The Day Love Chose Winter

The First Couch

The delivery truck got stuck on Main Street because Frosthaven decided that furniture day was a town holiday and everyone needed to be there to watch two couches get carried through a door. By 9am the sidewalk outside The Last Chapter was full of people holding coffee and wearing gloves and looking like they were ready to lift something heavy and talk about it for the next week. Evelyn had posted on f*******: at 6am. Noah told everyone who came in for batteries. Mrs. Patel told her entire church group. Now there were twenty people and one very nervous delivery driver who kept checking his watch like he wanted to be anywhere else. Inside the store Elara was trying to keep her hands from shaking. The back room was empty except for the smell of paint and dust and the memory of all the boxes they had dragged out after the storm. This was her idea. If it failed everyone would know. Adrian came in from outside brushing sawdust off his jeans and he looked calm the way he always did when there was work to do and that calm made Elara feel ten percent less like she was going to pass out. He said we have two couches and four armchairs and six rugs and a bunch of tables and the big bookshelf we built and we need to move fast before it starts raining again. Elara nodded and said okay and he said you don’t have to lift anything you just tell us where it goes and she looked at him and said I want to lift something because if she didn’t help then it wouldn’t feel like hers. So they went outside and the first couch came off the truck and it took six people to carry it and Noah was in the front and Evelyn was on the side and Mrs. Patel was yelling instructions and Adrian was in the middle saying left a little left watch the doorframe and somehow they got it through the door without hitting the frame and set it down in the back room where it looked huge and blue and soft and completely wrong in the empty space like it was waiting for the room to grow into it. The second couch was green and the armchairs didn’t match on purpose because Elara had spent three nights online picking them and she told Adrian she wanted it to feel like a living room not a furniture store. Then came the rugs rolled up and heavy and the tables and finally the big bookshelf that Adrian had designed with her and built with his own hands and it was going to go against the back wall under the new window. People worked for two hours straight and nobody complained and kids ran in and out with tape measures and someone brought donuts and someone else brought soup and by eleven the room didn’t look empty anymore it looked like it was holding its breath. Elara stood in the corner with a clipboard feeling useless until Adrian walked over and took it from her and said you’re doing great and she said I feel like I’m in the way and he said this is yours we’re just helping. At noon Evelyn clapped her hands and said lunch break and everyone went out to the front of the store where there were big pots of soup and paper cups and folding chairs and for thirty minutes Frosthaven sat and ate together like one big loud family. After lunch Adrian and Elara stayed behind to set up the last table and it was round and big and the second he put it down it wobbled. He swore under his breath and went to get a shim and Elara sat on the blue couch while she waited and it was so soft that she sank into it and forgot how to be nervous for a whole minute. Adrian came back and knelt on the floor and said hold this and she did and their hands touched and neither of them pulled away and he fixed the wobble and sat back on his heels and looked at her sitting there with paint in her hair and a pillow in her arms and he said you look good there and she said on the couch and he said in your store in your town doing this. She told him to come sit and he hesitated and then sat next to her and the couch dipped under their weight and they didn’t talk for a while they just sat and listened to the sounds of people outside and the hum of the heater and the way the room already felt like home. People started coming back in to say goodbye and thank you and see you tomorrow and by three it was just Elara and Adrian again and he was putting tools back in his box and she was fluffing pillows that didn’t need fluffing and her heart was in her throat because she had to ask him now or she never would. She said Adrian and he said yeah and she sat on the arm of the couch and said would you want to go to dinner with me not as co-workers not as whatever we are but like a date. The words hung in the air and Adrian went still for a second and then he looked at her and said you’re asking me on a date and she said yes and he cut her off and said I’m saying yes before you can take it back yes. Elara exhaled and he smiled and said when and she said Saturday at seven if the store is okay and he said Saturday at seven I’ll pick you up here. They stood there awkward and happy and then he cleared his throat and said he should go get more nails and she said right nails and he left and she sat back down on the couch and put her face in her hands because she was going on a date in Frosthaven with Adrian and that was terrifying and wonderful at the same time. The store closed early and they stayed to put books on the new shelves and they didn’t talk much but it was the good kind of quiet where you don’t need words. At eight Adrian walked her upstairs and said thanks for today and she said thanks for saying yes and he said don’t make it weird and she laughed and said too late. Inside the apartment smelled like soup and paint and Elara sat at her desk and Adrian sat at his and she opened a new document and typed the first couch arrived today and so did the courage to ask and across from her Adrian started a new sketch of the reading room full of people and in the corner he drew two stick figures on the blue couch and labeled them us saturday. At eleven Elara yawned and Adrian stood and held out his hand and said bed and she said bed and they collapsed on the mattress and he pulled the blanket over both of them and she said I’m nervous about Saturday and he said me too but good nervous and she said good nervous and fell asleep with her head on his shoulder and the new couch downstairs waiting for the whole town to come sit on it and talk and read and be together.