CHAPTER 1

The Borrowed Oven

Hannah had just decided that toast counted as Sunday lunch when Leah arrived carrying an empty roasting pan.

“Nothing has leaked,” Leah said. “I thought I should lead with that.”

She stood on the porch in a sweatshirt with one cuff turned inside out. Four houses down, her front door was open. Hannah could hear Ruby objecting to something from that direction, a small, sustained voice with considerable authority.

“Is something supposed to have leaked?”

“My oven won’t heat. The light comes on, and it makes a very convincing noise, but it’s cold. I put my hand right inside.”

“Before the chicken?”

“Yes. It’s still in the refrigerator. The oven never got warm.”

Hannah looked at the pan. She liked Leah, who returned borrowed things and once cleared snow from Hannah’s steps without mentioning it. She liked her better in conversations with an obvious ending. The oven presented difficulties.

“Ruth’s coming at one,” Leah said. “I told her I would cook for a change. Ben’s covering at work until tonight. Could I put everything in your oven? We can carry it back when it’s ready.”

In the kitchen behind Hannah, the toaster sprang up with nothing in it. Daniel had been trying to remove a heel of bread with the power disconnected. Now he had plugged it in again to test his work.

“We have successfully repaired breakfast,” he called.

Hannah stepped outside and pulled the door nearly shut.

“What are you making?”

“Chicken thighs. Potatoes. Carrots. Ruby ate carrots on Thursday, so I bought more. We’ll see.”

Hannah looked down the street. Dirty snow held on beneath the north side of a fence, but the walk was dry. March in Bellevue often looked like two seasons that had stopped speaking to each other. She had planned a quiet afternoon, a load of towels, some music, perhaps the walk she had been putting off. There was nothing on the list that could compete respectably with a cold oven.

“Yes,” she said. “Bring it over.”

Leah’s shoulders dropped. “I’ll be out of your way.”

That was what they both meant at first.

Within twenty minutes, the refrigerator held the prepared chicken, Ruby was crouching in front of the washing machine, and Leah had discovered that her roasting pan would not fit sideways on Hannah’s oven rack. It fitted lengthwise, provided the pan of potatoes went above it. Leah had also brought the carrots, a lidded cup, a canvas bag, and a rabbit with ears worn gray at the ends.

Daniel came in from the garage, where he had been sorting cabinet hardware for Monday. He listened to the oven description, shook his head, and said he could hang a door but could not persuade an electronic control board to reconsider. Leah texted her landlord.

“She likes watching the clothes,” she said as Ruby pressed both palms to the round washer door.

“There aren’t any clothes in there,” Hannah said.

“She likes to be ready.”

Hannah took the child’s coat. It was unexpectedly light. She hung it on the lowest hook, beneath Daniel’s work jacket, then turned back before anyone could notice that the simple arrangement had delayed her.

Ruth arrived at one with a bag on each arm.

Leah had called to explain the change of kitchen. Ruth had understood the change of address and apparently nothing else.

“I brought a few things.”

“You were supposed to bring yourself,” Leah said.

“I did. I’m under here somewhere.”

Hannah took a bag and felt the familiar weight of Ruth’s large blue bowl. She had known Ruth through church for years, long before Ruth introduced her niece as the new tenant down the street. Ruth had run a kitchen that served seventy people at noon. Retirement had not altered her estimate of human appetite.

There was cabbage salad, a loaf of bread, and an apple cake still warm enough to fog its cover.

“We’ll have to walk it all back,” Leah said, examining the counter.

Hannah imagined the hot pans, the child, the doors, the sequence of trips. Her table was only six feet away. Two places were set on it, although neither she nor Daniel had committed to eating anything beyond toast.

“Eat here,” she said.

Ruth was already taking off her coat. Leah paused.

“Are you sure?”

“It’s easier.”

Hannah had opened the cupboard where she kept the larger plates. She wanted to see them on the table.

Daniel retrieved a folding chair. Leah went home for Ruby’s booster seat and strapped it securely to one of the kitchen chairs when she returned. Hannah found four napkins that matched, then put them back and chose the blue ones, which did not quite match anything.

