Ashna took a step back. Mandy had never spoken to her this way. Something was very wrong.

Ashna’s mind started racing. Mandy had taken a day off last week and uncharacteristically not told Ashna why. Suddenly it was obvious what this was. An image of Mandy going to an interview at another restaurant formed in her mind. She imagined the sharp stab of abandonment when Mandy told her she had found a new job. It was inevitable, surprising that it hadn’t happened already.

“When were you going to tell me you had an offer?” The words were out before she could stop them.

Embarrassment colored Mandy’s cheeks, proving Ashna right.

The familiar discomfort of being left behind ballooned inside Ashna too fast. She swallowed it down. “You should take the job,” she said.

Mandy raised her chin, hurt and indignant. “Do you really want me to take it?”

If Mandy had gone looking, it was just a matter of time before she moved on. “You deserve to do what’s best for you.”

“Fine.” Mandy’s voice was too soft for what was happening. “Consider this my two weeks.” She opened the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

The door creaked shut behind her. It needed a fresh coat of paint. The gray had peeled, exposing white patches of primer.

Decrepit.

Ashna ran to the door and pushed it open. Cool night air whipped her face. Mandy was halfway across the parking lot to her car. The lampposts painted ominous halos around everything. The idea of two weeks now, with the connection between them damaged—Ashna couldn’t imagine it.

“Mandy,” she called, making her turn around. “I know you deserved much more than I could pay you. So . . . so why don’t you take two weeks. Paid. Take that trip to Sonoma. Take a break before the new job.”

Relief suffused Mandy’s face. She didn’t want two more weeks of awkwardness either.

“Thanks, Ashna,” she said.

“Thanks, Mandy.”

As simply as that, it was over.

Back inside, the kitchen wrapped around Ashna, unchanged over the years. Bricks, mortar, steel. Solid, dependable, predictable. Not fragile and breakable like the connections between people.

Sure, the appliances needed updating and the exhaust fans had become maddeningly loud—to a point where they sounded like a dead animal was stuck in the vents and screaming for mercy—but the steel countertops gleamed. Not a spot of grime anywhere.

Evidently, Ashna didn’t have as hard a time with pride as she had with hope. Plugging in her headphones, she turned on her playlist. To the power blast that was Alicia Keys’s voice belting out “Girl on Fire,” she made her way to the storage area and pushed out the janitorial cart. Then, snapping on the bright orange rubber gloves, she got to her nightly vacuum, dust, spit-shine routine.