“I think that might be a little pricey,” Nate said. He was already worried that they were over budget. The money they’d inherited from Helen’s father had seemed like so much at first, more than enough to build with and live on for at least a year. But there had been unexpected outlays: the price of lumber up here was higher than they’d originally budgeted for; the professional furnace and water heater install took a huge chunk of money; the ongoing expense of all the beer, wine, and take-out food because cooking in the trailer was depressing and difficult. The money was going fast. Faster than they’d imagined and planned for. Helen looked at the accounts and was sure they’d have more than enough to finish the house, but she worried that Nate might be right—if they kept going at this rate, they wouldn’t have much left over to live on. They hadn’t thought much about what they were going to do for income when the time came—it seemed so far away.

Of course, it didn’t help that Nate was splurging on hundred-dollar night-vision cameras. She shook the thought away, told herself she was being petty.

“Maybe we could get the rejected slate pieces for cheap, you know? The weird shapes that broke and aren’t square. I think it could work. We could do like a funky mosaic thing.” Her dad had done a floor like that for an artist friend of his and it had turned out beautifully.

“Maybe,” Nate said.

“These bricks—they were just so cool, and I love knowing that they came from a real mill up the road. Think about it. It’s like I pick one up and feel this instant connection to the past. I can practically smell the grease, hear the hum of the looms, feel the cotton dust in the air.”

Smell the smoke of the fire, she thought.

If installing the beam had helped Hattie come back, would installing the bricks draw one of the mill workers back? The burned woman with skin hanging off that the contractors had seen in the basement, maybe?

She shivered.

Nate smiled at her, kissed her nose. “I love you. I’m not at all sure that cotton dust is a thing, but I love that you imagine it is. And saving these bricks from the landfill by reusing them in our house—can’t really complain about that.”

“Cotton dust is definitely a thing,” she said. “Wanna help me unload these?”

“Sure,” he said.

She moved the truck up closer to the house and pulled down the tailgate, and they started pulling the bricks out, putting them in a stack next to the house.

“These are in pretty good shape. They’ll have to be cleaned up,” Nate said. “All the old mortar scraped off.”

Helen nodded.