By half past one, the potatoes were darker than Leah intended and the chicken was not yet ready. Hannah checked it with her thermometer, moved the potatoes out, and lowered the top rack. Everyone ate Ruth’s bread while they waited. Ruby wanted bread until bread arrived, at which point she wanted the serving spoon.

Leah cut a small portion into pieces and moved the spoon out of reach.

“She’ll ask for that spoon again tomorrow,” Leah said. “She always remembers.”

Ruth offered to take over. Leah said she had it. They spoke at the same time, then each repeated herself more loudly.

Hannah began washing a knife that was already clean.

She knew this part of an ordinary meal. People who loved each other issued small corrections. Children refused what had been prepared with thought. Someone sighed and was immediately sorry for sighing. She used to find it unremarkable. Now she had to decide where to put her eyes.

Daniel reached around her for the salad tongs.

“Are these reserved for an occasion?” he asked.

“No.”

“Good. I’ve finally found one.”

He carried the bowl to the table. Hannah followed with the chicken a few minutes later.

The first bite of potato was crisp all the way through. Leah called it rustic. Ruth said it needed gravy. Daniel took another and said he had installed countertops softer than that.

Leah laughed with her hand over her mouth. Hannah tried not to. It was rude to laugh at somebody’s dinner. Then Ruby, who had been studying the adults, began to laugh too, a deliberate, unconvincing ha ha ha.

That finished them.

Hannah leaned against the back of her chair. The laugh hurt pleasantly in her ribs. When it stopped, she reached for another potato. She did not search for a reason she should feel differently.

Ruth wanted to know what Hannah was printing these days.

“Five hundred invitations to a wedding where the bride does not want the groom’s middle name.”

“Does the groom want it?”

“The groom hasn’t been consulted. His mother wants it. His mother has very strong views about twelve letters.”

“Which name?” Daniel asked.

“I’m not telling you. You’ll start calling him that if you ever meet him.”

“I would wait until after the wedding.”

Leah asked about the paper, whether Hannah chose it or the couple did. The question was specific enough to be a real question. Hannah explained the difference between the sample people liked to touch and the stock their budget could bear. She heard herself describing a pale green envelope, getting interested, using her hands.

Ruby dropped her rabbit. Leah retrieved it without leaving her sentence. Ruth suggested another piece of bread. The conversation wandered to the price of oven repairs, then to the noise the delivery truck made at the wrong address.

No one asked how Hannah was doing in the careful voice people sometimes used.

After the meal, Leah wiped Ruby’s hands and took her home for a nap. She promised to come back for the pans. Daniel washed dishes while Hannah dried. Ruth sat at the table with a second cup of coffee.

At three, Hannah began to think pointedly about the towels.

At a quarter past three, Ruth asked for a pencil.

“What for?”

“I promised my sister the measurements of that cake pan.”

“Won’t she have a measuring cup?”

“She wants the pan measurements.”

“I know. I’m just wondering how she plans to bake from a description of your equipment.”

Ruth ignored this and drew a rectangle on the back of an envelope. Hannah fetched a ruler. Ruth used it incorrectly, starting at the edge instead of zero. Hannah moved it. Ruth moved it back.

Daniel left the kitchen with suspicious speed.

When Ruth finally gathered her things, she tried to leave half the cake.

“A quarter,” Hannah said.

“You like apple cake.”

“I do. I also like being able to close the refrigerator.”

They negotiated a third. At the door, Ruth squeezed Hannah’s upper arm and then let go without adding anything.

The house settled. Daniel went to finish sorting hardware. Hannah put the blue napkins in the washing machine and returned Ruby’s rabbit to the bag Leah had left behind.

There was a crescent of dried gravy on the table. She wiped it with the corner of a cloth. One chair stood farther out than the others. The quiet was back, exactly as she had expected, but now she could remember who had been sitting where.

She cut herself a narrow piece of apple cake and ate it standing at the counter.

Then she picked up her phone.

The message she wrote to Leah concerned the rabbit. Before sending it, she added, Your potatoes were terrible. Bring something else next time.

She looked at the last two words. Daniel came in for his tape measure, read the message over her shoulder, and smiled.

Hannah pressed send before he could say anything.