Jo opened the door with one earring in and the other between her teeth.
“Come in,” she said, which sounded like something else.
Mara stepped over a pair of small sneakers and took the earring before Jo could swallow it. It was green, a long bright piece of glass that caught the light against Mara's palm.
“Where are you going?”
“Nowhere.” Jo held out her hand. “I bought them.”
“I can see that.”
“I mean I didn't have them. They're new.”
She fastened the second one in front of the narrow mirror in the hall, turning her head to watch it move. Mara waited with the bag of towels Jo had asked to borrow for a school thing that had already become more complicated than the message explaining it. In the kitchen Calvin was trying to get brownies off a tray. A child beside him was offering instructions he didn't seem to find helpful.
“They have to cool,” Kit said.
“They've been cooling.”
“Not enough.”
Mara put the bag on the counter. Calvin looked up, smiling with the relief of a man who had just been given a witness.
“Tell her.”
“They have to cool,” Mara said.
Kit folded her arms. Calvin put down the spatula.
“Great. That's what I needed.”
The kitchen table had been divided into territories. At one end Milo was drawing a map with a ruler he kept dropping. In the middle a stack of clean shirts waited to be folded. At the other end Jo had put a saucer, a cup and the little bag her earrings had come in. Mara started moving the shirts.
“Leave those,” Jo said. “He's doing them.”
Calvin looked over his shoulder. “I am.”
“I'm only moving them.”
“Then he'll lose them,” Jo said.
Mara left the shirts and sat where the saucer was. Jo took the cup away before she could use it.
“That's mine. I'll get you one.”
Milo needed the ruler again. It had fallen beneath Mara's chair. She picked it up, and he took it without looking at her, the tip of his tongue pressed to his upper lip.
“What are you making?”
“A place.”
“Which place?”
“I haven't finished.”
He went back to it. The map had two roads, one park and what appeared to be a lake with a rectangular island. Mara thought of the paper in her bag and put her hands around the empty place where Jo's cup had been.
Jo brought tea. The kettle had a lid that didn't quite sit flat; she held it down with the corner of a towel while she poured. Calvin successfully freed something from the tray and put it in front of Kit. It broke in half. Kit considered it, then took the larger piece and left.
“You're welcome,” he called after her.
“She said thank you,” Jo said.
“When?”
“Earlier. Generally.”
He laughed and began putting the rest on a plate. Mara watched Jo turn her head to get the earring against her neck. In her work clothes the earrings would have looked impractical. Here, above the old striped shirt she had washed too often, they looked almost defiant.
“What did you pay?” Mara asked.
Jo told her.
“For both?”
“No. I had to sell Milo to get the second.”
“He'd have to finish his map,” Calvin said.
Milo looked up at last. “What?”
“Nothing. You're staying.”
He returned to the paper. Jo touched one earring and let her hand fall.
“I wanted them before Sunday,” she said. “Went past the window for weeks like a sad dog. Yesterday I went in.”
“They're pretty.”
“I know.”
Mara drank her tea. Jo had bought a thing she wanted with money she could spend, and Calvin was in the same room, not asking whether it could have been put toward something with a drawer or a school name on it. Mara had meant to say that was nice. She thought Jo would hear the smaller meaning.
“You should go somewhere in them,” she said.
“I am somewhere. I'm here.”
“Out.”
“Tomorrow, maybe. I'm free between four and six.”
Calvin made a sound at the stove. Jo looked at him.
“What?”
“I might be later. They asked if I could cover the end.”
“Which end?”
“The end of the shift.”
“Calvin.”
“I didn't say yes.”
She put down her cup. Mara looked at the map. Milo had added a bridge to the island, one end missing the bank by half an inch.
“I told you Tuesday,” Jo said.
“I know.”
“Tuesday for Thursday. Not tomorrow morning. Not when you're on the way out.”
“I said I'd tell you. I'm telling you.”
Jo sat very still. The green drops stopped moving.
“I'm going out at four,” she said. “You can tell them what you need to tell them.”
Calvin wiped the edge of the tray with his thumb. He put it in his mouth, then took it out when he remembered the surface was hot.
“All right,” he said. “I'll say I can't.”
“Thank you.”
He took out his phone and went into the hall. Jo lifted the tea again. Mara could hear the opening of a conversation, Calvin saying he'd looked at the times and couldn't do it. Kit called from the other room to ask whether somebody had moved her socks.
“No,” Jo called back.
“They're not there.”
“I still haven't moved them.”
Mara waited until Calvin had finished. She ran a finger around the handle of her cup, catching a little chip in the glaze.
“Could I ask a favor?” she said.
Jo's eyes lifted over the rim of the cup.
“I'm helping Elena tomorrow. With her bags. At two, but in case it runs over, could I call you? Just if I get stuck.”
“What's stuck?”
“I don't know. If she needs another car. I told her I'd help.”
Jo put the cup down. “I haven't promised the whole afternoon. What time would you need me?”
“Later than two. I don't know. I said I'd be there.”
Mara looked at the earrings again, then away.
Calvin came back and picked up the first of the shirts. He shook it, glanced at Jo and began folding. His sleeves were pushed up in uneven rolls, one above the elbow, one below.
“Where's she going?” Jo asked.
“A room. She's got it arranged.”
“I mean which way. Don't give me her address if she doesn't want you to.”
“I don't know the address yet.”
Jo rubbed a fingertip over the saucer. “I can come by at four. If she wants. I can give an hour, then I want some of the day left.”
“That's plenty. Thank you.”
Jo leaned across to stop Kit taking a second brownie. While they argued over whether the first two halves counted as one, Mara picked up her phone and wrote to Elena. Would you like Jo to come by at four in case another car's useful? She's free till five. The reply did not come immediately. Mara put the phone facedown.
“How's it been?” Jo asked.
Mara looked up.
“Elena. You two. All right?”
“Fine.”
“You were funny at dinner.”
“I'm always funny.”
“Not like that.”
Calvin was carrying the folded shirts out. Mara listened to his footsteps climb the stairs, waiting until the sound was far enough away.
“She's not going because of the money,” she said.
Jo frowned. “I didn't think she was.”
“People might.”
“Which people?”
Mara moved her phone an inch across the table. It vibrated beneath her fingers. Elena had written Yes please. Thank her. She can stay for tea if she likes.
Mara showed Jo.
“Not tea,” Jo said. “Something I haven't got here. I'll tell her.”
She took out her own phone, and for a moment they sat together typing into the same conversation without looking at each other. Milo had begun coloring his lake. A blue line strayed off the paper onto the table, and Jo put a piece of scrap beneath the edge without stopping her message.
Mara finished her tea. Calvin came down in a jacket, needing to get to work, and bent to kiss Jo. One earring caught his sleeve. They disentangled it carefully, laughing, Jo saying if he broke it she would invoice him for the second child too.
“They're good,” he said when he was free. “Wear them tomorrow.”
“I'll wear them tonight.”
“Suit yourself.”
He kissed her again and went. Kit appeared with both missing socks, worn over her hands. Mara carried the plate to the table. The brownies slid together as she set it down, one of them crumbling at the edge.
“Give me that one,” Jo said. “It isn't going to school looking like that.”
Kit held up her sock-covered hands. Mara broke the brownie and put half straight into Kit's open mouth. Jo ate the rest, still trying to pull a sock off her daughter.