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“Thanks.”

He nodded, turned, and followed his daughter back across the yard. I watched them go because I was weak and he looked really good in jeans. Sue me. I’d had a rough few days.

I went back inside my disaster and sat on the floor because there was literally nowhere else to sit. The carpet felt questionable beneath me, probably harboring decades of other people’s lives. The silence was complete in a way that city living never allowed. No traffic, no neighbors above or below, just me and my spectacularly bad choices.

Twenty minutes of contemplating my life led nowhere productive, so when the knock came, I actually welcomed the interruption. Maybe Margaret had come back to tell me this was all a joke. Maybe the previous owners had left buried treasure in the walls. Maybe…

I opened the door to find Noa standing on my porch alone, holding a juice box and what appeared to be a sandwich wrapped in paper towels.

“Hi!” She beamed up at me. “My dad said you don’t have any food ‘cause you just moved here and your kitchen looks broken. He got shy so I came to give it to you!”

I looked past her, through the scarce trees that separated our properties. Tyson was on his own porch, pretending to be very invested in untangling a garden hose. Even from here, I could see him stealing glances our way.

“That’s very nice of you,” I managed around the sudden lump in my throat.

“It’s peanut butter and jelly. I helped make it. I did the jelly part.” She held out her offerings like they were gold. “The juice is apple. The one I like.”

I took the sandwich and juice box because what else could I do? This tiny person in rain boots had decided I needed feeding and apparently nothing was going to stop her.

“Thank you, Noa.”

“You’re welcome! Okay bye!”

She spun around and skipped back across the yard, tutu and all. I stood in my doorway, holding a sandwich made by strangers, and felt my eyes burn. It was the first genuine kindness I’d experienced since before the wedding. No agenda, no questions. Just a little girl who thought I might be hungry and a father who’d noticed I had nothing.

I sat back on my questionable carpet and unwrapped the sandwich. White bread, crust carefully cut off. Grape jelly bleeding through one side. Peanut butter applied with enthusiasm if not precision. It was perfect.

Through the window, I could see Noa had stopped in my front yard, apparently having found something fascinating in the overgrown grass. She was sitting cross-legged, tutu spread around her like a purple flower, talking animatedly to what appeared to be a line of ants.

“Noa, leave the neighbor alone.” Tyson’s voice carried clearly across the distance.

“She’s not the neighbor, Dad,” Noa yelled back with exasperation. “She’s the Lady.”

I smiled for the first time in days, sitting on my disaster of a floor, eating a peanut butter sandwich made by tiny hands.

Maybe Tennessee wouldn’t be so bad after all.

Or maybe I was just delirious from stress and this house actually had a carbon monoxide leak.

Either way, at least I had apple juice. It was, indeed, good.

8

— • —

Sam

My first night on the floor of my new disaster house taught me that spite wasn’t actually a comfortable sleeping surface.

I’d spent hours scrubbing every surface I could reach with the cleaning supplies I’d panic-bought at the nearest grocery store, because if I was going to sleep on the floor, it would at least be a clean floor. The carpet in the living room had been sacrificed to the garbage gods after I’d discovered stains that predated my birth. The hardwood underneath wasn’t much better, but at least it didn’t feel like it might give me diseases.

Morning came with a crick in my neck and a determination that only comes from having absolutely no other options. I was going to fix this house myself. Not because I knew anything about home repair, but because I needed to control one single aspect of my rapidly imploding life. My marriage? Destroyed. My family? Shattered. But this cabinet door that hung at a weird angle? That I could handle.

Spoiler alert: I could not handle it.

The kitchen faucet seemed like an easy place to start. It dripped constantly, which had kept me up half the night with its rhythmic reminder that everything in my life was broken. I’d watched approximately four YouTube videos about faucet repair, which basically made me an expert. I had a wrench. I had confidence. I had no idea what I was doing.

Twenty minutes later, I was drenched from head to toe, standing in a puddle of my own making while the faucet sprayed water directly at the ceiling. Turns out there’s a reason plumbers exist, and it’s not just to overcharge desperate homeowners. There was a shut-off valve somewhere, probably, but finding it would require admitting defeat, so I just put a cork in it.