I grunt. He’s surprised to see me, considering he called to ask about hanging the shelves no less than forty-five seconds ago. He doesn’t know that I absolutely refuse to be idle right now. He doesn’t know that idleness means thoughtfulness and my new life’s goal is to never think again. I hang the shelves perfectly, in under fifteen minutes, and then I stand with my hands on my hips in the middle of their living room.

“Got anything else that needs my attention?” I ask.

The couple stands with their arms around one another, their eyes wide. She’s about two inches taller than he is and they’re wearing T-shirts for the same band. There are framed editions of Rolling Stone on their walls. They’re really cute together. I hate them.

“Nope!” the woman chirps. “We’re all good. Thanks for the help.”

I don’t blame her for wanting to get me out of her house. I’m well aware that there’s a black cloud of rage and disappointment and sadness hanging out over my head. I take the hint and go. Luckily, 6B calls because their hardwood floors are rotting away in places and they’ve finally decided to do something about it.

I take my storm cloud and spend the day up there. But then, of course, nighttime comes. And suddenly the entire world is the same exact color as my storm cloud and I’m surrounded. Can’t see through it, can’t step through it, can’t get to the other side, nothing to do but just sit there and stew.

I know it sounds crazy, but before Eliot, I genuinely didn’t mind staying up late at night. It was soothing to me. Calm. Like everything just sort of slid into slow motion and nothing else was expected of me for the time being.

But since Eliot found out who I am, the nighttime has been when my thoughts have caught up to me. When I have to physically stop myself from going into our text strand and reading his last note to me. It’s when I ask myself, over and over, if I’m doing the right thing.

It means that I have to keep busy at night as well. I cleaned Pops’s apartment from top to bottom. But there was really only one thing to do after that. And tonight, I’m finally going to do it.

I start at the hardest place. His bedroom. It’s already been picked over because he took almost everything he cared about with him to the facility where he lives now. But there are still worn, familiar clothes of his to box up. There are bookshelves with knickknacks to sort through. There are photos of me and Jack that he placed around his room. Boxing and sorting everything takes me two hours. And then the room is bare.

I decide to rearrange the furniture.