Page 24 of With the Key in the Office

“We know,” Jessie said, settling into the calm of a woman who guides storms. “You did ask for something. We won’t help if you don’t want us to.”

A woman, whose hair had been coaxed into smoothness with effort, suddenly appeared in the doorway of the kitchen. Victoria. The woman who had asked for our help. She held a dish towel in one hand. Her gaze ran over us the way a mother counts heads at a pool. Relief showed up, then suspicion took its seat.

“You’re early,” she said, then caught herself. “I mean thank you for coming on short notice. I spoke to the... I put a request in, and they said someone would help. I need help.”

“Victoria,” Jessie said. “We’re here to listen first. Then we’ll see if there’s a wish in the room that wants to be granted.”

“My wish is for peace,” Victoria said, and the dish towel twisted, just once.

“My wish is to not be smothered to death by chore charts,” Tamsin said. “And for my room to stop being a demilitarized zone.”

“Good,” Jessie said, tone steady enough to stack books on. “Clear and honest. May we sit.” She didn’t wait for ceremony. She chose the floor across from Tamsin and left the couch for Victoria, which gave both women a height they hadn’t asked for and choices they hadn’t noticed.

Jaylyn took the armchair angled between them. I hovered near the window. A clock in the hall ticked with conviction.

“Ground rules,” Jessie said. “We don’t fix people. We change the furniture around the choices. No one gets what they want by stealing it from the other.”

Tamsin’s mouth tilted. “Does that line work on everyone or just stepmothers?”

“It works on kitchens, classrooms, and bullies,” Jessie said. “It works on me when I try to win by being clever.”

Victoria sat, ankles crossed, the dish towel making another turn around her hands. “I’m not a bully,” she said, brittle at the edge, and then gentled her tone. “I’m outnumbered by a teenager who can hex the toaster because I asked her to empty the dishwasher.”

Tamsin did not look away. “One time,” she said. “And it unhexed when it cooled.”

Jessie checked that both sets of eyes stayed with her. “Tell me the story that ends without anyone losing,” she said.

Tamsin stared out the window. “I get room to breathe,” she said finally. “I can do my homework without someone standing in the doorway. I can practice without every spell turning into a family referendum.”

Victoria’s breath hitched. She pushed through it. “The house stops humming like a beehive,” she said. “We eat dinner without a speech about independence. I stop living in terror that something goes wrong and I’m the adult who didn’t stop it.”

Jessie nodded as if both answers made sense, because they did. “All right,” she said. “Let’s play the Minute.” She reached into her bag and drew out a palm-sized hourglass. The sand inside glinted with a faint charm that promised to nag when someone broke the rule.

“Oldest tool I own,” she said. “When the sand runs, one person talks and the other listens. No eye rolls. No sighs that could power a windmill. No texting ‘help’ to a cousin.” She checked both faces. “We do three passes. Then we decide if we need a second tool.”

Tamsin’s eye roll started and stalled. She nodded. Victoria pressed the towel flat on her knees and nodded too.

Jessie turned the glass and tipped her head at the girl. “Tamsin first. Tell your stepmother one thing you need by the end of this week. Not your entire manifesto.”

Tamsin’s mouth moved. No sound came for three beats. Then the words lined up. “If I text you where I am and I’m with people you’ve met, you don’t need to blow up my phone every thirtyminutes,” she said. “I come home on time. You trust me like a person.”

The charm at the top of the glass made a contented chime because she had stayed within the rule. Jessie flipped the hourglass. “Victoria.”

Victoria had her reply ready, which meant she’d been rehearsing it. “If you’re late,” she said, voice low and precise, “I need a call, not a text. I need to hear your voice. I need to hear that you are as annoyed as I am that the bus ran slow, or the practice ran long, or your friend’s mother got stuck at work.” A breath slid out. “And I need you to stop throwing the fact that I am not your mother in my face every time I ask you to rinse a bowl.”

Tamsin’s eyes flashed. Then she shut her mouth because the sand said wait. Jessie flipped the glass. “Two more,” she said. “Smaller.”

“I want my door closed without it becoming a referendum on secrets,” Tamsin said. “If I’m doing homework, the door stays closed. If I’m in there with a friend, you can knock, then ask to meet them after you’ve knocked.”

“Reasonable,” Jessie said. “Victoria.”

“I want the family phone rules back on the fridge,” Victoria said. “I want you to pretend for one week that the rules aren’t the enemy, they’re the net.”

The sand finished its work. The room shifted a hair toward breathable. Jaylyn made a small humming approval that did not carry smugness. Jaylyn glanced at the cork board and the lists no longer clenched quite so hard.

“Second tool,” Jessie said. “This one is sillier. It works anyway.” She drew out a fistful of bright string. “The tether. Whoever holds the end has the floor for five sentences. The other holds on and does not interrupt, which makes the hand remember that they are connected.”

Tamsin snorted. “It’s yarn.”