Elena answered the door carrying the wet shirt.
“Still?” Mara asked.
“Under the arm.”
“You could leave your arm out.”
Elena lifted it to see where an arm might go without touching the damp patch. They stood in the doorway considering this until Mara began laughing and pushed gently past her.
It was two o'clock. The hall smelled of paint. Daniel had left a small brush balanced across a jar on top of the shoe cabinet, a square of newspaper beneath it. Mara moved the brush farther into the jar before taking her coat off.
“Is he out?”
“He went just after twelve.”
Elena carried the shirt upstairs. Mara followed with the box and the rolls she had bought on her way. At the turn in the stairs the box caught the rail, and Elena reached back to lift its corner. They freed it, one standing above the other, each convinced the other was holding the wrong end.
“You'd think we'd done this before,” Mara said.
“We get paid to do it there.”
The bags stood against the bedroom wall. There were two, not three. Elena had left out a sweater, the hair dryer and the little packet of photographs. The damp shirt was still on its hanger. Mara put the box on the bed.
“Which one am I taking first?”
“Neither. Sit down. I haven't had lunch.”
They ate rolls in the kitchen, tearing pieces off over plates because Elena said she was not putting more butter knives in the sink. Mara had brought cheese without asking which kind; it was the one Elena always ate the last piece of, leaving the rind so she could pretend she hadn't finished it. She cut two thick slices and pushed the rest across.
“I'm going to need a plate,” Elena said.
Mara looked at the one in front of her.
“For there.”
“You'll have plates.”
“In the kitchen. I don't want to go down for every piece of toast.”
She opened the cupboard and took out a small blue plate with a chip underneath. It had never sat flat on the table. Daniel liked it for sandwiches because the sandwich disguised the faded flowers in the middle.
“That one?” Mara asked.
“Nobody will miss it.”
Elena wrapped it in a dish towel. Then she unwrapped it, took the towel to the sink to see whether it smelled clean, and made a face.
Mara laughed. “Now they'll know you're gone. Nobody checking the towels.”
“They'll live.”
She found a clean one in the drawer. Mara put the used towel in the laundry basket by the back door. Outside, a small pile of leaves had collected against the step. Somebody had swept them there and left them waiting for the next part of the job.
“What about the plants?” she asked.
Elena looked toward the window. Three pots stood on the sill, one empty except for a stick. The other two were alive by different amounts.
“I'll tell him.”
“He'll water the dead one.”
“He can stop when it grows.”
Mara grinned. Elena took a piece of cheese directly from the plate and ate it standing up. In all the years they had shared a kitchen Mara had seen her stand like that more often than sit. There was always something that needed putting away before she could have what she had come in for.
“Sit,” Mara said.
“I'm going upstairs.”
“Take the cheese.”
“You take it.”
They carried the plate upstairs between them, setting it on the dresser beside the spare photograph. Mara ate another piece while Elena checked the bathroom. The hair dryer lay across the top of the second bag, its cord tangled around a small comb. Mara unwound it and threaded the plug through the loop.
“That'll go,” she said.
Elena came back with a bottle of shampoo. It was nearly full. She held it up, weighing it, then put it in a plastic bag with two other bottles.
“I bought that last week.”
“Take it.”
“I'm taking it.”
“I wasn't asking.”
They smiled at each other. Mara tucked the hair dryer along the side of the clothes, then took it out because Elena said it would dent the frame. She could move the frame to the other bag. Or put the hair dryer in with the shoes. They tried both and discovered neither worked as well as laying it on top.
Downstairs Mara's phone sounded from her coat pocket. She let it ring until it stopped. Elena was looking into the drawer beside the bed, touching each thing once before leaving most of it where it was.
“Do you want me to do anything?” Mara asked.
“Get the lamp?”
It had been moved to the little table in the sitting room, where it was on despite the daylight. Mara switched it off and waited for the shade to cool. Her phone sounded again, not a call this time. She went into the hall to check it.
Daniel had sent a question mark after her unanswered call. Under it he had written Finished early. She wrote We're still here, then looked up the stairs.
The lamp was an awkward shape. The shade came away easily but the long arm had to be turned, and one of the screws was tight enough that she couldn't move it with her fingers. Daniel would know where the right tool was. It would take him a minute. She could tell him Elena was ready, help get the bags into the car while he was there, make the last ten minutes less like somebody had died and everybody was afraid to touch the furniture.
She typed Can you give us a hand with that lamp? Then added Only if you're nearby.
He called immediately. Mara went into the sitting room and answered quietly, though there was no reason to keep it quiet.
“I said you'd need a box,” he told her.
“I've got a box.”
“Then what's the matter?”
“The arm. I can't get it down.”
“Don't force it. I'll be there in a bit.”
“We're nearly done.”
“All right. I'll just—”
She didn't hear the last part. Something had fallen in his van, and he was swearing at it. She waited until he said goodbye and hung up.
Upstairs Elena had set the two bags upright. Mara took the lamp's shade to the bedroom and fitted it into the box. It rested against the towel like a very old hat.
“I'll do the arm when it's cool,” she said.
“It's cool enough.”
“It was on.”
“I know.”
Elena opened the small drawer again and found a nail file beneath a receipt. She put both in a pocket of her bag. Mara watched her zip it shut.
“Isn't that trash?”
“Maybe. I'll look when I'm there.”
The damp shirt had dried at last. Elena took it off the hanger and folded it over the other clothes. Mara took the empty hanger from her. It was one of the wooden ones from the hotel, an old logo burned into the crossbar, from the years before Simon decided guests would steal fewer of them if the hooks didn't come off.
“Thief,” she said.
Elena glanced up and laughed. “That was from the sale. You bought six.”
“You took one.”
“You gave it to me.”
Mara held it out. “Take another.”
“I'm not arriving with a bag full of hangers.”
She put it in the closet. Mara pushed the door shut, and they stood together looking at the cleared space beside the bed. The room was still full of Elena. Her nightgown hung from the hook behind the door. The drawer held socks she wasn't taking, a book she had started twice, the little packet of spare buttons. She could leave without turning the room into proof that she had gone.
Elena reached for Mara's sleeve.
“Thank you for coming.”
Mara looked down at the fingers on her arm. The simple gratitude made her throat tighten. It was what she had wanted, to be standing here when Elena needed another pair of hands, to be the person she asked. She covered Elena's hand with hers.
“Of course.”
The phone in her other hand lit up. Daniel's message showed across the screen before she could turn it away.
Ten minutes. Don't lose the screw.
Elena's fingers loosened. She had read it, Mara knew she had, and there was no way to ask how much.
“Why is he coming?”
“The lamp.”
Elena looked past her at the shade in the box.
“You asked him?”
“It won't come undone.”
“Then leave it.”
“We don't have to leave it. He's got the—”
Elena took her hand away.
Mara stopped. Downstairs, a car passed slowly enough for its shadow to move across the ceiling before the sound of it faded. The lamp had been on Elena's lap in Mara's imagination on Sunday, awkward, safe, entirely possible.
“I'll tell him we're going,” she said.
“Tell him whatever you want.”
Elena lifted the nearest bag. Mara reached for it, but Elena had already carried it to the door.