Page 14 of Make Room for Love

Isabel smiled. “I’ve done that too. I’m too proud to ask my mom to teach me to cook, after I refused when I was a teenager.” She sighed. “Although I should. She’s getting older. She’s not going to be here forever.”

It always came back to the wound at the center of her family, the one that would never heal. The silence settled over them. She’d gotten too comfortable with Mira, and it left an opening for Mira to pity her. She’d told Mira about losing Alexa just to get it over with. Maybe that had been a mistake.

Mira nodded. Maybe she was pitying Isabel, or maybe not. Thankfully, she didn’t say anything trite for the sake of it, like a lot of other people would have done.

They finished eating in a comfortable enough silence. It was time for Isabel to wash the dishes. She reached for Mira’s bowl, and her fingers closed over Mira’s.

Isabel jerked away as though she’d been shocked. Mira’s hand was warm, and it had been months since Isabel had touched another person and felt the heat of their body. No, thatwasn’t true. She’d grabbed Mira’s arm outside of Volume that night, and feeling her bare skin had been like touching a live wire. Mira had tensed up at first, and that tension had gradually given way…

She reached out again and yanked the bowl out of Mira’s hands. “I’ll wash up. You cooked.”

Mira looked startled. “Well, I wanted to thank you for helping.”

“I’ll do it.” Isabel grabbed her own bowl and carried both to the sink, putting Mira firmly out of sight.

She had a role to play. She was helping Mira with her union organizing, and that was that. Once she was done with the dishes, they sat back down at the table.

Now Isabel was on firmer footing. This was like training apprentices at work. Never mind that no apprentice had ever knocked her so off-balance. “I’m a grad student and a worker, and you see me in the…”

“Computer science building.”

“That’s where you’re going?”

Mira grimaced. “I was late in signing up, and this was the only slot left. Normally I’d be in my own department.”

“Okay, in the computer science building. And I look tired from working all the time.”

Mira laughed. Then she sobered up and looked at her lap. A ringlet that had come loose from her hair clip fell into her face. Isabel itched to tuck it behind her ear.

“Well… I guess I would approach you,” Mira said. “And I would introduce myself?—”

“Say it to me like it’s real.”

Mira looked up and blinked, her long lashes fluttering. She had such gorgeous deep brown eyes. “Hi, I’m Mira Levin, and I’m with the Graduate Workers’ Union. Do you, um— Do youhave some time to talk with me about your experiences as a graduate worker?”

“Sure. Make it quick.”

Mira dropped her gaze before making eye contact again. She was startlingly sexy when trying to project confidence. “I’m interested in hearing about the problems you’re facing as a grad worker right now, whether it’s in teaching, or your research, or housing, or something else.”

The low-burning fire in Mira, flickering under all her self-doubt, was intriguing. Isabel wanted to see more. She settled back in her chair and eyed Mira skeptically. Anxiety flashed across Mira’s face, but she held Isabel’s gaze. She looked like the shy, determined academic she was, in her prim cardigan with a single button undone.

“I can’t afford to live less than an hour away from campus on my stipend,” Isabel said. “And my advisor harasses me and my coworkers. And the university won’t help me with my student visa.”

“Wow, you really paid attention during the rally.”

Isabel raised an eyebrow. “Is that what you’d say to me?”

She hadn’t been fully honest with herself. She wasn’t just helping Mira because she believed in lifting up all working people. She did believe in that, of course. But, more than that, she hated the thought of Mira running out of money and having no one to turn to for help.

She wanted to protect Mira. The instinct that had kicked in that night at the club had never gone away.

And the truth was, she’d been looking at Mira’s mouth, at the one undone button of her cardigan under her collarbones. Knowing that if they were in any other situation at all—if they weren’t roommates, if Isabel weren’t a mess—Isabel would be imagining undoing the rest of those buttons, one by one, all the way down.

She forced herself to look at Mira’s eyes. Those dark eyes that were so easy to get lost in. Isabel was in trouble.

“No.” Mira smiled and glanced down. Then her serious demeanor returned. Isabel was in deep, deep trouble. Or she would be, if she didn’t control herself. “First of all, I’m sorry to hear that,” Mira said, to the downtrodden grad student Isabel was role-playing. “That’s terrible and unfair to you. You shouldn’t have to deal with that by yourself. Have you been able to get any help or support for any of these issues?”

Mira’s sympathy was so convincing that Isabel was caught off-guard. She was mesmerized, tempted to open up about her nonexistent advisor. “No,” she said curtly, pushing her emotions down.“I can’t just ask the grad student office if they’ll pay me more.”

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