CHAPTER FIVE #2
Nat stayed mostly out of the way. Michael appreciated this until he realized she was sitting on the kitchen counter drinking coffee and observing the move as though it were an educational program.
“Do you need something?” he asked.
“No.”
“Then why are you watching?”
“I’ve never seen a move in which nobody loses a lamp.”
“The lamps are in boxes twenty-one and twenty-two.”
She lifted her cup. “Naturally.”
His bedroom took less than an hour to arrange.
The bed stood against the inner wall, the desk faced the courtyard, and the bookcases fit precisely where he had planned.
When the last box was opened, everything had a place.
He hung one framed photograph on the wall beside his desk: Caroline and Michael at her wedding, both laughing as wind blew her veil across his face.
Nat appeared in the doorway. “Your sister?”
“Yes.”
“She looks happy.”
“She was.”
“Were you?”
Michael looked at the photograph. “Yes.”
Nat did not ask why he had answered in the past tense. She glanced around the room instead. “You don’t have much.”
“I have what I need.”
“No stacks of old magazines? No mysterious box of cables that fit technology nobody owns?”
“No.”
“What about sentimental objects?”
“The chair belonged to my grandfather. The photograph is sentimental.”
“That’s two.”
“How many are required?”
“There isn’t a minimum. I’m simply trying to determine whether you arrived fully formed at thirty-four with a filing system.”
Michael turned toward her. “You know my age.”
“It was in the questionnaire.”
“You said it was too long.”
“I still read it.”
She moved away from the doorway before he could answer.
Their first dinner in the apartment was not planned.
Michael had intended to order food after unpacking and review the remaining household tasks while eating.
At six thirty, he walked into the kitchen and found Nat standing at the stove.
Tomatoes simmered in a wide pan with garlic, olive oil, and something green.
Pasta boiled beside it. The dining table had been set with two mismatched plates and cloth napkins.
“I thought food expenses were separate,” he said.
“They are. This is a pantry-establishment meal.”
“That category is not in the agreement.”
“It should have been. Every new home needs a first dinner.”
“We ate here last night.”
“We ate downstairs. That was an approval hearing with potatoes.”
Michael looked at the table. “I planned to order something.”
“You still can.”
She said it easily, but her hand slowed as she stirred the sauce. Michael recognized the choice beneath the words. He could preserve the boundary they had written or accept a meal she had made because the apartment felt unfinished without one.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Pasta with tomatoes, basil, and ricotta. Nothing experimental.”
“I don’t dislike experimental food.”
“You objected to mushrooms you didn’t dislike at a dinner that never happened.”
“That was your invention.”
Nat smiled. “Sit down.”
The pasta was excellent. The sauce tasted fresh and balanced, the ricotta softened the acidity, and the basil had been torn rather than cut. Michael knew this because Nat explained the difference after catching him examining a leaf.
“You analyze food,” she said.
“I pay attention.”
“Those are cousins.”
“They are not.”
She laughed but did not try to make him laugh with her.
As they ate, Nat described the business behind her website. She had two regular sponsors, advertising revenue, freelance assignments, and a cookbook proposal her agent had been circulating for three months. Her income varied by season and depended partly on traffic she could not control.
Michael asked how she tracked expenses.
“I have software.”
“That was not my question.”
“I enter receipts.”
“How often?”
“When their emotional power over me becomes too great.”
He set down his fork. “How often?”
“Every month.”
“At the end?”
“Near it.”
“You should enter them weekly.”
“I knew dinner would lead to accounting.”
“I am not an accountant.”
“Financial intervention, then.”
“You would have more accurate information about your operating costs.”
Nat rested her chin on her hand. “Are you offering to look at my business?”
“No.”
“Your voice said no, but your face began making categories.”
Michael continued eating.
After dinner, Nat washed while he dried. She placed plates in the cabinet without checking whether he agreed with the location. Michael considered objecting, then decided the dishes were near the dining room and within reach of the sink. The arrangement was reasonable.
At nine thirty, they closed their bedroom doors.
At one fifty-seven in the morning, Michael woke up to a mechanical roar.
