It was a good flat. As good now as it had been when Magnus had bought it fifteen years before. The red brick of Cadogan Square had felt solid to him. Felt like permanence. Thick walls and fumed oak floors that kept things where they should be, either inside or out.
The flat had seen late nights with friends. Partners who had come for a time and then moved on. The Sørensen leather sofa was large enough for four people at least but was rarely filled. There was a Vitra chair that one of the women who had briefly occupied the place convinced him was a good investment. He never admitted it was the most comfortable thing in which he had ever sat.
The dining table of solid timbers, large enough for a feast but unused for longer than he could remember. All the right things, on the surface. But mostly, it was just him. A big man, occupying ample space with good things around him.
He dropped his keys in the bowl on the table beside the door. It had been a day full of client meetings. In the bedroom, he shrugged off the Samuelsohn suit, trading it for jeans and a cotton jumper. The buzzer rang at six-thirty, just as he’d expected.
This one was observant, at least. She had seen the precision with which Magnus approached all things and met it with her own version.
“I brought wine,” she said, holding up the bottle.
She tiptoed up, and still, he had to bend down to meet her lips.
“Good day?” she asked as she swanned through to the kitchen. Her coat was a deep yellow, her black hair trailing down her back. A bumblebee against the granite and wood and stainless steel of his space.
“Productive day,” he replied.
He watched her unpack the canvas bag she’d brought in. A bakery box tied with string, a small pot with tall spiky greenery sprouting from it, and a paperback novel that rolled forward at the corner joined the now-discarded bag. They scattered across the countertop like wreckage.
Magnus stood behind her, taking the lapels of her coat, and she shrugged it off. It was as if they’d done this a hundred times before. She was talking about some drama at work. A coworker’s imagined slight at being overlooked for an opportunity that she found unbelievable.
He returned from hanging the yellow coat and gestured to the plant. “What is this?”
“Chives!” she said, picking it up to show him. “So we can have fresh ones—remember how good they were on the bulgogi?”
She read his expression and put the pot back down on the counter. She crossed her arms, one brow raised. “Magnus, you don’t have a single living thing in this whole flat. You will survive having a pot of onions on your counter. It’s not that deep.”
“Ja, okay,” he replied. He thought briefly about whether the plant would be something he’d need to discard later.
“The food will be here soon. Do you want a drink? The wine, or something else?”
“Do you have any more of that whisky we drank last time?” she asked, gesturing lightly toward the bar with a tip of her head.
He nodded and walked to the bar, a small alcove just off the kitchen. He flipped the light on. It flickered—again. He’d had two different workers in to do work on the flat, hoping they would fix the damn thing, and nobody seemed to have prioritized getting the flickering under control. He’d tried himself. The fixture was oddly shaped. His hands too thick for the purpose.
She seemed to acknowledge his audible groan of frustration. She did not comment. Her eyes flicked to the light for a moment.
He poured the whisky, and the food arrived. After dinner, she helped him clear up. Recycling into the correct bins, leftovers covered and placed in the refrigerator, dishes in the dishwasher. The ritual left him more settled, undistracted. More often, recently, he had noticed her adapting to his idiosyncrasies.
After the food and drink, there was talking, and then, in his room, not talking, and then quiet. Magnus left her in the bed and took a long, hot shower. When he emerged, his bed was a tangle of empty sheets. He wrapped the towel around his waist and walked toward the kitchen.
She was at one of the dining room chairs. One foot was up on the seat; her toes curled over the dark wood of the edge. The position emphasized the curve of her thigh, around to the place where his t-shirt hung like a dress on her small frame. An arm was resting on her knee, holding up the tattered paperback.
“All right?” he asked.
“Mm, yes,” she replied.
He walked into the kitchen.
“Can you grab me a water?” she called after him.
Magnus walked into the alcove. He flipped the switch. The light. It came on without a stutter.
His hand found the switch again. On, off. No flicker at all.
“It was annoying,” she said.
Magnus turned.
She looked over her shoulder to where he stood in the doorway of the bar, just beyond the kitchen. “It bothered you. Your fingers were too big to tighten the bulb under the cover. Mine aren’t, so I fixed it.” She shrugged.
He poured the water from the glass bottle, brought it to her, and put it down on the table.
She tilted her head up, her eyes meeting his. “You deserve light.”
He leaned down, kissing her on top of the head.
“Ja. Maybe I do.”