Chapter 4
The elevator was too small for the suitcase and both of us. Amber had to turn hers sideways and it still brushed my shoes every time the car shifted. I watched the numbers climb and tried not to look at her reflection in the brass doors. Her pink top was a little wrinkled from where I'd held her.
I fumbled my keys outside 4B. My hand wasn't steady. The lock stuck the way it always did if you didn't lift the door first.
"You still have to do the trick," she said, quiet.
I lifted. It clicked open.
The apartment was dark and warm. I flipped the switch in the hall and the luggage wheels caught on the threshold, that same light stutter they'd had on the terrace bar. I pulled it inside and left it by the shoe rack where it didn't belong. It looked wrong there. Too ready.
She stepped in behind me and didn't wait to be invited. That was the thing I noticed first.
She dropped her purse on my kitchen counter, toed off her shoes and left them not lined up the way a guest would, but kicked half under the bench where she always left them. She reached for the light over the stove without asking and turned it on low. The apartment smelled like her shampoo. Faint, coconut and something clean. It shouldn't have still been in the air. She hadn't slept here in two nights.
"You're out of coffee," she said, opening the cabinet above the machine. She knew that without looking.
I stood by the door with my jacket still on. "I meant to go to the store."
"I know."
In the bathroom she didn't knock or pause. I heard the faucet run. When I followed her to the doorway, her toothbrush was still in the holder next to mine. Pink handle. Bristles frayed the way she left them. Her little bag of toiletries was open on the shelf, the moisturizer with the cracked cap, a hair tie looped around the bottle. Two cotton pads by the sink she hadn't thrown away. I hadn't moved any of it. I'd told myself I'd clean up if I had time.
She caught me looking in the mirror.
"You didn't put it away," she said.
I shook my head. My throat felt tight. "Didn't see a reason to."
She turned the water off and dried her hands on my towel. Not the hand towel I left for guests, but the big gray one on the hook. Her towel, really. She'd claimed it a month ago and I never said anything.
Back in the living room, she curled onto the couch like she owned the corner of it. Legs tucked under her, pink top pulling a little where she leaned. The blanket from the back of the couch was already over her knees. She'd done that in one motion, automatic.
I finally took my jacket off and hung it over the kitchen chair. The apartment felt smaller with the suitcase in it. I could hear the marina through the cracked window, the same bokeh of lights we'd just left, but muted now, far away.
"It's weird," I said. I sat on the edge of the coffee table so I was facing her. Close enough to see the faint tear tracks still on her cheeks, dried now.
"What is?"
"How you walk in here. Like you live here. Most people... they stand by the door and wait."
She smiled a little. Her eyes were still red. "Do you want me to stand by the door?"
"No." I said it too fast. I breathed. "No. I just realized I notice when you don't. When you're gone, I come back and the lights are off the same way I left them. The blanket's folded. The sink's empty. And it just... it feels wrong. Like someone paused it."
She looked down at her hands, picking at a loose thread on the blanket. "It feels empty to me too when I'm not here. That's why I leave stuff."
I swallowed. "I told myself I'd get used to it. An apartment's just an apartment."
She looked up then. Her silver hoop caught the low light.
"It's not," she said. "Not anymore."
We sat there a second. The fridge hummed. Outside, a scooter passed on the street below.
She glanced toward the suitcase by the door. "What time is it?"
"Almost one."
"If I call now they'll say it's too late to change," she said. "I'll have to do it in the morning anyway."
I nodded. My breathing was shallow. "You could stay."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah." I reached forward and put my hand over hers on the blanket. Her fingers were cold from being outside. "Stay. We'll figure it out when it's light. We don't have to decide tonight."
She didn't answer right away. Then she squeezed my hand back, just once, tight.
May you like
"Okay," she whispered. "I'll stay tonight."
I stood and pulled the suitcase a few inches away from the door, just enough so we wouldn't trip on it if we got up. She was already reaching for the remote, already dimming the stove light the way she liked it. I went to lock the front door and didn't set an alarm.
