Chapter 8: Across the Hall

By morning, Clara's shoulders protested every movement.

She had forgotten how physical ordinary work could be. Even during the leanest years of Grant's startup, they had paid someone to clean the office once a week. At Waverly Heights, other people had lifted, repaired, carried, and polished before she noticed the need.

This apartment required her hands.

She finished the last wall, stepped into the hall for a fresh drop cloth, and caught the edge of an open paint can with her shoe.

White paint spread toward the apartment opposite hers.

"No, no—"

Clara righted the can and dropped to her knees with a rag. The opposite door opened before she could erase the evidence.

Elias Mercer looked from the paint to Clara.

"You live here?" they asked at the same time.

For the first time since meeting him, she saw surprise break through his composure.

"I moved in yesterday," Clara said. "I'm sorry about the floor. I won't let it reach your door."

Elias glanced into her apartment at the roller balanced precariously on a chair.

"Wait here."

He returned with a folding ladder.

"The ceiling edge will be easier with this."

Clara accepted it. "Thank you. Again."

"You can return it when you're done."

He went back inside without asking why a woman linked to Grant Holloway was painting a seventh-floor walk-up by herself. Clara appreciated the silence more than sympathy.

She had grown used to questions that were really verdicts. Why live here when Grant owned a villa? Why study when he could support her? Why insist on work that did not improve his life? Elias looked at the unstable chair, solved the immediate problem, and left the rest of her choices intact.

With the ladder, she finished before noon.

Secondhand wooden shelves, a compact sofa, and a round dining table arrived that afternoon. Clara covered the sofa with bright cushions, set herbs along the kitchen window, and placed a small tank with two goldfish beside the books she had bought for exam preparation.

Sloane surveyed the result over a video call.

"You made that place look human in six hours."

"A home should feel lived in."

"Waverly Heights never looked this warm."

Clara adjusted a lamp. Grant had preferred rooms that resembled hotel lobbies: stone, glass, expensive objects no one touched. She had spent years trying to soften the villa without disturbing his taste.

Here, no one could veto yellow curtains or a chipped ceramic planter.

"Starting over suits you," Sloane said.

Clara looked around the imperfect room. "I think it might."

* * *

At six, she made sandwiches and a pot of millet porridge from the groceries she had carried upstairs.

She filled a thermal container, crossed the hall, and knocked.

Elias opened the door in shirtsleeves. A wall of monitors glowed behind him.

"I finished with the ladder." Clara held it out. "I also made too much dinner. Consider this repayment."

He accepted both. "You didn't owe me a meal."

"Then consider it a neighborly bribe. I may need to borrow a drill someday."

Something near a smile moved at the corner of his mouth. "Noted."

Elias returned to his data and forgot the container until hunger interrupted him two hours later.

The sandwich was still warm. The bacon remained crisp, the eggs soft, the vegetables seasoned just enough. The porridge was plain in the way good food could afford to be plain.

He finished everything at his desk.

Only afterward did he notice the small paper label on the container: Across the hall, in case you forget where to return this.

Elias turned the empty container once in his hands. Sloane had described Clara as someone who disappeared into another person's life. The woman across the hall had spent the day building a home from bare rooms and still found time to make a joke for a near stranger.

The description no longer seemed sufficient.

At ten, Elias returned from a run and found Clara near the building entrance with a package under one arm. Her hair was twisted into a loose knot, and a streak of white paint marked her wrist.

"Evening walk?" she asked.

"Run."

"That explains why you look healthier than every other researcher I know."

"The dinner was excellent."

"The ladder was useful. We're even."

Children chased each other through the small park across the street. Someone had opened an upstairs window, releasing the sound of a piano exercise into the warm night.

Clara watched the families for a moment. "It's lively here."

Elias had lived in the building for two months and had never thought to describe it that way.

For him, the apartment had been a place to sleep between experiments. Clara had been there two days and already knew which children played late, when the piano started, and how the setting sun reached the park.

"Miriam is home," he said. "I planned to visit tomorrow at ten."

Clara's grip tightened around the package.

"Come with me."

"Tomorrow?"

"Unless you need more time."

She almost asked for it. Then she remembered that time had been her excuse for six years.

"Ten is fine."

Elias nodded and did not ask whether she was afraid.

Rain began after midnight. Clara lay awake listening to it strike the fire escape, rehearsing apologies that all sounded too small.

At exactly ten the next morning, someone knocked.

She opened the door fully dressed, fruit basket in hand.

Elias took in her coat, shoes, and tense expression. "Ready?"

Clara stepped into the hall and locked the door behind her.

"As I'll ever be."