Chapter 5: Tea With Pia

On Saturday morning Florian drove me to the flat I had shared with Clemens for three years.

"He's at his office until two," Florian said. "I checked."

"You checked?"

"I'm not letting you walk into that alone."

He parked across the street and came up with me, carrying two folded boxes under his arm.

He stood very close behind me on the stairs.

When my foot slipped on the third landing, his hand came flat against the small of my back and stayed there.

He didn't push. He didn't say anything.

His palm was warm through my shirt, and I felt that warmth go all the way down.

"I'm fine," I said.

"I know."

He took his hand away slowly.

I walked up the last flight and my back was hot where he had touched it.

My key still worked.

I let myself in, and the first thing I saw was a pair of small pastel ballet flats by the door.

"Marit?"

Pia stood in the kitchen doorway in one of Clemens's shirts, holding a mug.

My stomach turned over.

"I thought you'd come today," she said. Her eyes were swollen. "I made tea. I didn't know what else to do."

Florian stopped in the doorway behind me.

"I'll be in the hall," he said, and I understood he was giving me a choice, and did not say so.

"Stay by the door," I said.

"All right."

He took one step back and no more.

The kitchen looked the way it always had. The yellow tea towel on the oven door. The herbs on the sill, which I had planted.

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