Chapter 37 — Stay Beside Me

By midday, the new sheet had fewer marks on it than the old one.

Hallie stood beside Caleb at the long table in the common room, looking at the empty spaces they had deliberately left empty.

Needs stayed.

Offers disappeared when the day ended.

No name, room, meal, shift, or spare bed carried forward unless the person offering it said yes again.

Caleb tapped the page with the chalk. “This is going to annoy people.”

“Because they have to ask twice?”

“Because they have to ask every time.”

Hallie looked at the crossed-out version from that morning. “Good.”

Caleb gave her a sideways glance.

She amended, “Not good that they’ll be annoyed. Good that the inconvenience lands on the people asking, not the people who already gave something.”

“That sounds less alarming.”

Hallie almost smiled.

They went through the sheet again. A sleeping place for one newcomer. Two meal gaps. An extra pair of hands for an evening repair. The needs were visible without attaching any resident to them.

It did not solve everything.

That was the point.

A test did not need to pretend it was permanent.

Grant found them before the afternoon work rotation ended.

He looked at the new sheet, then at Hallie. “You’re taking it back to the group?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“Now.”

Caleb gathered the old pages and moved toward the door, leaving them beside the table.

Grant did not follow him.

“What do you want from me?” he asked.

Hallie had expected the question and still had to think before answering.

Yesterday, she might have asked him to confirm that the change made sense. She might have wanted the authority of his agreement behind every sentence.

Today she knew how dangerous that would be.

“If someone asks what you think?”

“I can answer.”

She shook her head. “Not unless they ask you about something that’s actually yours to decide.”

Grant’s expression remained still.

“And if they challenge you?”

“Let them.”

His eyes stayed on her.

Hallie felt the old instinct to make the request smaller. Easier. More competent.

She ignored it.

“I want you there.”

Grant’s brows moved slightly.

“That’s all?”

“Yes.”

Not as Alpha.

Not as the man who could end an argument by speaking once.

Just there.

Grant nodded. “All right.”

The group that gathered was smaller than the one Hallie had imagined while rebuilding the sheet and larger than the one she would have preferred.

The woman whose floor space had been carried forward stood near the front. So did the man who had challenged Hallie that morning. The newcomer with the rolled blanket stayed near the wall.

Hallie put both versions of the sheet on the table.

“This one failed,” she said, touching the crossed-out page first. “Not because people refused to help. Because once they helped, we started treating yesterday’s yes like it belonged to today.”

No one interrupted.

Hallie moved her hand to the new sheet.

“Needs can stay visible until they’re met. Offers don’t carry forward. If someone gives a bed, food, time, or work today, that ends today unless they volunteer again.”

The man near the front frowned. “And if nobody does?”

“Then the need stays here.”

“So somebody can go without.”

Hallie met his gaze. “Possibly. I’m not going to hide that.”

A few people shifted.

“We’re trying this,” she continued. “I’m not asking you to accept it as a permanent rule. If it moves the same burden onto the same people again, we change it again.”

The woman beside him looked at the sheet. “How long is the test?”

“Three days.”

That was short enough to measure and stop. Caleb added, “We’ll track unmet needs. Not who refused them.” The man’s gaze moved to Grant, and Hallie noticed. Grant stayed quiet.

The silence held long enough that the man finally looked back at her.

“And after three days?”

“We come back here.”

Not Grant’s office.

Not a decision announced after the fact.

Here.

The woman whose floor space had started the argument reached for the chalk.

“I can offer it tonight.”

Hallie did not write her name.

She pushed the sheet toward her instead.

“You mark it.”

The woman did: one line, one night, a choice made again.

The newcomer by the wall loosened his grip on the blanket.

Other voices followed. Questions. Limits. One meal, not three. An hour after evening work, not an extra shift. A spare place for one night, not an open promise.

The sheet filled slowly.

No one declared the problem solved.

But when the group broke apart, the new version remained on the table.

In use.

Caleb collected the chalk. “Three days.”

“Three days.”

He left to catch the next work rotation.

Hallie should have gone with him.

There were still jobs waiting. She could feel the familiar pull toward motion, toward proving the meeting had not taken anything out of her.

Instead, she stayed.

Grant was still near the doorway.

He waited until the room had mostly emptied before walking toward her.

“You didn’t need me.”

Hallie looked at him. “I know.”

Something changed in his face.

She stepped closer.

“I wanted you here anyway.”

Grant went very still.

Grant stayed where he was. Their marriage had been a choice before either of them knew what else it might become, and the hands, wrists, and brief touches since then had given him no right to this. Hallie closed the last step herself.

His gaze dropped to her mouth, returned to her eyes, and held there until she put one hand against his chest, rose onto her toes, and kissed him. Surprise held Grant still for one second before his hand settled carefully at her waist, supporting the distance she had already chosen instead of drawing her closer.

Hallie kissed him again before she could turn the moment into a question. This time Grant answered, warm, controlled, and unmistakably real. When Hallie drew back, her fingers were still curled lightly in his shirt.

Grant looked at her as if anything said too quickly might damage what had just happened, and Hallie understood. The new plan was only a test. The kiss had already become something real.