The Objects of Her Affection Read Online Free PDF Page A

growing up along with its inhabitant, but it would never be packed up and left behind.
    Brian had stopped just inside the door and was prodding a makeshift closet built with wood paneling, which bowed inward when he pressed on it. “See how easy that would be to tear out?” said Sophie. “We could do it ourselves. We’ll use wardrobes, the way they do in Europe.” She crossed into the adjoining bedroom. “This is Elliot’s room, I think. It’s smaller, but not by too much. Crib. Changing table. Nursing chair.”
    “Water damage.” Brian poked at a bulge in the plaster. Paint was flaking off the wall in potato-chip-sized curls. Sophie pulled him to the window, which looked over a concrete patch piled with rusted trash cans.
    “Look out there. The kids could have a sandbox,” she said. “A few potted plants? A grill? Think about it.”
    And he seemed to be, until he tilted his head back and she realized he wasn’t looking out the window, but at it. He plucked a shard of paint from the frame and sniffed it tentatively.
    “Just try , okay? Put that down. Can you try to see this the way I’m seeing it?” Sophie pressed her hand over her belly, fingers splayed. “I know I shouldn’t have done this without you. I should have waited.” She took a deep breath. “I just wish you could see all the potential I see here.” She stared into his face, smooth and pale, his brow tranquil, his eyes barely able to summon the energy required to be an actual color. The sole hint of feeling, perceptible only to Sophie (and perhaps, if she had been alive to see it, his mother), was a slight stiffening of his nostrils.
    “It’s not too late,” she said, more gently now. “We can still walk away. I can go downstairs right now and tell Steve. All we’d lose is the deposit.” She felt a tiny flicker of nervousness, but she knew that the combined weight of the house, the paperwork, the insurance, the inspector, the real estate agents, the grateful sellers, and her own excitement would require too much energy for Brian to dislodge on his own.
    He looked down and toed a hole in the carpet. “It scares me.” He looked at her. “Financially. I can’t help but think we’re being a little reckless with this. I want you to be happy, you know I do. But this scares me.”
    “Okay.” Sophie waited a beat. “Okay. Do you want me to—”
    “I’m not sure what to do.”
    “Okay. We can call it off.” She stared at him; he didn’t flinch. “Just know that I believe in this, Brian. I believe I can get enough work, I can make enough, I can get a good payment plan. Steve said he knows a guy—he said we qualify, no problem. We’re good to go.”
    “Really.”
    “Really. Brian, this house, I wish I could explain it to you. It’s just meant to be ours. I feel like it wants us as much as we want it. And living here…it will make me so happy. Everything will work out. I’ll make sure it does.”
    Brian leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling for a moment. “Show me where your office will be.”
    She held out her arm. “Right this way.” It was a relief to settle into their familiar dance step—Sophie deciding, Brian acquiescing. Perhaps the dance mostly worked to her advantage, but she knew they both heard the music. She led him down the hall to the large rear bedroom. Two cobwebbed windows faced west; one, broken, faced south. A trio of fat flies loitered in the center of the hot room. “I figure an L-shaped workstation over here, with all my monitors on it, and maybe a mini station in that corner.” She paused, mentally organizing her bookshelves. In their apartment, her workspace was a sticky corner of the kitchen table, with a few laptops balanced on chairs. Here, in a room like this, she knew—she was sure— work would be efficient. Professional. Abundant. “See?” she said, seeing the backup arrays, the CPUs, the neat stacks of project briefs. She’d never had a real home office before. The thought