The lift takes nine minutes each way and shudders at the third floor.

So the stairs get used by everyone who can manage them, and by one person who is trying.

JuneDon't help. I mean it. If I fall, catch me, but don't help.

You have never been told not to help so precisely before.

She goes up one step at a time, hand flat on the rail, and the prosthetic makes a sound like a knuckle on wood.

JuneI paint them. Constellations. It's a stupid idea but it's mine.

Halfway up, she stops, and you stop a step below her, and nobody says anything for a while.