The wrong parts arrived on day five. Reed opened the box on the workbench, checked the part number against his order, and set it back in the packaging without a word. He called the distributor. Tessa was at the work table and could hear him, his voice even, precise, not angry, but not soft either. He read the correct part number twice. He confirmed the shipping error was on their end. He asked about a replacement. The replacement would take three more days to route from a different warehouse. He came and stood in front of her work table. She’d already seen his face. “How close does that put us?” she asked. “Cutting it close. Maybe a day inside your window.” “Maybe not.”
She closed her laptop. The math was immediate and ugly. “Reed.” “I know. If I miss the start date.” “I know, Tessa.” Not sharp. Just, “I understand the stakes. Don’t explain them to me.” “I’m going to call Waverly Salvage. They pulled a parts car from the same generation last month. If the assembly is there, two days to ship and one more to install. We’d still make your window.” She looked at him. She hated what she was about to ask. And she asked it anyway because she didn’t know how to not ask it. “Do you actually want to fix the car?”
The words landed wrong and she knew it the moment they were out. Reed went still. He picked up the shipping box, turned it so she could see the packing label, the part number, the name of the warehouse. He opened his laptop, the old one that lived on the corner of the workbench, and turned it toward her. The original order, the confirmation email, the timestamp. He laid it out in front of her without a word. Then he turned and went back to the phone. She sat with what she’d said for approximately 30 seconds. Then she stood up. “I’m sorry,” she said to his back. “That was unfair.”
He didn’t turn around right away. When he did, his jaw had lost some of its set. “It was.” “I know. She didn’t dress it up. I’m sorry.” He looked at her for a moment. “Waverly’s got the assembly. I’ll go pick it up myself tomorrow morning.” “What does that cost?” “Same as the other order. I’ll show you the receipt.” She nodded. “Then I’ll make dinner.” “You don’t have to.” “I know I don’t have to.” She picked up her laptop. “That’s not why I’m doing it.”
While she cooked, Reed spread a Missouri highway map on the kitchen table and circled the Greyhound station in Rolla, 40 minutes north, with a red pen. He wrote down the schedule for the Springfield route, the price of a one-way ticket, the transfer time. He slid the paper to the edge of the table where she’d see it when she turned around. She saw it. She read it. She turned back to the stove without saying anything. After a moment, she said, “Is this a hint?” “It’s a backup plan,” he said. “In case I’m wrong about the timeline, I’d rather you know it exists and not need it than need it and not know.”
She looked at the map again. He’d circled the station, not the destination. He was telling her she had options, not telling her to use them. She turned all the way around. He was standing with his arms crossed, leaning against the counter, not blocking the door, not taking up space, just standing there like a man who had said what he meant and was done performing anything around it. “Thank you,” she said. It came out simpler than she intended. “Don’t thank me for parts and a bus schedule. I’m not.” She held his gaze for a second, then turned back to the stove. “Dinner’s in 20 minutes. Sit down.”
They ate at the kitchen table. The map was still there at the corner. Neither of them moved it. She had cooked because she wanted to, because she was tired of keeping careful accounts and she just wanted for one evening to do something uncomplicated. She hadn’t named it out loud. But when Reed asked why she’d gone to the trouble, she told him the truth. “Because I wanted to have dinner with you.” He looked at her across the table. Something shifted in the quality of the silence between them. “Okay,” he said. “You say that a lot.” “When I mean it.” She laughed genuinely, briefly, and he smiled at the table, and neither of them said anything for a few seconds. When he looked up, she was already looking at him.
The kiss happened without a plan, which was the only way Tessa had ever trusted anything. He was close. He’d leaned forward slightly to refill her water glass of all things, and she closed the remaining distance without making a decision about it. His hands stayed on the table. He didn’t grab. He let her lead the pace, and when she pulled back, he let her do that too. They looked at each other. “I have a job to get to,” she said. “I know,” he said. The words were simple. The weight behind them was not.
Three more days of parts waiting became three days of small unplanned things. One morning, Tessa moved her coffee mug to the pegboard hook near the window. She liked it there, closer to where she actually stood when she drank it. And when Reed came in later and saw it, he glanced at her with a question in his eyes. “I moved it,” she said. “Is that okay?” “More than okay,” he said, and went to start the coffee without making anything of it. It was a small thing, but she noticed that he’d noticed and that he’d asked rather than assumed, and she filed it away without meaning to.
Reed stopped scheduling his last appointment before 6, which meant that by 5:30, the shop went quiet and the kitchen became a shared space without anyone having to negotiate that. They went grocery shopping on Saturday morning. Not by arrangement, they just both reached for their keys at the same time and looked at each other. She pushed the cart. He read labels on things and put them back. She bought two items he’d looked at and returned to the shelf. He paid for the cart and she let him, which surprised her until she realized she was going to make dinner that night and she’d buy the wine.