Brooke got a job. I thought it was too soon, too early. But what the hell did I know anyway? Not a whole lot, judging by the fear that lit through me when she’d told me about the job, and then casually asked if I could help her, if Norah needed it.

The day she’d brought it up, her face had been completely illuminated. Like a spark that had been dormant in her was suddenly lit again. And I’d stammered through a no, before watching that light fade a little from her face. This was important to her. She wanted to do this, to feel like she could provide for herself and for Norah. And really, wasn’t that the end goal here? When I’d invited Brooke to move in with me, I’d done it with the idea that eventually she’d be out. And she couldn’t do that without some kind of financial support.

So, I told her I would. And every Tuesday through Saturday morning, Brooke was out the door around the time I was just getting ready for bed—shortly after midnight. She’d gotten a job at a bakery nearby, a place that her mom had found for her when she’d visited town a couple weeks before. And off Brooke went, from one in the morning until eight or nine, for weeks.

Norah was only a few weeks old, but she was mostly sleeping through the night, apart from one short bottle feed around four in the morning. Except for once in a while, as Brooke had warned me about when she’d asked for my help with Norah, she woke again at eight for another bottle.

And each time I heard that rousing cry, like a little lamb trying to be a lion, I hurried to Brooke’s room to take care of her. I couldn’t explain my attachment to Norah. She wasn’t mine. If I was being honest, apart from sleeping and eating, she didn’t have a whole lot of personality yet. But there was something that warmed me, every time I held her with a bottle pressed against her little rosebud lips. The way her dark eyes looked up me, how her fingers locked around my pinky, not letting go even after she fell asleep during each middle of the night feeding. She was so small, so helpless, and even though it was like holding the most breakable piece of china when I held her, I looked forward to it each time I did.

When Norah was seven weeks old, and Brooke stood in the doorway of her bedroom after a morning shift, flour up to her elbows, I knew. The look on Brooke’s face was a mixture of regret and excitement—a hard one to pull off, but she managed it with the lightness in her eyes but the half frown of her lips. “I got a place.”

Norah was still in my arms after her eight in the morning feeding. She was sleeping soundly, had been for the last thirty minutes. But I knew that my opportunities to hold her were growing fewer and fewer every day, so I held her while she slept, listening to small bursts of air leaving her lips here and there and her little whistle snoring here and there.

I didn’t want to let her go, even as Brooke walked around the bed toward me to take her.

“You’re covered in flour.”

Brooke paused and looked at me peculiarly. “Okay. Well, I’ll just be right back then.”

I didn’t like how she said it, like she expected I might walk out the door with her baby, sending her running after me like a bad tv movie. I wasn’t delusional enough to believe Norah was mine, and even less delusional that I could possibly and properly care for a baby. But the idea of Norah not being here was something I hadn’t expected so soon.

When Brooke returned, moments later with red arms raw from scrubbing, she reached her arms out again for her child and, reluctantly, I handed her over. “What about mornings? Who’s going to watch her?”

“My mom is moving here, at least for a bit.” She looked a bit perturbed by the idea, which made me feel even more upset. Was I not to be trusted with her baby?

“I could watch her,” I said before I could stop my tongue from forming the words. “I mean, you could bring her here on your way to work.”

Was it just my imagination, or did Brooke hold Norah closer to her chest? “That’s okay. My mom is looking forward to grammie time. She’ll take care of her.”

I wanted to convince myself it wasn’t a slight toward me. I wanted that, really badly. But she’d pulled her baby from my arms just after delivering the news, and it felt like more than just a convenience thing. I scratched my wrists, tried to think about what to say and how to say it.

“When’s your mom going to be here? I can watch her until then.”

“Next week.” Brooke turned her back to me as she buckled Norah into her car seat. “But it’s slow at the bakery with Thanksgiving over, so I’m taking time off to move in and get adjusted to the new commute.”

This wasn’t a dig, I tried to tell myself. She wasn’t taking her daughter from me because of me, because I was lacking in some way.

But I didn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe it. Because Brooke was calmly, cautiously, packing up her things without looking me in the eyes. “So that’s it?” I asked.

She paused, her back still to me, but I saw the tightening of the muscles across her shoulders before she slowing turned around. “Thanks, for everything. You’ve helped out a lot.”

“So what’s the rush?” My leg bounced and I stilled it. There was an energy lit within me, despite having been up all night. And I knew it was because Norah and Brooke were about to walk out of my life and leave me alone, without even Six there to distract me.

“It’s been a while now, right? Six months?”

“Sure.” I stuffed my hands into my pajama pant pockets to keep their movements out of view. My entire body was vibrating, because I realized I was about to watch her walk out the door with Norah, and I hadn’t adequately thought about how this would go. I hadn’t thought long term. I’d had a purpose with Brooke and Norah here, and soon I’d have…nothing.

“I’m getting the keys this afternoon, and my mom got me a rental car to help me bring everything over, so I’ll be out of your hair soon enough.”

I wanted to tell her she wasn’t in my hair, but the truth was that Norah was the one who wasn’t in my hair. That tiny little mewling human had shifted something in me. Brooke, well, I was starting to get used to her, because I knew she was a package deal with Norah. But it was Norah that I’d come to want.

So, I backed off. I didn’t offer to help her carry stuff to the car. But when she brought Norah out and placed her car seat beside the bassinet in the back seat, I stood there and kept an eye on her. Brooke hadn’t asked me to, but I would’ve done it either way.

What did it say about the situation that Brooke wanted her baby out of the house before the furniture?

When Brooke had loaded the last thing, she turned to me, and a small smile turned her lips. Her arms widened imperceptively, but enough that I noticed. Enough that I turned around, my own arms wrapped around my middle, and returned to the house.

As I locked the deadbolt, I saw Brooke’s key on the counter, beside Henry’s former home.

And then, unwilling to spend another minute alone in Six’s house, I packed my bags and left too.