We eventually chose the apartment above the bakery. We returned for a second viewing, checked the documents carefully, compared the final costs against our budgets, and signed a lease together. There was no surprise announcement. Each of us read every page before signing, asked questions, and took responsibility for what we were choosing. When Mr. Evans handed over the keys, Donovan let me take the first set while he counted the second.
The keys were ordinary silver, cut at a hardware store and attached to a cheap plastic ring. Nobody would have mistaken them for a romantic gift. I held mine in my palm and thought about how differently I had received the brass key a year earlier. Then I looked at Donovan and asked whether he was ready. He smiled and said he was, as long as we remembered that being ready did not mean knowing every answer in advance.
Moving day was chaotic. Arthur arrived with a borrowed truck, Lorraine brought sandwiches, and Zoe appeared carrying a box labeled "ESSENTIAL ITEMS" that contained nothing but snacks and a portable speaker. Kendra came after her shift and immediately began organizing the kitchen because she claimed I could not be trusted to arrange dishes without an elaborate emotional backstory. I accepted the teasing because it was affectionate and because I had given all of them more than enough material.
We worked through the afternoon, carrying boxes up the narrow staircase while the bakery sent the smell of warm bread through the hallway. Donovan assembled the bed frame, and I organized the bookshelves, though we had to rearrange them three times before both of us were happy. At one point we disagreed about where to put a large chair, and I felt the first spark of annoyance. He suggested we try it by the window for a week and move it if we hated it. I agreed, and we returned to unpacking.
After everyone left, the apartment felt enormous and unfamiliar despite being smaller than the two places we had given up. Cardboard boxes lined the walls. A single lamp illuminated the living room, and our dinner consisted of leftover sandwiches eaten on the floor because we had not found the table legs. I was exhausted, but the exhaustion belonged to a day we had chosen together, not one of trying to impress anybody.
Donovan leaned back against the sofa and asked whether I wanted to take a photograph. I looked around at the boxes, the loose packing paper, and the green kitchen walls visible through the doorway. A year earlier I might have arranged the room, waited until the lighting improved, and added a caption about destiny rewarding true love. Instead I took one picture of our tired faces and the empty pizza box beside us. I kept it on my phone without posting it.