Page 45 of Home Ice

“It doesn’t come down,” I said.

Max looked at me. “I want it up,” he said. “It’s why it’s a good wall. God, look at it. That’s texture. You can’t buy texture, that’s—“ He stopped, spun around and pointed at me. “Don’t say anything.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything.”

“You were going to say you can buy texture on Elston.”

Rafe leaned against his counter, drinking his water and watching the two of us.

“Where do you want the table?” he asked.

“Where do you want it?” Max asked.

“Wherever’s good for you.”

“Under the window.”

Thirty seconds later, after I helped Rafe move it, Max looked at it from five feet back with one eye shut. “It’s fighting the light.”

We moved it to the wall by the hall. Max studied it for eleven seconds and had us move it back three feet. Then he stood with his hands on his hips.

“Okay, real question. Centered on the window or centered on the couch? Rafe. Your apartment. Your call.”

“They both look good.”

“That’s true,” Max said. Then he had us move the sectional near the window and center the table under the tapestry.

I crossed my arms over my chest. A man not caring where a table sat was not unusual, but thirty minutes earlier, Rafe had run his thumb along the waney edge and treated it like a treasure.

Max placed his light where he wanted it, clipped a diffuser on, and the room’s light turned warm and even. He clapped once and turned into the version of himself that two million people watch.

“Walkthrough, then the couch, then cutaways.” He held up his phone. “So you guys have been asking about this man’s apartment—“

Rafe was good.

He came around the counter on the beat Max wanted and stopped where Max wanted him to stop. Max asked him what nobody warns you about in the NHL, and Rafe said the pillows. Max laughed a half-count late so it would land on a cut.

Rafe’s phone buzzed on the counter. He glanced at it and turned away.

“Take it,” Max said. “I’ve got B-roll.”

He took it two steps into the hall, raking fingers through his hair. “Yeah.” A pause. “No, put me with Heath. Not the third pair; they’ll sit on the wall and we’ll lose the entry.” A pause. “Because he steps up at the line every time. He’s done it twice this month.” Another pause, shorter. “Then I’ll take the left side. Tell him no on the other thing.”

He hung up.

“Sorry. Line stuff.”

“Your coach?” Max asked.

“Assistant.” He picked his water back up. “It’s nothing.”

It was more than that and required more engagement from Rafe than anything Max was doing.

“Cutaways,” Max said. “Give me the counter, give me the coffee thing, give me—“ He swung the phone around, hunting. “Give me literally anything else in this apartment.”

There was nothing else worth seeing in that apartment.

“There’s the—“ Rafe looked around his own home and came up empty. “There’s the wall.”