Chapter Nineteen Nora
Maeve is looking at me with puppy eyes.
Her chin dips. Her lips push forward into an exaggerated pout. Her lashes flutter, overdone, fully aware of what she’s doing.
“Please,” she says, drawing the word out. “Can you do the laundry this week?”
I blink at her. “But I did it last week,” I say slowly. “And the week before that.”
She doesn’t deny it. She just groans and lets herself flop dramatically onto the arm of the couch, limbs splayed.
“I know,” she whines, draping a hand over her forehead.
“I know. But I’m so tired, Nora. I just want one week where I don’t have to think about separating whites and colours or forgetting a sock in the machine. Please.”
She is tired. I can see it in the shadows under her eyes, in her slumped shoulders, in the faint rasp in her voice. The café has been busier than usual. She’s been there from open to close, stepping in wherever she’s needed, handling a thousand small crises that never make it onto any schedule.
For a split second—just one—I feel the old instinct twitch.
The automatic fine. The reflexive I’ll handle it. The part of me that keeps the peace by taking up as little space as possible, by asking for nothing, by absorbing the small burdens of other people so they don’t have to feel them.
But then I pause.
I picture the café. The early mornings. The late nights. My notebooks spread open on the kitchen table, numbers blurring together because I’ve been pushing my brain to learn things it was never allowed to learn before.
I feel the tiredness in my bones. It goes beyond sleepiness, a deeper weariness weighing through me.
I straighten. “No.”
Maeve’s pout freezes mid-beg.
I look her in the eye. “We’re equals. I did laundry two weeks in a row. Your turn.”
She opens her mouth.
I hold up one finger. “I’m tired too. And it’s not my turn.”
Maeve’s face transforms. Her smile spreads wide, bright, reaching her eyes, crinkling the corners. Her whole expression opens, warmth flooding through it.
“Finally!” She throws her hands up, a burst of relief breaking through her.
I stare at her, caught off guard. “What?”
“I had a bet going with Myra. She lost. You finally said no—I was starting to think you’d say yes again this week and I’d lose my money.”
“You did this on purpose?” I ask in disbelief.
“Yes! I wanted you to say no.” She says it simply, with no apology. “You never do. So I kept asking until you did. Myra thought it would take three times. I said two.” She grins. “I was right.”
“I can’t wait to tell Myra you said no and take her money.” She is already reaching for her phone, thumbs flying across the screen as she crafts a message to broadcast the news of my rebellion.
An unfamiliar warmth blooms in my chest, carrying a weight that could only be pride.
My mouth curves upward. “First wash the clothes. Then gloat about winning money.”
I turn toward my room, still carrying that curve on my face while a groan follows me from behind.
*****
A few days later at the café, I notice it almost immediately.
Kieran is… off.
His smiles don’t reach his eyes. They come too fast, fade just as quickly. His shoulders stay tight, carrying more than they should.
Maeve has been glancing at him all day. The glances are quick, almost hidden, careful enough that he doesn’t notice.
And his hand keeps drifting to his arm.
Kieran always keeps his sleeves rolled just enough that his tattoo stays hidden, even on the hottest days. An unspoken rule. The ink exists, but only in glimpses. Never fully seen.
I’ve caught pieces of it before. A flicker of black when he reaches for a high shelf. A hint of script when he passes me a cup. I’ve never asked about it.
The tattoo is hidden today as well. And his attention keeps snapping back to that spot, his hand brushing it again and again, as though it aches.
So when the café closes for our fifteen minutes and we sit side by side outside, and I catch his hand drifting there again—
“Kieran.” I angle my head toward him, waiting.
He looks up, his focus lagging behind the movement. “Yeah?”
I search his face, looking for the man beneath the tension. “Are you okay?”
He blinks. Then his mouth curves into a tired, almost fond smile.
“That’s not what you’re supposed to ask.” The words come out flat, almost amused, but underneath sits a heavier weight.
I frown. “What?”
He nods toward his arm, where his hand hovers again. “You’re supposed to ask about that. Or why I keep touching it.”
His hand drifts to his arm again, fingers pressing in for a second before easing off. His shoulders stay tight, his jaw set, that faint smile hovering where it doesn’t belong.
“That’s not what I’m curious about,” I admit. “I just want to know if you’re okay.”
A shift ripples across his features. The practiced smile fades; his guard slips.
His eyes shine suddenly, too bright, and for one terrible second I think I have pushed too hard, stepped somewhere fragile I was never meant to enter.
