Here's the original. For a different perspective.
Golden Hour
Oh, the Golden Hour. Dusk. He was a crepuscular creature. Never really comfortable with daylight. All his best work was done as Diego buffed the floor outside his office.
In civilized circles it would be Cocktail Hour, or when he was younger, Happy Hour. Now it was the time when he could reflect on the events of the day while postponing the inevitability of his evening. Glenlivit, Cole Porter and a few spoonfuls of Chunky Monkey.
But now, as the sun filtered through the blinds everything glowed golden. He put the journal down and gazed out the window. Now was the time. He was the requisite thirty minutes into his tea-time dose. All the edge was off. Now he could think clearly, or was his thinking opaque? Did this light diffuse and blur the edges?
He seemed to have fixed on an object on the horizon. That tree? A building? He sought beyond items in his sightline.
He believed things about himself. His mystique. Arrogant, brilliant, aloof, detached. His match was a woman who could hold her own with him. At least, that's what he believed. Yet here she was and the reality crashed around him. Arrogant, brilliant, aloof, detached. He couldn't have been less interested. But the brain has always had a hard time convincing the heart.
He believed things about her. Her guilessness. Warm, seeking, accessible, attached. Beautiful, but so many women were beautiful. Damaged. He worried her façade like a kid with a loose tooth. Probing with his tongue to dislodge the mask and reveal the woman.
He wanted to believe that they could be good for one another. In this light, he thought they might. She would do something for him. He would be grateful. At the end of the day it was easy to be generous. In the harsh morning light, disappointment.
The sun disappeared behind buildings and street lamps winked on. Off into the dark; back into the shadows. His gloom shrouding him against the cold, against feeling old. He'd rather be miserable than feel old.
In the golden moments between day and night House saw himself as dark. Black as anthracite. Deep, unfathomable, no light escaping. She contradicted him. Light and white and bright. As dusk turns day to night, dawn turns night to day. Not quite ready to leave yesterday for tomorrow.