Aurora(46)

“I thought I heard somebody knocking. It’s so quiet in here I could barely tell.”

“I know.” Ann-Sophie smiled. “Weird, isn’t it? Do you feel your ears popping in the elevator?”

“Yes! Drives me crazy. I’ve chewed more gum in the past three days than my whole life. Sorry, did you want to come in?”

Ann-Sophie peered behind him. “Are Beth and—I’m sorry, I forgot her little girl’s name.”

“Kearie.”

“Kearie. Are they here?”

“No, Beth took her up to the gym to burn off some energy. But come on in anyway.” He opened the door and she stepped inside.

Unit 9A was one of the smaller apartments, a one-bedroom with an alcove in the living room. The pastel palette of the rest of the complex had been continued in here, more shades of light brown than anybody should see in their whole lives, but Thom had read some psychological adaptability test that said beige tones were the most soothing colors. Ann-Sophie hated it.

“You can repaint if you want, you know,” she said.

“No, no, it looks great.”

“Oh, it does not. I’m Scandinavian. We know about dark. You don’t want brown; you want bold colors. Plus candles. I put a couple in the bag. This is for you guys.” She set the cloth bag on the small dining room table.

“Wow. That’s so nice of you.” He meant it. The atmosphere around the facility had been hostile and discontented so far, and her gesture was the first kindness he’d encountered.

“Plus a few spices and sauces, things they don’t have in the stock house. Cholula, some spicy mustard, anything with flavor, basically. And the kids picked these flowers for you all.”

Marques took them, unsure what to say. “Thank you so much.”

Ann-Sophie nodded and looked around, uncomfortable. She’d been putting off coming down here for a few days, and now that she was here, it was harder than she expected. She’d been married to Thom for nearly a decade and had been tidying up the emotional messes he’d made since she’d known him. She was used to sweeping up the broken plates, but now, knowing that she wanted out of the marriage, it was harder to keep doing this particular chore. Thom’s inability to hide his narcissism shouldn’t have been her daily problem anymore. But if she was going to be living in a bunker with this family, she didn’t want there to be any tension whatsoever.

“He can be quite an asshole,” she said.

“Sorry?” Marques asked.

“Thom. How long have you worked for him?”

“Four years.”

“So you know it’s true.”

Marques smiled. “No comment.”

“I did one of those checklists for borderline personality disorder once and he had seven out of ten. Not enough to make it a diagnosis but definitely enough to qualify as a jerk.”

“I wouldn’t say that. We took him by surprise. Sort of forced the situation on him. I’m not sure I would have reacted any differently.”

Ann-Sophie shrugged and looked around again. Her eyes fell on the alcove, an extra sleeping space in case the occupants of the apartment had a child. The bed there was made but had been slept in. She looked at it twice, feeling something slightly off. She couldn’t put her finger on what it was—the lack of stuffed animals and other detritus of childhood, perhaps? She looked away and back at Marques.

He suddenly seemed anxious. “Could I make you a coffee? I think I have it down with the Keurig thing.”

“No, thanks. I should be going. The kids are outside, probably playing with a rattlesnake by now.”

Marques laughed, a little too hard. “I know, we’re not really desert people. Kearie keeps wanting to go for a walk, and Beth’s like ‘Yeah, girl, if you find me a pair of cowboy boots.’”

Boots. That was it. Ann-Sophie turned her head to the side and looked at the bed again. There was a pair of boots beside the bed, toes neatly tucked underneath the end table. Definitely not children’s footwear, they were men’s boots, set carefully next to the bed, and that was a man’s chunky wristwatch on the bedside table.

That was not Kearie’s bed, Ann-Sophie realized. A man was sleeping in that bed, Marques was sleeping in that bed, which meant Kearie was in the bedroom with her mother, and why would they settle on that arrangement, unless they were having a fight? But Ann-Sophie had seen Marques and Beth around, and if they were a couple in the midst of a you-will-not-sleep-in-this-bed fight, they sure didn’t look like it.

She turned back to Marques, failing to hide the look on her face.

He looked back and forth from her to the bed. “What?”

“Hmm?”

“Sorry.”

It was a nonsensical exchange between two people who both knew what the other was thinking.

Marques brightened, suddenly and too much. “Oh, damn. Did it again.” He walked over to the bed, bold as he could muster, picked up the boots, and marched them over to the closet. He opened it and tossed them inside, shaking his head and smiling. “I leave my shit everywhere, drives her crazy.”

“OK.” She was thinking, and he could see she was thinking.

“I snore,” he added. “Pretty loud. Kind of a problem.”

“We never sent you patio furniture,” she said.