Page 56 of Dropping the Ball

“I’ll show you my office. It’s my favorite space.” He follows me down the hall. I flip the switch to turn on the floor lamp and point to it. “Everything in here is my favorite, like that.” It’s simple, a black arch with a drum shade in neutral fabric. “I don’t know how to explain it, but she bought that lamp and put it in the living room. But it has such a perfect arch, I moved it in here because it makes me feel peaceful. That’s rope glued all over the lamp shade, but it doesn’t feel busy. It feels intentional, like the rope chose its natural course and the lamp maker was smart enough to let it.”

He doesn’t say anything, so I point to the love seat. “I study there pretty much every night, and the lamp makes it better. I smile every time I turn it on.”

I cross to the desk beneath the picture window. “And this. I never thought I’d want a glass desk. Fingerprints and all that stuff. But I love it. It makes me feel like I’m out in my yard, in the grass and fresh air because it’s here and not here.”

“Madison really knows you, huh?” he asks softly.

“Yes, but this is the only room I didn’t let her do. It’s my retreat more than even my bedroom. Some of this I moved in here after she ordered it for the living room. Other stuff, she’d send me options and I’d pick. She must have sent me twelve pictures of desks, but I knew as soon as I saw this one.”

“You have a good eye. The base matches your lamp.”

“Right? That perfect curve feeling again.” The glass desktop sits on two black arches forming its four legs. They run parallel to the long edges, not the short ones, so it’s unexpected and soothingly symmetrical at the same time. The longer arches give it the same curve as the lamp. “Do I sound like a lunatic or does that make sense to a furniture maker?”

“Makes sense.” He glances down to the green rug and over to the only art in the house that I chose myself. “And that piece?”

When I lie on the sofa, my head on the lamp end, my feet propped on the armrest, this is what I see on the facing wall. It’s a wood mosaic made of chips from light ash to walnut. At first it looks like gentle rolling hills against a sunrise. But look longer and you realize it’s the silhouette of a woman’s body viewed from the back.

“Do you see hills or a nude woman lying on her side?” I ask him.

“Both.”

“Does it feel provocative?”

He meets my eyes. “No.”

I agree. The artist didn’t include any of the provocative parts, catching the curve at the rise of hip and following the lines to her head, the hair made from wood so light it must be birch, pooled gently behind her, no curls or tendrils to suggest motion. “She’s resting. She found a place where she feels safe enough to lie down and . . .”

“And what?” It’s a quiet prompt.

I shake my head. “I don’t know. Maybe that’s why I like it. The second I saw it, I wanted to be her, like it matters to be her, like being there is the most important thing she can do.” I know why I love this picture, but do I want to explain it to Micah? Micah will understand. Am I okay with that?

“She’s enough,” I say, studying the relaxed curve of her shoulder. “In that moment. Probably in all her moments. But you can only rest like that and belong to everything around you if you know you’re enough.”

When I look over at Micah, he straightens from the wall and looks down the hall in the direction of the kitchen. “Could I get a drink? Just water.”

His tone is distracted. It’s like running into a light pole in front of the boy you like.

“Sure.” I turn off the light, glad to hide my stinging cheeks. In the kitchen, I pull out a glass and show him the door for the built-in fridge. “I don’t do bottled water, but the fridge dispenser water tastes good.”

He nods and takes the glass, watching it fill while I wet a paper towel and use my reflection in the faucet to swipe at the smudges on my cheeks. At least then there’s a reason for them to be red.

When he’s done, I shut off the faucet and turn to face him.

“Did I get it all?” I ask.

He eyes me over the rim of his glass and nods as he drinks, and I look away from the mesmerizing rhythm of his throat muscles as he pulls at that water.

I busy myself with throwing away the dirty paper towels, and when I look up and he’s still drinking, I go to work on the bottom button of my borrowed shirt, trying to figure out how to politely kick him out of the house. Probably the trustyActually, do you mind if we skip the movie? I just realized how long my day is tomorrow.

“What are you doing?”

I freeze on the next button and look up at him. “Giving your shirt back.”

“Don’t worry about it. You can bring it next time you stop by the warehouse.”

“No, it’s okay. I realized it’s pretty late to start a movie, so if you don’t mind—”

“Kaitlyn.”

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