In March, I moved into my own apartment.
It was small, on the fourth floor of a building without a doorman, with a window that looked out on a street of small shops and a church with a clock tower. The light in the morning was not as good as it had been on the ninth floor by the lake, but it was mine.
Maya helped me paint the kitchen.
"Do you need a lamp?" she said, holding up the lamp I had taken from Julian's apartment. The same lamp. The thrift store lamp.
"No," I said. "I'm going to get a new one."
"Really?"
"Really."
She put the old lamp in the donation box and we finished painting and ordered pizza, and we sat on the floor because I didn't have chairs yet, and we ate and looked at the wall.
"You know something," Maya said.
"What?"
"That first night, when you called me, I th
