I held up the bags. "Hey! I wanted to check on you so I brought food."
Smooth, Briggs. Real smooth.
I couldn't remember the last time I'd been nervous around a woman. Nervous wasn't something that happened to me anymore. I'd spent three years being the guy who always knew what to say, always had the easy smile and the charming line ready to go.
But there I was, standing in her doorway with takeout getting cold in my hands, feeling like I was seventeen again, showing up to a first date with sweaty palms and no game.
She stared at me like I'd shown up with a live tiger instead of Chinese food.
"You didn't have to do that."
"Had to eat anyway." I shrugged, aiming for casual. Missing by a mile. "Figured you did too."
It barely counted as an excuse. We both knew it. The silence stretched between us, and I braced myself for her to tell me to leave, that this was weird, that she didn't need some random firefighter showing up at her apartment unannounced.
But even with all of that, she stepped aside and let me in.
The apartment was small. Cozy, but worn around the edges. A couch with a throw blanket that had seen better days. A bookshelf overflowing with paperbacks and framed photos. The smell of something floral, maybe lavender, underneath the general chaos of a lived-in space.
And at the kitchen table, a teenage girl with dark hair and her mother's eyes looked up at me like I was a home invader.
I'd done the math at the hospital when Maya had mentioned Zoe was thirteen. Maya was thirty. Which meant she'd had Zoe at seventeen. Someone was learning how to grow while raising someone else.
I'd thought about that more than I should have over the past few days and wondered what that must have been like. She'd managed to finish school, get a degree, and build a career, all while raising a daughter on her own. Most people I knew at seventeen were worried about prom and college applications. Maya had been changing diapers and figuring out how to survive.
It explained a lot. The exhaustion. The fierce independence. The way she held herself like someone who'd learned early that no one was coming to save her.
"Zoe, this is Shane," Maya said, her voice carefully neutral. "He's a firefighter. He helped me when I got hurt at school."
Zoe didn't move, didn't smile. She just stared at me with the particular intensity of a thirteen-year-old deciding whether you were worth her time.
"Hey," I said. "Nice to meet you."
"Hi."
One syllable. Maximum suspicion.
I didn't blame her. Some strange guy shows up at your apartment with food for your mom? I'd be suspicious too.
"What are you working on?" I nodded toward the textbooks spread across the table.
"Homework."
"What subject?"
"Math."
I waited for more. Got nothing.
"Math was never my thing," I offered. "I was more of a science guy."
Zoe's expression didn't change. "Cool."
Maya was watching us with something between amusement and anxiety. I caught her eye and gave a small shrug.I'm trying.
She smiled, just barely.
We ate dinner at the small kitchen table, the three of us crowded around takeout containers. Maya kept apologizing for the mess, for not having real plates, for the state of the apartment. I told her my place was worse, which was true. Zoe watched me like a hawk, saying nothing, missing nothing.
