Mrs. Vale arrived for her curtains at four fifty-three, which made her seven minutes early and Iris feel as if she had been given a present.
Priya brought the long wrapped parcel from the stockroom. Mrs. Vale apologized three times, explained that she worked in a care home and could not leave until somebody else arrived, and offered them a packet of chocolate biscuits she’d bought at the gas station.
“You don’t need to do that,” Iris said.
“I know. I wanted to.”
They ate one each while Mrs. Vale checked the fabric, happy to discover it was the precise blue she remembered. Her daughter had said curtains could be bought more cheaply online, she told them, but she’d wanted to feel them first.
“She’s got gray ones,” Mrs. Vale said, running a hand over the cloth. “Everything in her house is gray. Lovely girl. Terrible rooms.”
When she had gone, Priya finished her biscuit and looked at Iris.
“You’re wearing lipstick.”
“I often wear lipstick.”
“You’ve put it on again.”
“An investigative career awaits you.”
Priya grinned, checked the last changing room and collected her coat. Iris locked up with her, recorded the extra time and said good night. She had an hour before Daniel picked her up at home. Plenty of time to change, provided she did not begin arguing with her wardrobe.
She began arguing with it almost immediately.
The green dress was too much for the movies. Trousers seemed sensible until she wondered whether sensible was becoming a trap. A black skirt fitted but made her think of parent-teacher meetings.
In the end she put on dark jeans, soft black boots and a pale blue sweater with a neckline that showed her collarbones. Her body looked like her body, which was what she intended to bring.
Daniel rang the bell at six-twenty-eight. She opened the door with her coat over one arm, determined not to seem as if she had been waiting behind it.
He took in the hallway, the framed photograph of Beth, the little table holding keys and unopened mail.
“Ready?”
“Yes.”
He did not try to come inside. She found this unexpectedly disappointing, although she had not decided she wanted him there.
His car was clean without being immaculate. A map lay folded in the door pocket; there were two empty coffee cups in a holder and a packet of cough drops beside the gearshift. The inside of another person’s life, she thought, pleased by the untidiness.
“I didn’t know you used maps.”
“I don’t trust my phone in unfamiliar places.”
“Doesn’t that defeat the point of the phone?”
“Frequently.”
He waited until she’d put her seat belt on, then pulled out.
Millport lay twenty minutes away, past the river and through a stretch of low woodland where the first green leaves were beginning to soften the branches. The theater had four screens and a lobby smelling gloriously of popcorn that had no nutritional pretensions.
Daniel looked at the choices on the board.
“Tell me we didn’t come for the musical.”
“You don’t like musicals?”
“People stop perfectly adequate conversations to sing.”
“You chose that song on Thursday.”
“That’s different. Nobody was trying to solve a plot.”
She laughed. “We’ve come for the comedy. Unless you’d rather see something involving a helicopter.”
“Comedy, please.”
They bought popcorn to share. He wanted butter. She did not.
“We could get two,” he said.
She considered the giant tubs. “We’d need a mortgage.”
“Then I’m afraid you’ll have to endure my portion being more delicious.”
They asked the boy at the counter to butter one side. He did so with the grave care of someone handling a diplomatic request.
In the theater Daniel held the tub between them. For the first ten minutes she was aware of his elbow more than the film. Then a character fell through a greenhouse roof and she laughed so suddenly that she dropped a handful of popcorn into her lap.
Daniel leaned toward her.
“Your side or mine?”
“Mine.”
“Tragic.”
She put her hand over her mouth and tried to stop laughing. Beside her, his shoulder shook.
Halfway through, he reached for the tub at the same time she did. Their fingers touched. He turned his hand palm up, and she let her fingers settle into his.
No fanfare. No negotiation. His thumb moved once over her knuckle, and the small warmth of it accompanied the rest of the film like a second story.
Afterward, they found a noodle place that was still serving. The tables were close together, the menus laminated, the smell of ginger and hot oil immediate enough to make Iris hungry again.
Daniel ordered something with three red peppers printed beside it.
“That’s ambitious,” she said.
“I like it.”
“Do you also enjoy discomfort in other forms?”
“Only professionally.”
Her own meal was fragrant and mild. His made him reach for water twice, though he refused to concede that it might be hotter than anticipated. She watched him with interest.
