Nina answered my confession with a photograph of a grocery basket inside Olica's car. Pasta, tomatoes, onions, chicken, and several containers I could not identify filled the frame. The message beneath it removed any possibility that she planned to reward my incompetence.
{Nina: I will bring ingredients. You will cook while I prevent a small apartment fire.}
{Kofi: That arrangement sounds dangerously close to institutional support.}
{Nina: It is supervised learning. Wear shoes.}
I checked the time, discovered I had forty minutes, then spent ten choosing which chair looked least abandoned. The System offered no quest for impressing her, which I appreciated more than expected. A dinner built around her approval would turn every mistake into evidence against me.
The black shirt from discharge still fit without irritating the bandage, though I changed into softer trousers. I cleaned the table slowly, resting whenever my side tightened instead of racing the clock. By the time the doorbell rang, the apartment looked occupied rather than staged.
Nina stood outside with two grocery bags plus the expression of someone inspecting unsafe equipment. She had changed from her campus clothes into jeans and a yellow blouse, leaving her hair loose around her shoulders. My prepared greeting disappeared before it traveled anywhere close to my waiting mouth.
"You can stare after taking the lighter bag," she said, raising it toward my uninjured hand.
"I was evaluating whether yellow receives adequate academic respect," I replied, stepping aside after accepting the bag.
"Your research face needs work," Nina said, entering only after I opened the door wider.
She paused inside the living room, noticing the cleared table plus two plates borrowed from my parents' cabinet. Nothing about her inspection felt like judgment, though I suddenly understood how much of my home had remained frozen around absent people. I placed the groceries on the counter while she chose where to leave her bag.
"Pain number first," she said, washing her hands at the sink before touching any ingredients.
"Three while standing, two while sitting," I replied, giving the answer without reducing it for pride.
"Dizziness?" Nina asked, turning toward me while she dried her hands.
"None since breakfast," I said, showing her the medication times recorded beside the refrigerator.
She nodded, then removed a wooden spoon from one bag as though she had brought a weapon. My single pan waited beside a pot Jake had apparently donated without announcing it. Nina arranged ingredients across the counter while making me name whatever I recognized.
"That is an onion," I said, receiving no visible praise for completing the opening question.
"Excellent beginning," Nina replied, placing it beside the cutting board, "now explain what you intended to do with it."
"Introduce it to heat," I said, looking between the knife and my healing side, "then negotiate from there."
"We are making tomato chicken pasta," she explained, moving the knife toward herself, "I cut because your balance remains suspicious, while you measure and stir."
The division protected my healing body without turning me into a spectator during our dinner. I filled the pot halfway, carried it using both hands, then accepted Nina's correction before adding enough water for a flood. She showed me how much salt belonged inside without pretending everybody learned this at birth.
"My mother cooked when she was home," I said, measuring the pasta against the packet instructions, "then stocked frozen meals before each contract."
"Your father?" Nina asked, slicing the onion into even pieces while keeping her eyes on the board.
"He believes grilling meat outside counts as full domestic range," I replied, setting the packet down.
"Olica can cook anything," Nina said, sliding the chopped onion into a bowl, "which meant my family decided I should enjoy doing it too."
The sharpness beneath the sentence arrived quietly, though it changed the lesson immediately. Nina liked choosing meals when she had time, but relatives treated competence like permanent availability. Compliments became repeated requests, then permanent expectations nobody bothered asking her to accept willingly.
"So directing me is not your natural purpose," I said, leaning against the counter while the water warmed.
"Thank you for discovering that before dessert," she replied, meeting my eyes with visible approval.
"I asked you here for dinner," I continued, keeping the distinction clear, "not because the apartment required a woman before food could happen."
Nina set the knife down, studying me for several seconds before her shoulders loosened. She had probably heard polished versions of that sentence from men who still waited beside empty plates. I moved toward the stove when the water began trembling, making the promise practical.
"Then cook," she said, passing me the pasta while she reclaimed the knife, "I will invoice you for consultation."
"My current Life Point balance is healthy," I replied, lowering the pasta carefully, "though the exchange rate remains hostile."
She laughed while cutting the chicken, then instructed me through heating oil in the donated pan. The first onion pieces landed before the oil warmed enough, producing a pale surrender instead of the dramatic sound I expected. Nina made me wait, smell, plus watch rather than fixing everything with her own hands.
"Cooking is mostly noticing," she said, pointing toward the edges turning translucent, "recipes give times because strangers cannot see your pan."
