needed to hear.
It had turned into May without me realizing it. As the cabinets began the slow process of curing, the bookstore idea continued to linger and harden inside my mind.
I texted Mika. How did Bex learn how to start a business?
You’re still thinking about it! she said. That makes me happy.
Just curious.
Instinctively, Mika knew not to push. Ridgetop Means Bizness. They’re a nonprofit that teaches people how to open small businesses. They’re affordable, and they guided Bex and Craig through the whole process.
I clicked on her link and was disheartened to discover that there were no private appointments. It was an actual school with actual classes. And unlike Bex, I had no Craig, no business partner. I’d have to do it alone.
I put the idea back onto the shelf.
I slept each night at my apartment and went straight home after our late shifts, but every other hour of my days was spent in Macon’s company.
I worked like a maniac. No doubt it was mania.
Because I couldn’t screw the hardware back on yet, I polished each individual handle and knob and oiled the exposed insides of the cabinets.
Then I oiled the window frames, back door frame, crown molding, and baseboards.
Then the ceiling looked shabby, so I painted that, but it was the wrong task to do last, so then I had to do more touch-ups.
“I don’t think there’s anything else you can improve,” Macon said, dropping off a clump of scarlet radishes dusted with rich black soil beside the sink.
He’d long stopped helping, at my request. He purchased the supplies and assisted with the prep, but then he disappeared into the garden while I worked.
“A rug for the sink area,” I said. “And curtains, café style, so you can still see out into the garden. Red and white stripes. Or maybe gingham. I bet Brittany could teach me how to sew them.”
His silence was so acute that I knew to pivot.
The backsplash was original and in great condition; any chips only added to its charm.
New countertops would have been fantastic, but the cost put them out of the question.
A different light fixture also would have been good, but if I went antiquing and found something I loved, I would be tempted to keep it for myself.
He was right. I was done here, but I wasn’t done.
“Your bathroom,” I said.
His hackles rose. “What’s wrong with my bathroom?”
“It’s not gross, don’t worry. But it’s dreadfully boring.”
“ Dreadfully ” was all he said, although it wasn’t a denial. The bathroom was another drab, all-white space.
“Blue. You have that little window high up that shows off the sky, so it would bring that color down into the rest of the room. Plus, it’s a bathroom. Blue is a clean color.”
“There’s ceiling paint in your hair,” he said, stepping back outside and letting the door slam shut behind him.
This was as good as a yes, so my attention shifted and stayed on the bathroom for the next week and a half.
It was a faster job, and I was already more experienced.
I painted the ceiling first, then the sink cabinet, and then the walls, all the same delicate shade of a robin’s egg.
Macon was absurdly blessed to have an original tub and hexagon-tile floor, and he clearly knew it, because his grout was clean.
Cory and I had been good about cleaning but bad about grout.
As renters, the chore had never seemed important.
Seeing the history contained in this one small room made it seem important now.
“I suppose I should be grateful that I have no secrets,” Macon said, approaching from down the hallway and passing all of his belongings.
“You should consider new towels,” I said.
His head popped in.
I was scrubbing his medicine cabinet. “Sorry. This will be good to go as soon as I’m done, but the sink cabinet is another you won’t be able to use for a month.”
“You don’t sound sorry.”
I stopped to give him a smile. “I’m not.”
We stared at each other for a moment, and then he seemed embarrassed. “I can’t get over how beautiful it looks,” he said, turning his gaze and admiration toward the room. And I did sense that it was a turn. That he had been admiring me.
It made me nervous. I didn’t trust myself. “Thanks.”
“I mean it. I don’t know how to repay you for all this.”
I assured him, as I already had a dozen times, that the distraction was helping me.
“Speaking of distractions,” he said, “have you given any more thought to that bookstore idea?”
I was surprised that he was bringing it up again. Unenthusiastically, I told him about the business school. “And you don’t want to go to school,” he said.
I pointed at him as if to say bingo . “I do, however, want to paint your dining room.”
He leaned against the doorframe, tired but amused. “Oh yeah?”
“I’d like to bring the yellow into that room to marry those two spaces.”
“Marry the spaces.”
I hid my pinkening cheeks behind the door of his medicine cabinet. “Yes.”
He stayed quiet while I finished cleaning.
As a person who could, on some extremely notable occasions, be impulsive, I had always admired that he was comfortable taking his time.
I asked him to hand me the items from the hallway that belonged inside the medicine cabinet, and he urged me to sit instead.
So I sat on the toilet lid while he carefully put everything away—the toothpaste on this shelf, the razor on that one.
He didn’t have much. Only what he needed.
“Just how deep into my house is this yellow going to spread?” he asked.
“Your living room will be green.”
“My study?”
“Red, maybe. A dark, classic red.”
“My bedroom?”
“I haven’t seen your bedroom,” I said, making it awkward again. I remained highly aware that he was aware that I had wanted to sleep with him, that I’d accidentally admitted as much out loud in front of him and our coworkers.
Our coworkers. They knew I was helping him paint, but they didn’t know I was spending more time at his house than my own apartment.
Macon and I hadn’t discussed it—hadn’t meant for it to be a secret—but it was.
Whatever I was doing over here was strange and private.
The only other person who knew the full depth of the situation was Kat.
“There’s nobody here who you’d want to fuck, but will you come paint my rental house next?” she’d asked.
“I do not still want to fuck Macon.”
“Yeah, okay,” she’d said.
“Okay,” he said. “Dining room next.”