Iris arrived ten minutes late the following morning. Nora had spent the ten minutes deciding what she would do if she didn't come, which meant she was unprepared when the entry bell finally rang.
She pressed the release and waited at the apartment door. There were footsteps on the stairs, a brief stop on the landing below. Then Iris appeared, breathing a little harder than she meant to show.
“Hello,” Nora said.
Iris looked at her. Her gaze went down to the dressed arm, then back to Nora's face. Neither woman moved.
Nora had expected a sentence, some accusation she could answer. Instead Iris stood with one hand still on the banister. She was thinner, or Nora thought she was. Her coat looked too large at the shoulders. There was no bag.
“Come in,” Nora said.
Iris passed her without touching her. Nora closed the door, keeping the movement quiet.
The apartment was too familiar to greet her properly. Iris knew the narrow place by the kitchen, the chair which scraped against the wall, the radiator which wasn't hot even when the others were. She looked toward the scarf and then away, as if she'd found something deliberately laid out for her.
“That's yours,” Nora said.
“I know.”
“I kept it.”
“You didn't have to.”
Nora wanted to say she hadn't known what else to do. That wasn't true. She could have put it away, sent it somewhere, asked Mina to hold it. She had kept it because she wanted the apartment to contain proof that Iris had been there.
“Tea?”
“No.”
“Coffee?”
Iris looked at her. “Sit down.”
Nora sat on the sofa. Iris remained standing, then took the chair by the window, the scarf beneath her coat sleeve. She moved it aside before sitting. The small care made Nora hopeful in a way she distrusted.
“How is it?” Iris asked.
Nora knew she meant the arm.
“Getting better.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Yes.”
Iris's eyes filled. She turned her face toward the window, furious with herself or with being seen; Nora couldn't tell.
“I didn't mean that,” Iris said.
Nora said nothing. The apology was both less and more than she'd expected. Iris had meant to shove her away. She had not meant what the door did. Nora didn't want to offer the easy absolution contained in agreeing.
“You left,” she said.
“I know.”
“I said your name.”
“I know.”
“Then why?”
Iris turned back. Her eyes were wet but her voice held.
“Because I was scared.”
Nora heard her own first explanation to the police. In someone else's mouth it sounded horribly inadequate.
“I was on the floor.”
“Yes.”
“You could have called.”
“I know that now. I knew it then, too. I didn't.”
There was no argument to have with the answer. Nora had wanted Iris to say something false, something she could make more accurate by getting angry. Instead she had put the ugly fact between them and left it there.
“Did you see me move?” Nora asked.
“You moved before. Then you didn't.”
“Did you check?”
Iris shook her head.
“No.”
“So you didn't know.”
“No.”
Nora stood and walked to the kitchen. She needed somewhere to put her hand, something which did not depend on deciding what to do with the woman behind her.
“I'm making coffee,” she said.
“All right.”
There was a little steadiness in that answer, the permission to do an ordinary thing without pretending ordinary things had returned. Nora filled the kettle. Her good hand shook enough that water went over the side.
Iris appeared in the doorway.
“Let me.”
“No.”
She stopped. Nora wiped the spilled water with a cloth, awkwardly, angry that Iris could remember the drawer and find the towels more quickly than she could manage them.
“I didn't come to argue about coffee,” Iris said.
“You used to.”
Something almost like a smile touched her mouth.
“Your coffee needed arguing about.”
Nora looked at her, and for an instant it was possible to see the woman who had opened the windows and made the apartment feel occupied. Then her arm throbbed and the smile vanished.
“Why did you go to the police?” she asked.
“Because I couldn't keep not going.”
“After nine days.”
“Yes.”
“Where were you?”
“Places I could stay.”
“With somebody?”
“Sometimes.”
Nora resented the answer for no reason she was proud of. There had been other rooms, other people giving Iris a bed while Nora put a scarf on a chair and decided she didn't exist.
“You could have contacted me.”
Iris looked at her sharply.
“What did you think I believed?”
Nora lowered her eyes.
“I don't know.”
“You do. That's why we're here.”
The kettle clicked off. Nora made two coffees, giving Iris the mug she'd bought herself. This time there was no pretence the old arrangement meant nothing.
Iris took it and held it between both hands.
“They told me you were alive,” she said. “I thought they'd got the wrong person. For a few minutes. Then they told me enough.”
“What?”
“Where you were. That you'd been hurt. That they'd seen you.”
“And that I didn't know you.”
Iris nodded. She touched the mug handle with a finger, then said, “That was a strange thing to be grateful for.”
Nora's eyes began to sting.
“I was going to say—”
“Don't tell me what you were going to say. You've had days to say it.”
“I told them.”
“Afterwards.”
“Yes.”
They returned to the sitting room. Iris took the same chair. Nora sat on the sofa, leaving more space between them than she'd wanted to.
“I didn't want to be cheated,” Iris said.
“We weren't going to cheat you.”
“You don't know what he was going to do.”
“I know what I was going to do.”
“You were going to keep me there until he came back.”
“I wanted to talk.”
“You had hold of the bag.”
Nora looked down at her right hand. It was the hand she had used then, the one which remained useful now.
“You had all the money.”
“I had it in a bag. That doesn't mean I was taking all of it.”
“You were leaving.”
“I was going outside. If I'd wanted to leave you both, I should have gone earlier. I kept thinking it would be fair because you were there.”
Nora could hear the old attraction in the accusation. Iris had relied on it, or claimed to, and Nora wanted that to make her own choice kinder than it was.
“You didn't trust me.”
“I trusted you more than him.”
“That's not much.”
“It was something.”
Iris set the coffee down. She had barely drunk it.
“We could argue about the handles all day. I pushed you. I left. I can't take that back. But you weren't trying to stop me because you thought I was stealing from him.”
“I know.”
The admission surprised Iris. Nora saw it in the little lift of her chin.
“I wanted the money,” Nora said. “I wanted what it would buy.”
Iris nodded slowly. There was no relief in it, but something became less exhausting between them. They could stop pretending the fight had begun with only one woman wanting more.
“Did he bring it back?” Iris asked.
“Some.”
“From where?”
“What was left, he said.”
Iris looked at her. “Left where?”
“At the house. After you went.”
“You believe that?”
Nora felt her body preparing to defend him before she knew what the defence would be.
“He saved my life.”
Iris stood abruptly. Nora thought she was leaving and rose, too quickly, bumping the low table with her knee.
“Don't,” Iris said.
“I wasn't—”
“I'm getting my phone.”
She took it from her coat pocket. Her fingers moved without hurry now, with a care which frightened Nora more than the sudden movement had.
“You need to see what he told me,” Iris said.
Nora sat down. Iris remained standing until she'd found it, then came closer and held out the screen.