“I’m not—” he rasps, the sound catching in his throat. “I’m not crying because of you. This isn’t your fault. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
The words spill out of him, quick, urgent, almost tripping over each other—like he needs me to understand before I can misunderstand, before I can take it on myself and pull back.
He scrubs at his eyes with the heel of his hand, his shoulders trembling just a fraction. “I promise,” he manages, breath uneven.
He waits until I nod. Until I believe him.
He pulls in a breath. Then another, longer this time. His hand drops to his sleeve. For a moment, it just rests there, fingers curling into the fabric. Then he starts to push it up. All the way.
It takes a moment to register.
It’s… a list.
A grocery list, tattooed on the inside of his forearm.
Black ink. Thin, clean lines. Simple. No shading, no artistic flourish. Just handwriting made permanent.
The paper itself is part of it, drawn as though it was torn from a notebook. One edge is uneven, rough from a hurried rip. The corners carry faint creases, softened from being folded into a pocket and opened again and again.
milk
good bread (not the dry one)
eggs
tomatoes (ripe, not big)
tea
One word is crossed out.
cookies
Next to it, written smaller and with obvious care, is a replacement.
apples
Then at the bottom, in a wobbly, unformed script, the ink reads:
don’t forget the flowers
The ordinary tenderness of it makes my breath catch.
Kieran tracks the movement of my eyes, ignoring the ink entirely. His focus remains pinned to my expression, gauging every flicker of my reaction.
“My mom made the lists,” he says quietly. “She’d sit there with her pen waving and call a family meeting to see what was needed.”
I can see it. A kitchen table. A mother with a list. Everyone arguing about what to add. The chaos of a family that is comfortable with each other.
He looks down at his arm. A faint smile pulls at the corner of his mouth. “My dad always tried to sneak something in. Cookies. Cake. Ice cream. Anything sweet.” A ghost of a chuckle escapes him, warm and bittersweet. “She always caught him. And she always crossed it out.”
His finger drifts down and rests gently on the word apples. “She’d replace it with something sensible. Every single time.”
Then he hesitates. Just for a second.
His finger drops to the very last line.
don’t forget the flowers
“That part’s mine,” he reveals. His thumb traces over the ink once, light, almost absent.
I keep my eyes on his, waiting for the rest.
“She loved flowers,” he continues, his eyes not leaving the line. “My dad never forgot to buy them. Not once. It didn’t matter if he was just going out for a walk or if they were fighting. He always got her flowers whenever he went out.”
He rubs the line with his thumb. Back and forth, as if trying to erase the ink and feel the memory beneath.
“We went together that day. Dad and I. He gave me the list, the responsibility of keeping it safe. So I wrote this at the end.” His voice drops to a near whisper.
“Just in case he forgot about the flowers.”
He releases a heavy breath that seems to drain the tension from his frame.
“It was a normal day,” he narrates. “We were supposed to get the groceries. Eat ice cream. Go back home and not tell Mom about the ice cream.” His mouth curves, just slightly.
“I lived for those trips. Just the two of us. I thought we had forever to do it again.”
He goes quiet for a moment, his thumb tracing the ink on his arm.
“I was ten,” he says, almost to himself. “I didn’t know yet that forever had an end date.” His voice tightens on the last sentence, pulled too far. He keeps talking anyway. “We were—”
The cut is jagged. He gulps and attempts the line once more. “We were supposed to—”
The rest doesn’t make it out. A rough breath slips out instead. His hand curls suddenly over the tattoo, hiding it even as his eyes stay fixed on the spot. His chin drops, gaze slipping to the ground.
“I thought—” The words drag, forced out one at a time. “I thought I was ready for this conversation.”
His gaze stays fixed on his arm, thumb pressing into the skin again and again. Every muscle in his back bunches, iron-tight and straining, battling the visible tremor threatening to take hold.
I don’t look at his eyes. I don’t have to. I know they’re brimming again, fighting to stay clear.
I have seen that fight before. In the mirror. In the dark. In the moments when I was trying so hard not to cry that my whole body shook with the effort of holding it in.
I lift my hand, then pause with it halfway between us. It hovers there for a moment, uncertain, before I let it move forward inch by inch, aware of every bit of space I’m crossing, aware of him.
I leave room for him to pull back. Leave space for him to stop me.
He doesn’t.
I place my hand over his, where his fingers have curled tight over the ink, light enough that he can shake it off if he wants.