CHAPTER TWELVE — Nia's Kindness
Elara
Nia never announced her kindness.
That was the first thing I noticed when she came over the day after we moved into the apartment. She didn't knock like someone checking on charity. She knocked like someone coming home.
Three soft raps. A pause. Then her voice through the door.
"Elara. It's me."
Just that. No pity wrapped in syllables. No careful tone.
I opened the door and she stood there holding two grocery bags and a folded blanket under her arm, her curls pulled back messily, eyes already scanning my face for damage I might try to hide.
"Before you say anything," she said, stepping inside, "I was already at the store. And before you say anything else, your fridge is empty and I refuse to pretend that's normal."
I let her pass.
The apartment still smelled unfamiliar—fresh paint layered over old cooking oil, the scent of a place that had been lived in by strangers before us. The Cole family had cleared it out quickly, handed us the keys with an efficiency that felt like mercy disguised as normalcy. Three bedrooms. A working stove. Locks that clicked solidly.
More than I'd allowed myself to hope for.
Nia dropped the bags on the counter and immediately started unpacking like she'd always belonged there. Rice. Bread. Eggs. Canned soup. Fruit. Practical things.
Not gifts.
Supplies.
Lucas hovered in the hallway pretending not to watch. Aaron sat on the couch with his backpack still on, as if he didn't trust the apartment not to disappear if he relaxed too much.
My mother was asleep in the back room, exhaustion finally winning.
Nia glanced toward the hallway, then back at me. Her voice lowered. "How is she?"
"Breathing," I said. "Which feels like an accomplishment some days."
She nodded. No commentary. No hollow reassurances.
That was another thing about Nia—she never tried to make the truth prettier than it was.
She moved closer and wrapped her arms around me without warning.
I stiffened on instinct, then slowly let myself lean into it.
For a moment, I wasn't the oldest daughter holding a family together with frayed hands. I was just a girl whose best friend knew exactly where it hurt.
"You don't have to be strong with me," she said quietly into my shoulder.
I swallowed. "I know."
But I still was.
She pulled back first, studying my face the way she always had—like she could read what I wasn't saying between breaths.
"They're adjusting," she said, glancing again at my brothers. "That's something."
"They shouldn't have to," I replied.
Nia's mouth pressed into a thin line. "None of this should've happened. But it did. So now we deal."
She turned toward the boys. "Hey. Who wants toast?"
Aaron raised his hand instantly. Lucas hesitated, then shrugged like it didn't matter.
It mattered.
Nia made it matter without turning it into a performance.
While the toaster hummed, she leaned against the counter beside me. "My parents didn't do this because they felt sorry for you."
I looked at her.
"They did it because your father once did the same for us," she continued. "When my dad lost his job and we were three months from eviction? Your house fed us. Your mother didn't make a big deal out of it. She just added extra plates."
I remembered. Vaguely. I'd been younger then, unaware of how close generosity could come to desperation.
"We didn't know," I said.
Nia smiled faintly. "Exactly."
That was the point.
She stayed for hours.
Not hovering. Not asking invasive questions. Just folding laundry with me, helping Aaron with homework, teasing Lucas into laughing when he'd clearly decided laughter was irresponsible now.
At some point, she followed me into the small bedroom I'd claimed as mine. The door barely cleared the bed. The walls were bare.
"You okay?" she asked.
"No."
She nodded. "Good answer."
I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at my hands. "I don't know how long we can stay here."
"I know," she said gently. "But today? You're here."
I exhaled slowly.
She hesitated, then spoke carefully. "My parents didn't put a deadline on it."
My head snapped up. "Nia—"
"They didn't," she repeated. "They said you'd leave when you were ready. Or when you hated it too much. Whichever came first."
I laughed weakly. "I already hate it."
"Good. That means your pride's still alive."
That word—pride—sat heavy between us.
After she left that night, the apartment felt warmer.
Not safer. Not solved.
But less hollow.
Days passed.
Nia became part of the rhythm without ever pushing herself into it. She showed up with food sometimes. With notebooks for the boys. With quiet company when my mother had bad days and words only made things worse.
She never asked what I planned to do next.
She knew I would hate that question.
One evening, we sat on the apartment steps while the boys were inside, arguing over a video game they couldn't afford but somehow had anyway.
"You're thinking too far ahead again," Nia said.
I stared at the cracked concrete. "I don't have the luxury not to."
"You have the right to rest."
I shook my head. "Rest is how things fall apart."
She leaned back on her hands. "You're allowed to accept help, Elara. It doesn't make you weak."
"It makes me dependent."
"Temporary dependence is not failure."
"It feels like it."
She turned toward me fully then. "Listen to me. You are not invisible to the people who matter."
I laughed softly. "That's a small audience."
"It's the only one worth performing for."
Silence stretched.
I thought of my father's voice, steady and warm, reminding us that dignity wasn't about what you had—it was about how you treated others when you had it.
And how you survived when you didn't.
That night, after everyone slept, I sat at the kitchen table with a notebook and started writing again.
Numbers. Plans. Possibilities.
I didn't know it yet, but this was the last stretch of quiet before everything shifted.
Before the world reminded me how expensive pride could be.
Before kindness stopped being enough.
Before someone with power noticed how hard I was trying to stay unseen.
But for now, in a borrowed apartment held together by gratitude and memory, I let myself believe something fragile and dangerous.
That maybe falling didn't have to mean disappearing.
And that sometimes, being held—just for a moment—made you forget how much it could cost.