It's funny how quickly "hard" starts to feel normal.The mornings stopped being heavy after a while. The alarm would buzz, I'd roll over, kiss Clara's shoulder, and she'd make that sleepy noise halfway between a sigh and a laugh. Our apartment still smelled faintly of paint from when we'd redone the kitchen walls a shade too bright. There was always a thin patch the roller hadn't covered properly. She called it our lucky spot.
Breakfast was cheap toast and burnt coffee, but she danced around the stove like we were already rich.
Then I'd take the bus to Harlow Industries. The driver knew me by week two—"Morning, Mr. Early Bird"—and I'd nod like it wasn't because rent depended on those paychecks arriving on time.
The office was nothing like the Vale mansion: too open, too alive. People shouted across desks, laughed mid-report. Anders, my boss, kept a plant on his desk that looked like it might sue for neglect. I ended up watering it most days.
Little by little, they trusted me with more. Schedules, then clients, then presentations. I didn't plan to help Harlow steal Vale's clients, but the opportunity came wrapped in irony too tempting to ignore. Vale Logistics had grown lazy, arrogant. I knew their weak points—their delays, their broken promises. I didn't even have to lie; I just told the truth better.
It wasn't revenge exactly. It was something quieter, something like balance.
By the end of the second month, Anders called me into his office. He was grinning, waving a sheet of numbers like it was a flag. "Three new clients in one week, Ethan. I don't know what you're doing, but keep doing it."
"I just listen," I said.
"Whatever it is, it's working. We're finally cutting into Vale's territory."
That night I came home late, smelling like printer ink and rain. Clara was sitting cross-legged on the couch, folding napkins for the diner because Mrs. Graham liked them neat. When she saw me, her face lit up.
"You got that look," she said. "The one you get when something went right."
I shrugged, tried to sound casual. "We might've pulled a few clients from Vale."
Her eyes widened. "Ethan—"
"I didn't plan it," I said quickly. "It just… happened. I guess I still know how they think."
She reached across the couch, grabbed my hand. "You did good, didn't you?"
"I think so."
"Then stop trying to sound guilty."
I laughed, leaned back, watched her smile. "You always make things sound simple."
"They usually are," she said. "It's people who make them complicated."
Days blurred after that. Weeks even.We started learning the rhythm of a life that wasn't quite poor but wasn't easy either. I'd get home late, she'd save dinner for me, and sometimes we'd sit on the balcony with our knees touching, watching the streetlights flicker.
Our neighbors upstairs argued constantly about a broken radio; Mrs. Graham brought leftover pie that tasted mostly like cinnamon and too much love.
On Sundays, Clara dragged me to the park. She said the world looked better in daylight. I told her daylight looked better with her in it. She rolled her eyes but didn't disagree.
I started fixing things again—the leaky tap, the squeaky door, the radio that had been stuck on one station. Every time I repaired something, she'd look at me like I'd just rebuilt Rome.
"You really can fix anything," she'd say.
"Not everything," I'd answer. "But I'm working on it."
One evening, after a long day of spreadsheets and endless calls, I came home to find her asleep on the couch, still in her diner uniform. Her head was tilted back, mouth slightly open, hair tangled against her cheek. A book rested on her chest—one she'd been reading in little stolen breaks between shifts.
I just stood there for a minute. Watching. Listening to the soft sound of her breathing.
And for the first time in a long time, I realized I wasn't angry anymore. Not at my father, not at the world, not even at the way things turned out. We had less, but what we had was ours.
I sat beside her, careful not to wake her.
Outside, the city hummed—the familiar, restless heartbeat of people trying.
She stirred, mumbled my name without opening her eyes.
"I'm here," I whispered.
It started with a jar.An old jam jar, actually — the kind with the faded label still stuck to the glass. We kept it on the kitchen counter, beside the fruit bowl we never filled because fruit was expensive and we always ate it too fast.
Every time I got paid, I'd drop a few bills inside. Clara called it "hope money." I called it "rent-that's-not-rent-yet."
She'd tease me about it, say I was too careful, too proud to ask for help. And maybe I was. But watching that jar fill a little more every week did something to me — it made the future feel like something we could touch.
We didn't talk about what we were saving for at first. Maybe we were scared to jinx it. But every time I'd hold her close at night and hear the pipes creak and the neighbors argue, I'd think, someday.
Months slipped by the way sunlight moves across a floor — quietly, almost without being noticed.
Work at Harlow was picking up faster than I could keep up with it. Anders called me into his office one morning, his sleeves rolled up, tie loose as usual.
"You've been here what — six months?" he said.
"Almost seven."
He nodded, leaning back. "We're giving you a promotion. Team lead. You'll oversee the new accounts you brought in. Comes with a raise, too. Don't get too smug."
I laughed because I couldn't find the right words. My throat tightened in that strange, grateful way that happens when life stops being all uphill for a second.
He clapped my shoulder. "You earned it, Ethan. And if anyone deserves a win, it's you."
That night, I brought home takeout instead of cooking. Clara's favorite noodles, even though the sauce always dripped through the paper bag.
"What's the occasion?" she asked, eyebrows raised as I laid the food on the table.
"I got promoted."
Her mouth fell open. "Ethan!" She threw her arms around me, nearly knocking the cartons off the counter. "Oh my God, I knew it! I knew they'd see what you can do."
I held her, laughing. "You're more excited than I am."
"Of course I am," she said, eyes bright. "I get to brag now."
The jar grew heavier after that.
We didn't touch it except to add more. A little from my bonus, some tips from her shifts at the diner. Then one day she came home, hair tied back, looking like she'd been thinking about something all day.
"There's this place," she said, sitting down beside me. "A counseling center. They're looking for assistants—someone to help with group therapy sessions for PTSD patients. It's mostly veterans, but also people who've gone through... things."
Her voice softened.
"You'd be perfect for that," I said.
"You think?"
"I know."
"Finally I can make some use of my psychology degree."
She looked at me for a long moment. "It doesn't pay much."
"Since when do we care about much?"
She smiled, slow and small, and I swear I could see something bloom behind her eyes — purpose, maybe. Or peace.
A few months later, we moved into a real apartment.
Nothing fancy — but it had a balcony wide enough for two chairs and a window that actually faced the sunrise. The day we got the keys, Clara stood in the middle of the empty living room, turning in a slow circle, her laughter echoing against bare walls.
"Look at us," she said. "People with doors that lock properly."
I dropped the last box near the couch and wrapped my arms around her from behind. "And plumbing that doesn't sound like a dying whale."
"That too." She turned, grinning. "We did it, Ethan. We really did."
We unpacked that night with music playing from an old speaker and takeout boxes scattered on the floor. When the last of the city noise faded and we finally sat down, legs tangled, our new home smelled of cardboard and possibility.
She leaned her head on my shoulder. "You know, it's weird," she said quietly. "I used to dream about big things — traveling, owning a car, a big kitchen... But right now? I don't want to be anywhere else."
I looked around at the stacks of boxes, the cracked paint, the leaky faucet we hadn't fixed yet. It wasn't much. But it was ours.
And for a while, that was enough.