One Hour, Mostly

The café by the library had six tables and a menu written on a board that was too high to read comfortably from the queue. Leila stood beneath it, trying to decide what cost the least without ordering something she did not want.

Micah was already at a table by the window. He had a glass of water and a book about plants with a receipt sticking out of it. When he saw her, he closed the book with unnecessary speed.

“You can keep reading,” she said.

“I wasn't planning to do that for the entire date.”

The word date landed so plainly that she forgot the next thing she meant to say.

“Good,” she managed.

He grinned. “Too direct?”

“No. Helpful, actually.”

She put her bag on the chair and went to order. He did not leap up to pay for her or perform a discussion about who should. She bought tea, returned to the table and felt relieved by how unremarkable the transaction had been.

For the first few minutes they talked about college and work. Micah had spent the morning trying to find a missing delivery that had been put exactly where it belonged, only under the wrong name. Leila told him about the group task at the gallery and Idris's foil pavement.

“Unpleasant for dogs,” Micah said.

“That was not one of the issues we discussed.”

“Clearly an incomplete assessment.”

They laughed. Then there was a pause long enough for Leila to become aware that she was holding the teaspoon even though the tea did not need stirring.

“What do you do when you're not drawing?” he asked.

“Apparently carry shopping and learn new bus routes.”

“I meant before.”

Before. The word opened a space she had been stepping around.

“I went to Esme's. Watched things. Walked places without checking whether I'd miss a connection.”

“Do you still do that?”

“Some of it.”

She looked at the book on the table. “What about you? Apart from plants.”

“Music. Not well. I play guitar badly enough to keep it private.”

“That's disappointing. I was hoping for a surprise performance.”

“You're safer without one.”

He told her about his older sister, who lived in Leeds and sent him voice messages while walking to work. About his mother, who worked in a school office and had an unreasonable interest in whether he was carrying a coat. About his father, a delivery driver who understood routes but could not remember where he had put his glasses. Ordinary people, described with the affection and irritation of being near them often.

Leila realised she had assumed, from how much time he spent with Jean, that his family situation was more complicated. She disliked catching herself arranging someone else's life into a story that suited her expectations.

“So Jean's on your mum's side?” she asked.

“Yes. She lives ten minutes away. She pretends that's an accident.”

“Do you live in a house?”

The question escaped before she considered how it sounded.

Micah blinked. “Yes.”

“Sorry. That was strange.”

“Not especially.”

“How many rooms?”

Now he looked properly puzzled, and she wished she could gather the questions off the table and put them back where they belonged.

“Three bedrooms,” he said. “One's my sister's when she comes back. It's also where the ironing lives.”

Leila nodded. She could see it immediately: a room that could remain partly empty because its owner might return. Nobody would ask whether the ironing could share more efficiently.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

“Leila.”

She looked at the tea. “I keep noticing space. It's boring. You don't have to do anything about it.”

“I wasn't going to offer you my sister's room. She'd object before we reached the ironing.”

She laughed despite herself.

“I don't know what to say sometimes,” he admitted. “About where you're staying. I don't want to ignore it, but I also don't want every conversation to become about whether you need a lift.”

“Don't give me lifts. You don't have a car.”

“That's one practical difficulty.”

She put down the teaspoon.

“You can ask. And I can say I don't want to talk about it. I'm still learning that second bit.”

“All right.”

He did not turn the agreement into a speech. They returned to music, then to a film they had both disliked for different reasons. Leila showed him a drawing on her phone. He asked why she had chosen to leave one part pale. She explained the reflection, and he listened as though there might be something to understand rather than only something to praise.

Near the end of the hour, his phone rang. He looked at the screen and apologised.

“That's the apprenticeship place. I should take it.”

“Of course.”

He went outside. Through the window, Leila watched him stand a little straighter as he listened. He took a pen from his pocket, discovered he had nothing to write on and used the back of the café receipt. When he returned, he was trying not to smile too much.

“They want me to come for a practical day.”

“That's good.”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“Thursday next week.”

“You'll be good at that.”

“You don't know what it is yet.”

“Will it involve plants?”

“Likely.”

“Then I feel confident.”

He laughed. Leila was pleased for him. She was also suddenly aware of Calder Gardens being farther away, of the word apprenticeship describing a future with hours and places that did not include her. They were on their first date, and she had already begun imagining being left behind. The unfairness of that was embarrassing enough to keep her quiet.

Micah noticed the change without knowing what to do with it.

“Are you worried about your interview?” he asked.

“No. Yes. A bit.”

“They said next week.”

“I know what they said.”

Her answer came out too sharply. He leaned back slightly.

“Sorry,” she said at once. “That wasn't about you.”

“What was it about?”

She could tell him the truth, which was unreasonable and did not deserve to become his problem. Or she could let him believe he had done something wrong. Neither option appealed. One was at least fairer.

“Everything moving,” she said. “Dad's place doesn't work. There might be a flat somewhere else. You might go to Calder. I know that last one isn't bad. I'm not asking you not to. I'm just tired of trying to work out where people will be.”

He looked at her for a while.

“I don't know where I'll be,” he said. “I do know I wanted to be here today.”

It was not a promise about the future. She found she preferred it to one.

“I wanted that too.”

They left a few minutes after her hour was up. Leila messaged Mum to say which bus she was catching. Micah walked with her to the stop, neither of them speaking much now but not in the strained way they had earlier.

At the crossing, he held out his hand.

She took it. His palm was warm and slightly rough. Nothing in the street changed. A van blocked the turn. Someone dropped a paper cup. The crossing signal made its ordinary impatient noise.

Leila had expected something more dramatic from the first time she held his hand. Instead she noticed how easy it was to keep walking.

When her bus came, he let go so she could find her pass.

“Again?” he asked.

“Yes.”

She went upstairs on the bus and sat where she could see the pavement. He was still there when she looked down, holding the café receipt with the details of his practical day. She waved. He waved back, then put the receipt carefully inside his book.

She watched until the bus turned the corner. For the first time in weeks, counting the stops felt like something she had forgotten to do.