“You’re crying.”
“Seasonal allergies.”
“Indoors?”
“Very persistent pollen.”
She slid him her napkin. He took it, laughing at himself at last.
They talked about bad holidays. A family cottage with damp mattresses. A honeymoon Colin had booked near a road that had looked much smaller on the map. Daniel described a cabin he had rented alone after his divorce, intending to hike, only to discover he disliked hiking in the rain and had brought no books.
“What did you do?”
“Drove to a hardware store and bought a jigsaw.”
“You repaired the cabin?”
“A puzzle. Five hundred pieces. Lighthouse.”
She stared at him, then laughed so hard the woman at the next table smiled.
“I finished it in a day and a half,” he said. “Then I went home.”
“Did it help?”
“The lighthouse was satisfying.”
There was an opening there for another tender disclosure. Neither took it. They were enjoying themselves too much to make the pleasure earn its place by turning solemn.
Outside, a fine rain had begun. Daniel had parked at the far end of the block, where the spaces were free after six. He offered her his arm without comment. She took it, feeling the solid warmth beneath the jacket, and walked close enough that their shoulders touched.
At the car he opened her door, then stopped with one hand resting on the top of it.
“I’d like to kiss you.”
The rain made small dark marks on his collar. There was a spot of it on one lens of his glasses. She felt no urge to laugh now.
“I was hoping you might.”
He bent toward her. She met him halfway.
His mouth was warm and gentle at first, a question with time for her answer. She put a hand against his chest and answered by drawing him nearer. His hand settled at her waist. The second kiss was slower, firmer, and made her forget the rain entirely.
When they parted, she stayed close. The little space between them seemed full of something that had been waiting to happen.
“Hello,” he said softly.
She laughed, breathless. “Hello.”
He brushed a damp curl away from her cheek, then kissed her once more, briefly, as if he could not quite help himself.
The ease of that undid her more than the first kiss. Wanting, openly enough to come back for another taste.
In the car, neither reached immediately for the seat belt. Daniel looked at her, smiling in the quiet.
“Are we going to sit here until someone taps on the window?” she asked.
“I was considering it.”
“Your parking is no longer economical if we stay all night.”
He laughed and started the engine.
On the way home she watched the wet road shining beneath the headlights. Her hand rested on the seat between them. At a red light he took it, lifted it and kissed her knuckles before putting it back exactly where it had been.
There were gestures a person could find ridiculous until they happened to her. Iris was rapidly acquiring evidence.
At her house, he walked her to the door. She had her key ready. The porch lamp lit the silver at his temples.
“Would you like to come in?” she asked.
The words surprised her. Not because she didn’t mean them, but because she had planned to be much more guarded with her own wanting.
“Yes,” he said.
She unlocked the door.
The house was warm and smelled faintly of the basil plant on the kitchen windowsill. Daniel took his shoes off without being asked, then looked at her as if he realized he’d done something domestic too soon.
“Habit,” he said.
“It’s fine.”
She offered tea. He accepted. In the kitchen, she filled the kettle while he stood beside the table she had moved toward the window.
“The six inches?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Good choice.”
He looked so natural there that she had to turn back to the kettle for a moment.
They sat at the table with their mugs. She told him about the house valuations booked for the following week. He told her he was between long assignments, that the Hargreaves contract had seemed manageable partly because he could drive home at night.
“Do you want to stay in Providence?” she asked.
“I think so.”
“You think so?”
“I’ve spent more time renting places elsewhere than deciding whether I like the one I have.”
“I know a little about that. Without the renting.”
He reached across the corner of the table and touched her hand.
She turned hers beneath his, letting their fingers fit.
At eleven, he stood.
“I should go.”
She wanted to ask him not to. She also wanted to wake up tomorrow without feeling she had rushed through the unfamiliar parts to reach something she knew how to do.
“All right.”
At the door he kissed her again, long enough to make the decision difficult and gently enough to make it remain hers.
“Lunch Monday?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Not always lunch, I hope.”
“Definitely not always lunch.”
He smiled. She closed the door behind him and stood with her back against it, her mouth still warm.
Then she reached into her coat pocket for her phone and found a piece of popcorn.
She ate it before she could think of a reason not to.