"That sounds uncomfortably similar to journalism," I replied, stirring with my wrist held stiff.
"History student discovers observation," Nina said, leaning closer to inspect the heat, "the university will survive the scandal."
The chicken browned unevenly because I crowded the pan, though nothing burned or remained dangerously pink. Nina corrected the spacing once, then sat at the counter when I added tomatoes plus seasoning. Her willingness to stop helping became an important part of the lesson for me.
The System appeared while the sauce thickened, offering a plain description instead of celebration.
[Skill condition met: prepared a complete meal through guided effort.]
[Basic Cooking acquired.]
[Empathy milestone recorded.]
[Empathy: 34 → 37]
I expected Cooking alone, so the second increase held my attention longer. Asking what Nina resented had mattered more than producing one edible plate of pasta. The System measured my response without exposing anything private about her thoughts or feelings.
"Basic Cooking," I reported, lowering the heat before the sauce caught, "plus three Empathy points for recognizing unpaid labor."
"Your machine receives one point for vocabulary," Nina said, folding her arms across the counter, "you receive judgment after I taste the sauce."
I offered the spoon after blowing across it, careful not to turn the movement intimate by assumption. Nina took it from my hand, tasted the sauce, then considered the ceiling with theatrical severity. My stomach tightened far more than the ordinary cooking result could possibly deserve.
"Needs salt," she decided, returning the spoon without softening the verdict.
"That pause was an abuse of editorial power," I said, adding a measured pinch before stirring again.
"You invited a journalist," Nina replied, watching me taste from a clean spoon, "dramatic withholding comes with the profession."
The final meal looked rougher than the photograph on the packet, but steam carried garlic plus tomatoes through the kitchen. I served smaller portions because neither of us needed the evening defeated by pasta. Nina carried the glasses while I brought one plate at a time.
We sat across from each other beneath the dining light my parents usually left switched off. The first bite contained too much pepper and one stubborn piece of onion. Nina swallowed, took another bite, then gave me the answer without manufacturing astonishment.
"It is good," she said, winding more pasta around her fork, "not miraculous, not poisonous, and good enough to repeat."
"That may be the kindest review available under your ethics code," I replied, tasting my own portion.
The food was genuinely decent, which felt stranger than succeeding through a System reward. We talked about campus buildings, terrible lecturers, plus the musicians Olica played while driving. Nina asked which history period I loved before grades made the answer useful.
I told her about migration routes, ordinary letters, and the decisions hidden beneath official events. She listened without checking her phone, interrupting only when my explanation outran the meal. Her attention felt different from gratitude because the subject belonged entirely to me.
"You become louder when you care about something," Nina said, resting her fork after finishing half the plate.
"I was told volume represented poor scholarship," I replied, noticing the familiar embarrassment arrive late.
"You were told by boring people," she said, nudging the bread plate toward me, "continue after eating another piece."
The permission warmed me, though I made myself ask about her work before turning dinner into a lecture. Nina described the student paper's argument over publishing the accident video, including the editor who considered consent an inconvenience. She planned an article about viral witnesses becoming public property without agreement.
"Will I appear in it?" I asked, keeping my voice steady while her fork stopped.
"Only if you choose an interview after reading the angle," she replied, giving the boundary before persuasion, "your no would remain no."
"Then send the questions," I said, refusing both automatic agreement and automatic retreat, "I want to decide after seeing them."
Nina smiled, accepting the conditional answer without treating my reasonable caution as personal mistrust. We finished dinner while rain thickened against the windows, turning the city beyond them silver. Neither of us noticed how late the evening had become until she yawned above her empty plate.
"That was subtle," I said, collecting her plate before she could stand.
"I woke early to buy groceries for an unqualified chef," Nina replied, carrying her glass despite my look.
We washed everything together, with me rinsing while she arranged the drying rack. Our shoulders touched twice inside the narrow kitchen, each contact acknowledged through a glance without becoming a test. The closeness remained easy because either of us could step away whenever needed.
Nina moved toward the sofa after checking the rain, intending to wait until the next bus. She tucked one leg beneath herself, opened her notebook, then asked me another question about the student article. I answered from the recliner while medication softened the room around its edges.
At some point, her notebook slipped closed against her stomach while her breathing became slow. The rain continued beyond the windows, covering the city with a steady private sound.
I checked the bus schedule before waking her and discovered the final route had departed twelve minutes earlier. The glowing timetable turned our comfortable evening into a decision neither of us had planned.