Mina brought a drawer which didn't need to be there.
“It's for the other cabinet,” she said, setting it on the counter. “I want you to see the colour in this light.”
Nora had been writing the wording for the little card beside the oak piece. She turned the paper over before Mina could read it, then regretted doing so. Mina noticed.
“What have you called it?”
“Nothing yet.”
“You were calling it something.”
“I was trying things.”
Mina put her bag down. “Show me.”
Nora turned the paper back. At the top she had written The Vale Cabinet. Beneath it was a description, carefully spare, mentioning Mina's name in the second sentence.
Mina read it. She did not put it down immediately.
“Why Vale?”
“It goes with the room.”
“Whose room?”
“You know what I mean.”
“I don't.”
Nora felt herself stiffen. She had asked for the dimensions, shown Mina what she wanted it to hold, drawn the outline of the doors. Mina had changed it, improved it, made it. They both knew the work had begun in conversation.
“I didn't just pick it from a catalogue.”
“No.”
“It's a collaboration.”
“Then put both names at the top.”
Nora looked at the card. Vale and Patel sounded like an accountancy practice. She could hear herself saying that and wisely didn't.
“It doesn't have to have a title.”
“Good.”
Mina set the paper down.
The ease of the solution irritated Nora. She had wanted something memorable, a name a customer might say to someone else after leaving. Mina wanted her work to remain recognizably hers. It was hard to object without becoming a person Nora would not have liked to work for.
“I'll change it.”
“Thank you.”
“I wasn't trying to hide you.”
“I know. You were trying to make it yours.”
Mina said it without cruelty. Nora still felt it land.
They took the drawer to the window. It was walnut, finished differently on its left and right sides. Nora crouched to look across the grain, then had to steady herself against the sill with her good hand.
“You all right?”
“Yes. This one's too dark.”
“For this room.”
“For the wood.”
Mina made a doubtful noise.
“It won't always be next to your bowl.”
“Nobody's asking it to be.”
“You're looking at the bowl.”
Nora was. She laughed, reluctantly, and looked again.
There was warmth in the darker finish which the sample in Mina's workshop hadn't shown. She brought the drawer back from the window, placed it beside the cabinet, turned it, then covered one half with a blank sheet of paper. Mina watched, arms folded.
“Darker,” Nora said.
“Yes.”
“I hate it when you're right that quickly.”
“I've had all morning.”
Mina took the paper away. Under it, a little flaw in the grain looked almost black. Nora ran a finger beside it.
“Leave that.”
“I was going to.”
They had met at a job where Nora's client asked whether a mark in the wood could be made to look more natural. Mina had been new to working for herself and had said, politely, that the tree had been involved. Nora laughed at the wrong moment, and they had both been kept an extra hour while the client explained how a house had to feel.
Afterwards they'd gone for a drink. Mina had been worried she'd lost the job. Nora told her she'd improved it. Neither knew then how often they'd need the other to repeat some version of that.
“Remember the tree?” Nora asked.
“I remember the invoice.”
“He paid eventually.”
“After you rang him.”
“I was quite good.”
“You were terrifying. You sounded as though he was being charged by the minute for listening.”
Nora smiled. She could still do that. She could make a person pay someone whose work they were already living with. It seemed a clean, useful talent until she thought of the electricity she'd paid for that morning.
Mina took a small envelope from her bag.
“These are the final figures for the walnut piece. You said you wanted it for the opening, but I need a deposit before I buy more.”
Nora opened the envelope. She had seen an estimate. The numbers were close enough that she couldn't pretend the increase surprised her.
“When do you need it?”
“Tomorrow.”
“That's quick.”
“So was your opening.”
There was a pause. Mina took the drawer off the cabinet before its edge could make a mark.
“I can do someone else's work if it's too much,” she said. “I'm not asking you to fit it in because we're friends.”
“I want it.”
“I know you want it. I'm asking whether you're buying it.”
Nora disliked the distinction because it was the entire difference between wanting the showroom and being able to keep it.
“Yes.”
Mina nodded, accepting the answer. She put the drawer back into its cloth bag and left it beside the cabinet, then stopped.
“Where has all this come from?”
Nora's attention went to the little cupboard beneath the counter, though there was no money in it.
“What?”
“You were talking about delaying. Then you weren't.”
“Things changed.”
“How?”
“Cal helped.”
“He's paid for all this?”
“He's put something in.”
Nora could see Mina considering the room again, replacing the picture of Nora's independent business with one in which her brother stood behind every item. It was painful enough that she reached for the easier lie.
“It's an investment.”
“From Cal?”
“Through him.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means he knows someone who wanted to help.”
Mina looked at her for a long moment. Nora had been expecting relief, or at least professional acceptance. The lie was an ordinary one, containing the language of people who had money. Mina didn't seem relieved.
“What have you agreed?”
“Nothing you need to worry about.”
“I'm asking because you'll be paying me.”
Nora set the figures on the counter.
“I'll pay the deposit tomorrow. The balance when we agreed. Your name will be on your work.”
Mina didn't answer immediately. Out on the pavement somebody dropped a bag, scattering oranges. Both women looked toward the sound. A passer-by stopped to help gather them, and for a moment it was possible to watch a small difficulty being fixed with no argument at all.
“If something's wrong, I'd rather you told me now,” Mina said.
“I've got the money.”
“That's not quite what I asked.”
“I know.”
Nora looked down at Mina's figures. Naming the cash meant losing this work. Mina was still waiting beside the cabinet, willing to argue about its finish as if Nora's promise to pay could be trusted.
“I'm sorting out what happened with Iris,” she said.
“With the police?”
“Yes.”
“Did you tell them she stayed?”
“I did.”
Mina breathed out. “Good.”
Nora had wanted that word for the larger lie and received it for the smaller truth.
They rewrote the card together. Mina objected to timeless, saying it made her think of a carpet showroom. Nora removed it and put Mina's name first. The work looked less like Nora's possession and more like something a person had made, which made it better. She knew that while still resenting it.
At the door, Mina said she would see her tomorrow. Nora promised the deposit again, too quickly, and watched her friend walk away. The drawer bag stood beside the cabinet, its straps folded neatly across the top.
Cal rang a few minutes later. She answered before she decided whether she wanted to.
“How much is in the other account?” she asked.
“What other account?”
“The rest of the money.”
He was quiet. Nora looked at the new card beside the cabinet.
“I need to know what I can promise,” she said.
“Tell me what you need.”
It was the same answer he had given her before. Until now she had mistaken it for an answer to the question.