“Whoa, Isadora, the board is officially nailed.” Michelle eyes my work with raised eyebrows. Okay. Maybe someone else should be in charge of the nail gun today. But it’s so satisfying.

“I’ve been texting you all morning,” she says. Even though she’s been right down the stairs the whole time.

“My phone’s dead.” No phone, no infuriatingly chipper texts and messages from Ry asking to meet so he can explain. Phones let people be both lazy and intrusive. Really, they’re a terrible invention. We should go back to messengers. Or smoke signals. Way easier to ignore.

“How close are we?” She surveys the room with a concerned look. Rightly so. I’m getting a little nervous about brashly declaring I could do this. I want to prove myself to her (and to me) so very badly. This is the biggest project I’ve ever undertaken, and I need it to work. I need to show I can do more than color schemes and furniture.

But with the approval delay, we had to start on the framework without blueprints, so until yesterday my prep was pretty much pointless. Once Michelle got me the room’s actual schematics, I had to compensate with extra bracings because there weren’t enough studs in the drywall to support the weight of the plywood sheets and drop ceilings.

The only one happy about this situation is Tyler, with her infinite supply of “If only we had more studs!” jokes. I set down the nail gun and, not even sure what I’m doing, wrap an arm around her side in some sort of approximation of a hug. “I’m glad you’re here,” I say. She’s keeping me sane.

“Of course you are,” she answers, hugging me back. “I just wish I were—”

“If you say ‘studlier,’ I’m kicking you out.”

She laughs, and I go back to nailing. Opening night is in a week. Already announced to the papers, already sent out in the newsletter in fancy, glossy, full-color glory. Which means I have two days, max, to finish the framing—easily a week’s worth of work—and then four days for drilling the star maps I’ve already marked on the plywood, painting, wiring, installing, and finessing.

Leaving me only one day—the day of the evening gala—to clean and get the actual exhibits set up.

It’s impossible.

I will make it happen or die trying.

I don’t realize I’ve said that last part aloud until I notice Michelle’s horrified face. “We could use some help,” Tyler says from the finished section where she’s touching up the cement floor’s black coat of paint.

“Not just anyone,” I say. “You pull in, say, Lindsey from the front desk, and it’ll take more time to explain what needs to done than it would for me to do it all myself.”

“So we could use some capable help,” Tyler amends.

Michelle bites her lip. “With the cost of the storage and extra security, we don’t really have the budget for—”

“I can do this. Tyler is enough.”

“What time did you get here this morning?” Michelle asks.

“Five,” I say. Lie: I’ve been here since 3:30. After the attempted robbery, security confiscated keys from everyone other than Michelle, but she gave me the only employee-held copy so I could drop off supplies and work whenever.

“It’s four thirty. Have you taken a break?”

“I can’t.” I turn back to the wall and line up the gun with a new board. But when I pull the trigger, nothing happens. I pull it again and again. “Floods, what is—”

Michelle stands next to me, dangling the unplugged cord. “Lunch. Now. If you come back one minute before six thirty p.m., I will have security deny you entrance.”

My mouth gapes open wider than a hippo’s, but every line in Michelle’s small body is rigid and unyielding. I could pick her up and deposit her outside this room, then lock the door . . . but I wouldn’t put it past her to call security. “Fine,” I snap. “I need to deliver paint samples to the guys doing the display stands, anyway.”

“I’m going to smell your breath when you get back and I had better smell food!”

“That’s disgusting!”

“I don’t care!”

Tyler straightens and drops her roller.

“You”— I jab one long finger, the black polish sadly chipped, in her direction—“already ate lunch. Keep working.”

My boots crack like a gunshot with each echoing stomp down the stairs and through the mostly empty museum. At the bottom I feel someone staring at me and whip around, ready to catch Tyler trying to skip out, but her angular frame is nowhere to be seen among the small group passing in a blur at the top of the stairs.

A strange smell dries and pricks at the back of my mouth; I can’t place it, but it doesn’t belong. It reminds me of the break-in at Sirus’s house, which makes no sense because there isn’t any salt breeze here.

I fight the odd urge to shudder, and stalk out of the museum instead. I can run three errands in two hours if I literally run.

Laden with bags, I drain the last of my Coke. I had three of them instead of anything to eat. It was faster and I couldn’t get that dry sensation out of my mouth. Besides, Michelle’d have to stand on a stepladder to smell my breath, so I think I’m okay. Except it’s 6:24 p.m., and I’m hovering outside the taped-up do not enter signs blocking the wing-in-progress. She can’t get mad at six minutes early. The plastic handles of the bags are threatening to tear and burning where they dig into my exposed forearms.