He sat upright, disoriented by the unfamiliar room. The sound stopped, then began again in a short violent burst. Something struck the floor in the kitchen.
Michael reached the hallway at the same time a pale cloud drifted through the archway.
Nat stood beside the kitchen island wearing loose pajama pants and a white T-shirt. Flour covered the counter, the floor, and most of her upper body. The stand mixer remained plugged in, its stainless-steel bowl tilted at an angle. A wooden spoon lay several feet away.
Michael looked for smoke. “Is anything burning?”
“No.”
“Is anything damaged?”
“My dignity. Possibly the mixer.”
He crossed the room and unplugged it. “What happened?”
“The speed control was higher than I expected.”
“You turned it on without checking?”
“I believed I had.”
Flour dusted her hair and eyelashes. A streak crossed one cheek. The scene might have been funny if it were not two in the morning and directly prohibited by the agreement they had both signed.
“You agreed to provide notice before using kitchen equipment between midnight and six,” he said.
“I know.”
“You did not.”
“I didn’t plan this.”
“You assembled ingredients.”
“I couldn’t sleep. I had an idea for cardamom breakfast rolls that don’t need yeast.”
“That is planning.”
“That is inspiration followed by poor speed assessment.”
Michael looked at the floor. Flour had reached the baseboards and the dining-room threshold. “Why could this not wait until morning?”
“My sponsor wants a breakfast recipe by Monday. If it works, I need daylight to photograph it tomorrow, which means I must test it tonight.”
“You could have sent me a message.”
“You were asleep.”
“The purpose of the message was notification, not conversation.”
Nat took a towel from the counter and began wiping flour from the mixer. The humor left her face. “You’re right. I should have told you.”
The immediate admission interrupted the argument Michael had prepared.
“I’m sorry,” she continued. “This is my work, but that doesn’t make it more important than your sleep. I thought I could mix one batch quietly.”
“The mixer is not quiet.”
“I have now gathered evidence.”
Michael looked at her. She was tired, embarrassed, and genuinely sorry. She was also standing in the middle of a kitchen that looked as though weather had occurred inside it.
“We need a better procedure,” he said.
“Agreed.”
“If you plan to work after midnight, send a message before I go to bed whenever possible. If it is not possible, send one before you begin.”
“Even if you’re asleep?”
“Yes.”
“And I keep the mixer below speed four.”
“Below speed three.”
“Three won’t properly aerate some batters.”
“Then speed four for no more than thirty seconds.”
Nat considered it. “That is strangely specific.”
“It is two in the morning.”
“Four for thirty seconds,” she agreed.
Michael found the broom in the utility closet.
Nat retrieved the vacuum, proving she did know how to use it.
They worked from the outer edges toward the center, containing the flour before it could travel farther into the apartment.
Michael swept beneath the cabinets while Nat cleaned the counters and rescued the ingredients.
When he straightened, she was close enough that he could smell cardamom beneath the flour. The streak remained on her cheek.
“You missed some,” he said.
“Where?”
He lifted his hand before considering whether he should. His thumb brushed lightly across her cheek.
Nat went still.
The flour came away, leaving warm skin beneath his fingers. Michael became aware of the quiet apartment, her bare feet beside his, and the fact that neither of them was performing for Mrs. Gable.
He lowered his hand. “There.”
“Thank you.”
Her voice was softer than usual.
Michael returned the broom to the closet. “How much longer will the recipe take?”
“Twenty minutes to finish the dough. Eighteen to bake.”
“Do you need the mixer again?”
“No.”
He nodded. “Good night.”
At seven the next morning, Michael emerged from his bedroom dressed for his run. The kitchen was clean. The mixer sat in its place, the counters had been wiped, and sunlight had begun to move across the floor exactly as Nat had predicted.
A covered plate waited on the table beside a handwritten note.
Compensation for sleep disturbance. Cardamom-orange breakfast roll, test number one. No yeast, no fire, and only moderate structural risk.
Michael lifted the cover. The roll was still slightly warm. He sat at the table, took one bite, and then another.
Across the apartment, Nat’s bedroom door remained closed. The home around him was no longer silent, empty, or entirely orderly.
Michael finished the roll.