Home Sweet Trap
1130 Words
Anne Wheeler rolled her second suitcase through the entrance of Derrick Cavell’s penthouse and her first thought wasn’t wow or this is beautiful or even this is nice.
It was, four exits, two staircases, one private elevator. Good to know.
Derrick stood near the far window with his hands in his pockets watching her take in the space. He didn’t say anything. She didn’t ask him to.
“Guest suite is down the hall,” he said finally. “Second door on the left.”
“Which door is yours?”
“End of the hall.”
Anne nodded and kept looking around. The penthouse was large in the way that shows it hadn’t been designed to impress anyone because they didn’t need to. Clean lines. Good furniture. A reading chair near the window that had been used enough to show it.
“Kitchen?” she asked.
“Through there.”
“Study?”
“Why?”
She looked at him. “Because I work from home sometimes and I need to know which rooms are usable.”
He looked back. “Study’s mine. Living room is fine.”
“Okay.”
“That’s it? Okay?”
“What did you expect?”
“More questions,” he said.
“I have more questions,” Anne said. “I’m just choosing the order carefully.”
Something moved at the corner of his mouth. Not a smile exactly. Close enough to be annoying.
He gave her the rest of the tour, hallway, kitchen, the balcony, a small room that turned out to be a library that he mentioned offhand like it was a storage cupboard. She didn’t react. She made a note of it in her head.
They ended up back at the entrance with her two suitcases still sitting where she’d left them.
“I’ll have someone….” he started.
“I’ve got it,” Anne said.
“They’re heavy.”
“I packed them.”
He looked at the suitcases. Looked at her. “Right.”
She picked up both handles. He watched her for half a second like he was going to say something and then didn’t. She wheeled them down the hall and found the second door on the left and went inside and closed it behind her.
The guest suite was bigger than her old apartment. She didn’t think about that too long.
****
The first evening was fine.
They had dinner at opposite ends of a dining table that was designed for eight people, which meant they were technically eating together and also practically alone. Anne had pasta. Derrick had steak. Neither commented on the other’s food choices.
“The building has a gym,” he said at some point.
“I saw it.”
“You saw it?”
“I looked at the floor plan on the elevator screen.”
He put his fork down. “When?”
“When you were showing me the balcony.”
He stared at her. “You were reading the floor plan on the elevator screen while I was giving you a tour.”
“Multitasking.”
“That’s…..” He stopped. Picked his fork back up. “Fine.”
“Were you going to say impressive?”
“I was going to say strange.”
“Same thing, coming from you.”
He looked at her across the table. She ate her pasta and didn’t look up.
The dinner finished without anything going wrong, which felt like its own small achievement. They washed up in the kitchen at the same time and somehow developed a system without discussing it, he washed, she dried, she put away. It happened naturally enough that neither of them noticed until it was done.
Anne put the last plate in the cabinet and turned around and he was already gone.
She stood in the kitchen for a moment. Looked at the cabinet. Looked at the empty room.
“Okay,” she said to no one.
****
She woke at six fifteen the next morning and came downstairs and stopped at the kitchen entrance.
There was coffee on the counter.
She walked over to it slowly. Picked it up. Took a sip.
It was exactly right. The right amount of everything. Made the way she made it at home.
She put the cup down and looked at it.
There was no one in the kitchen. The hallway was quiet. She could hear the distant sound of a shower from somewhere toward the end of the corridor.
She picked the cup back up. Took another sip. Stood at the window looking at Dallas waking up eight floors below and tried to think of a practical explanation for how he knew. She hadn’t told him. It wasn’t in any file she’d seen. She’d never made coffee in this kitchen before.
The shower stopped.
She was still standing at the window with the cup when Derrick appeared in the kitchen doorway, already dressed, jacket on, phone in hand.
“Morning,” he said without looking up from his phone.
“How did you know how I take my coffee?”
He looked up. Looked at the cup in her hand. “Building management sent over your profile for emergency contact forms. It lists dietary preferences.”
“My coffee preference is in my emergency contact form?”
“Apparently you filled it out very thoroughly.”
Anne looked at the cup. That was a completely reasonable explanation. She had filled out that form thoroughly, she always did. That was all this was.
“Okay,” she said.
“Okay,” he said, and picked up his own cup and left the kitchen.
She heard the front door close a minute later.
She stood at the window a little longer. The coffee was still warm in her hands. Dallas kept moving below her, completely unbothered.
She put the cup down and went to get dressed.
Halfway up the hall she stopped.
Went back to the kitchen. Picked up her phone from the counter. Opened her notes app. Started a new note and typed *DC….observations.* Then typed three lines about his routine, his exit time, the reading chair by the window.
Got to the fourth line.
Stopped.
The fourth line wasn’t about his routine. It was about the coffee. About the fact that he’d made it right without asking and left it on the counter and been gone before she came down so she couldn’t thank him or question him about it. Like someone who did something and didn’t need credit for it.
She looked at the fourth line for a moment.
Then she deleted it.
Typed it again.
Deleted it again.
Put the phone in her pocket and went upstairs and told herself it was ….
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