"You did well today," Emma says quietly, bumping my shoulder with hers. "This is going to work out."
I look at Harper in her bouncer. My house is full of baby supplies, and a woman I met today agreed to move in and help me raise my daughter. My life is unrecognizable from what it was yesterday.
"I hope you're right," I say.
Because if she's not, I have no idea what the hell I'm going to do. And that's the part I haven't let myself look at directly, notreally. Not the logistics of it, or the feeds, the diapers, and the schedules, but the rest of it.
The fact that there's a small person asleep in a crib upstairs who is going to need things from me that I don't know how to give yet. The fact that I have spent the last year on this team being someone nobody trusts, and I am now responsible for keeping another human being alive. The fact that I want to get it right in a way I haven't wanted anything in a long time, and I'm not sure that's enough.
6
NORA
"Ready?" Diane asks, popping the trunk of her car.
I look back at my building one last time. Six months I’ve been here, and I'm leaving it the same way I arrived: with everything I own in the back of a car and nowhere particular I'm supposed to be going. Only this time, somewhere particular is exactly where I'm headed.
"Ready."
We load the last boxes. Clothes, toiletries, books, and a few kitchen things that are actually mine. Everything else got sorted yesterday: furniture arrangements with my landlord, Tyler agreeing to cover the rent until November, and everything organized. That's what I do when I don't know what else to do—I organize things.
My entire life fits in the back of Diane's car with room to spare.
"You okay?" she asks as we pull away.
"Fine. It's just a place."
She doesn't push, which I appreciate. She has an instinct for when people need silence rather than words. It's a rare thing.
We pull into Tyler's driveway, and Emma is already at the door.
"Perfect timing! Tyler's feeding Harper in the nursery, Maya's making breakfast, and I've cleared the guest room closet." She grabs two boxes from the trunk. "Come on, let's get you sorted."
The guest room is at the end of the upstairs hall, across from Harper's nursery. It’s bigger than I expected, with a queen bed, a dresser, a desk, and its own bathroom. The closet is empty, and the bed has fresh sheets on it, corners tucked.
"It's yours for as long as you need it," Emma says, setting down her boxes. "Make it feel like home."
Home.The word catches somewhere behind my sternum before I can stop it. Home was a specific thing once: a kitchen that smelled like my mother's cooking, a father who said goodnight from the doorway, and a car on a bridge that didn't make it to the other side. I have been to many places in the two years since then, and called none of them that.
I nod and start unpacking, because it's easier than explaining any of that, easier than saying that I don't know yet what to do with a word that used to mean everything and now mostly just means nothing.
Diane and Emma help me organize. Clothes in the dresser. Toiletries in the bathroom. Books on the desk. Everything finds a place.
The last thing I unpack is my parents' photo.
It was taken at my aunt's barbecue the summer before the accident. My dad said something, and my mom turned toward him, laughing, and whoever had the camera caught it perfectly, both of them looking at each other, not at the lens, as if the rest of the world had excused itself for a moment. I've carried it to every placement since. It's the first thing that goes on the nightstand and the last thing I pack.
I trace my thumb over the glass. Then I put it down and turn away before the grief gets a proper grip.
Two years.I keep expecting it to get easier to set down, but it never does.
When I make it back downstairs, Maya has made breakfast. Eggs, toast, fruit, and coffee are laid out on the kitchen table.
Tyler is in the living room with Harper in his arms, and I stop in the doorway before he sees me.
His hold has changed. It's only been two days, but I can already see it: he's supporting her head without thinking, her body is settled against his chest with the ease of someone who has been practicing. He's talking to her in a low voice, narrating something, and she's watching his face with the absorbed attention that newborns give to the people who care for them.
Something about the image makes me look away.