The coffee filters were on the top shelf, but Kayla kept asking Andrew to reach them whenever she crossed our kitchen in a towel. She called it a test, even after I told her to stop. On Sunday, Andrew set down his coffee, unlocked his phone, and showed her why he’d stopped leaving the room that day.

I moved the toast off the hot pan before it burned.

“I asked you not to do something in my home, and you decided I needed to convince you my reason was good enough.”

She pulled the towel tighter under one arm.

“So this is punishment.”

“No. If I wanted to punish you, I’d have let you keep eating Andrew’s cereal. He buys the terrible kind.”

Andrew pointed at me.

Kayla didn’t laugh.

“I’m heartbroken, Amanda. I have no money. I don’t even have a job yet.”

“I know.”

“And you’re giving me a deadline?”

“I’m giving us a plan.”

“Same thing.”

She looked at Andrew.

“And you. You’ve been acting like I’m some kind of predator all week.”

Andrew picked up his coffee.

“No.”

“You leave every time I come into the room.”

“The first time, I left because it was awkward,” he admitted. “After Amanda asked you to stop, I left because I wasn’t participating anymore.”

“In what?”

“Whatever experiment you thought you were running. You kept trying to make me a character in an argument with my wife.”

For once, Kayla had no quick answer.

Then she looked at me.