“Forget about it,” he said, because that’s what he wanted. While he was here, sitting with her like this, caring for her like this, he didn’t want to talk about this thing between them—this feud they’d been carrying on. The one that he was, whether she liked it or not, about to win with a few clicks on his laptop and a return to his regular life.

“I was going to cancel it,” she said. “I didn’t really want to do it anymore, not after we found the kittens, but then I felt so sick, and I lost track of the day, and then today I—”

“Nora,” he said. “Let’s leave it for now, okay?”

She pulled the towel back, her face pink and dewy, her eyes still puffy, and her mouth tugged down at the corners in the saddest, sweetest pout he thought he’d ever seen.

“I feel awful,” she said, and for sure, she was whining.

“I know, baby,” he said, and for sure, it was the static talking. They stared at each other, steam from the bowl between them, and in those silent seconds, it seemed like they were agreeing to something. For as long as she was like this, they weren’t going to be feuding neighbors. Nora wasn’t going to cheerfully smile, and Will wasn’t going to charm. She was going to admit that she felt bad, and Will was going to call her baby when she did.

It wasn’t going to be normal at all.

She slumped against the back of the couch. “I’m probably gonna fall asleep,” she murmured, already sounding halfway there.

“Good.” He grabbed at a faded, crocheted throw that hung over one end of the couch, waited for her to put her feet up before he draped it over her legs.

“Only for a little bit. I only sleep for a little bit at a time, since this started.”

“Sure,” Will said, but he hoped she would sleep good and long; he could tell she needed it. And while she did he’d go pick up a scrip for her, and then he’d sanitize every cat-dandered surface in this building, even if it took him all night. He’d barely slept the last four; what was one more?

“I’ll go pick you up some meds, okay?”

Her swollen eyes flickered open, and her brow furrowed. “You’ll come back?”

He nodded. “Yeah, of course. I’ll leave it on the—”

“And then you’ll stay?” she said.

He stared down at her. Everything he saw when he looked at Nora, it was still a problem: his weaknesses, his past, his fear for how he figured he was destined to turn out, if he let himself get too close to her.