“Hm,” he said. “Tempting. I have Ben and Jerry’s in the freezer.”
“Flavor?”
“Flavors,” he said, stressing the plural.
“Are you rich?” I whispered, my eyes wide.
“Terribly.”
We giggled, finished off our second round of margaritas, and went outside to hail a cab.
“Ben and Jerry’s?” Graham asked when we got in. “I should actually check in on Brontë. I’ve been gone a while.”
“Ice cream and Brontë sounds perfect,” I said.
He rattled off an address and we were on our way.
We could hear Brontë snuffling at the door as we stood on the front porch, Graham digging his keys out of his pocket. He unlocked the door but didn’t open it.
“For the record,” he said. “It was not my idea.”
“What?” I asked, frowning in confusion.
And then he opened the door.
“Oh,” I said, stepping inside, my eyes wide as I took it in. “Oh Graham. No.” I slapped a hand over my mouth and started to laugh as I slipped off my shoes and walked deeper inside, Brontë beside me. I knelt beside her, scratching behind an ear. “Is it… a mausoleum?” I whispered to her. “Is someone famous buried here? Is it a museum?” I stood and touched a finger to a small sculpture of... “Is this a boob?”
Graham snicked and waved a hand. “Have at it.”
I did. Each room was white on white on white. It was bright. Glaringly so. Glass and acrylic and white stone and ceramic. I ran my hand over the back of a mid-century style white patent leather sofa, poked at a lamp shade that looked like was made of bubbles, and shivered from the cold white tiles under my feet.
“Did she hate color?” I asked. “Where do you find comfort?”
He looked amused as I moved on to the kitchen, poking my head into a powder room on the way. Brontë had curled up in her bed next to the acrylic kitchen table once she’d gotten a hello from me. Her space was the only comfortable looking spot I’d seen so far.
White dishes, white cups, crystal glasses, silverware with white handles…
“Graham,” I said, my voice filled with… awe? Horror?
“I spilled spaghetti sauce in here once,” he said. “That’s the night I learned we don’t cook red in here.”
“You don’t cook… red?”
“That’s what she told me.”
I pursed my lips, trying not to burst out laughing.
“It’s… soulless,” I said. “And you’re so…”
“I’m so what?” he asked, his eyes meeting mine.
I took in a breath and let it out slowly. “You’re so not.”
The second floor wasn’t much better, though Graham had clearly reclaimed some of the space since his ex had left. There were small white hand-weights piled in the corner of the home gym, new black weight plates and bars stacked on a black rack, and hand towels in shades of blue and beige folded on a shelf.
Her office across the hall, which was mostly cleaned out, save for a mirrored desk and fuzzy white chair, looked like a showroom for futuristic meetings.
The next door down housed his office.
