Iris stood at the kitchen doorway.
Nell looked at her and, for a second, looked past her. As if somebody else might be there.
“What did you say?”
Iris took one step forward. “I just meant you can stay.”
Nell heard the words again. Not in Iris's voice this time. She saw them on an old phone screen, late at night, after she had sent a long miserable message about a shift that went wrong.
Jonah had answered, You don't have to be good company to come home.
She'd told him she hadn't even been to his home. He'd said that didn't matter. He liked having her there, on the other end of the phone. She had read that reply so many times that its little mistakes felt like places she knew.
Nell put her bag on the floor.
“Did you read my messages?”
Iris looked down.
“From Jonah. Did you read them?”
“Nell—”
“Answer me.”
Iris's mouth opened. Nothing came out.
Nell's hands felt cold. The house was warm, but her fingers felt like she'd been standing outside for an hour.
She could have said that sentence to Iris once. She might have repeated it while crying. She'd told Iris so many things that she couldn't separate all the nights anymore.
But Iris wouldn't look at her.
Nell thought of the bus. Barely off it before the message. A detail Iris had pulled out so easily by the bakery sink.
“Were you Jonah?” she asked.
Iris pressed a hand over her mouth.
Nell waited. She could hear someone walking past the house, laughing on the other side of the window.
Iris lowered her hand.
“Yes.”
The word was small. It didn't fill the hallway. It ought to have.
“What?” Nell said.
“It was me.”
Nell stepped back until her shoulder hit the door. Iris moved toward her.
“Stay there.”
Iris stopped.
“His brother,” Nell said.
Iris nodded, almost before she'd finished.
“You?”
“Yes.”
“And the message.”
Iris's eyes filled. “There wasn't a brother.”
Nell couldn't see the kitchen properly. The edges of the doorframe seemed too sharp and everything behind Iris too far away.
“You told me he died.”
“I know.”
“You told me.”
Iris nodded again.
Nell made a sound she didn't recognize. It might have been a laugh. It hurt her throat.
“I came home,” she said. “You picked me up.”
“Yes.”
“You were there.”
Iris's hands were open at her sides, as if Nell might put something in them. Nell looked away from them.
She'd come home from that trip with her clothes still folded in the bag. She hadn't unpacked for days. Iris had brought her water, sat on the floor beside the bed, put the phone out of reach when Nell kept sending messages to Jonah's dead account.
Nell remembered pushing Iris away one night, then calling her back because she couldn't bear to be alone.
Iris had come back.
“You watched me,” Nell said.
“I was scared.”
“Of what?”
Iris wiped her cheek. “What you'd do. How you'd be. I hadn't thought—”
“You hadn't thought I'd believe you?”
“Not like that.”
“He was dead.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that.”
Iris closed her mouth.
Nell picked up her bag. She couldn't find the strap. It lay in front of her, plainly there, and she couldn't make her hand take hold of it.
Iris bent toward it.
“Don't touch my things.”
She straightened immediately.
Nell got the strap. The cake tin knocked against her knee. She held it too hard, then set it down again because she couldn't leave yet. She had one question left that wouldn't let her.
“Why?”
Iris looked at the kitchen floor.
“You were going to Calder.”
“So?”
“You'd found the room. You had the job. You were going. I thought—just for the summer. I told you he'd come back here. You might wait for him.”
“Jonah wasn't here.”
“No. You started asking when he'd arrive. Not when you could leave.”
Nell stared at her.
Iris swallowed. “It was stupid. I made a profile. You answered. It wasn't supposed to be five months.”
“How long was it supposed to be?”
“I don't know.”
“And then you killed him.”
Iris flinched.
“You killed him because I got on a bus.”
“I couldn't meet you.”
“You could have told me.”
“Yes.”
The answer was almost a whisper. Nell wanted it louder. She wanted it somewhere everybody could hear it, and then she wanted the whole house empty, Iris gone, the last four years put back where she could begin them again.
She couldn't get any of those things.
Iris leaned against the wall. “I thought you'd get over him. He wasn't—”
“Don't.”
Iris stopped.
Nell's phone was in her pocket. She pulled it out and opened Tess's name. The screen blurred. She blinked until she could see the letters.
Can you get me from Iris's?
Tess answered, Leaving now.
Nell put the phone back in her pocket. It was an ordinary movement. She did it slowly, to make sure it happened.
Iris whispered, “Are you going to tell her?”
“Yes.”
Iris looked as though she'd been struck.
Nell finally lifted her bag. “You don't get to ask me not to.”