Page 73 of The Overtime Persuasive

I push away from the table and the noise stops as suddenly as it began, followed by a long shushing sound somewhere inside the pipes. I cross the room and place my hand near the radiator.

No heat rises from it. When I touch the metal, it’s cold.

“No.” I check the thermostat in the hallway. It’s set to sixty-nine, but the temperature in the apartment has dropped to sixty-three. I tap the screen, but nothing changes.

“Come on.”

I raise the temperature two degrees and wait for the system to respond. Usually, the pipes begin clicking within seconds, and I hear when the boiler catches somewhere beneath me, signaling that heat will soon slowly begin to move through the building.

Tonight, there is no clicking, no boiler catching, no signals of warmth making its way to my lair.

Tonight, there is only silence.

I turn the thermostat off and on again, because while I do not know anything about heating systems, I have spent enough time around technology to understand that turning something off and on is the first step in every repair process. Still nothing.

Then, the radiator gives one final hollow knock. A small line of water appears beneath the valve and travels slowly down the pipe. Horrified, I grab a hand towel from the kitchen and crouch beside the radiator. The leak isn’t fast, but it’s steady enough to darken the fabric. I wrap it around the base.

Before I allow myself to freak out, I check the radiator in the spare room. Cold. The one in the bathroom is cold too. This isn’t one bad radiator. I think it’s the system.

My stomach drops. Fixing an old building’s heating system does not happen for a reasonable amount of money. It does not require a friendly technician to tighten one adorable little screw before accepting twenty dollars and a cup of coffee.

Old heating systems require parts no one manufactures anymore. They require emergency callout fees and solemn conversations in basements. They require a repair person to come and make things better. I bet it’ll cost me four figures. At least. Possibly five if the entire system needs replacing.

Sick to my stomach, I walk back into the kitchen and look at the spreadsheet I felt so proud of less than five minutes ago. The city payment tracker is still open. The money allocated for the next installment is there, but it belongs to the city. Subscription revenue has already been divided between inventory, packaging, shipping, and the payment after that. My remaining cushion is thin enough without an emergency repair taking a bite out of it.

If I move this month’s inventory payment⁠—

No. I need the inventory for the holiday boxes.

I could delay the next packaging order, but only by a week. Maybe two.

The hiring money is already gone. There’s the credit card, but adding a heating repair to the balance would mean carrying even more debt into the holidays. I reopen Liam’s forecast. One new expense. That’s all it takes to make every carefully balanced number slide out of place.

My chest tightens.

“No,” I say aloud. “We are not panicking. We do not know that the entire boiler is dead. We do not know that this will cost thousands of dollars.”

I pick up my phone and search for emergency heating repairs in Alexandria. Several companies appear. Most advertise twenty-four-hour service, which I suspect means they’ll answer the phone at any hour before charging me enough to regret all my life choices.

I choose one and start to tap the phone icon, but my thumb opens my messages instead. Liam’s name sits near the top.

Before I consciously decide what I’m doing, I tap our conversation and begin typing.

This may be a strange question, but do you either have a repairman or know anything about old boilers? Mine made a horrible banging noise, the radiators are cold, and now one of them is⁠—

What am I doing? I’m supposed to call the repair company, yet instead I’m texting Liam. I look at the unfinished message, choosing to finish it.

—leaking. Is that very bad?

I press send.

Forty minutes later, Liam sits back on his heels in my basement and watches the boiler come to life. A low hum moves through the old machine. Pipes click overhead, followed by the unmistakable sound of water moving through them.

I stare at him from where I’m standing on the bottom step. “Is that good?”

“That’s heat.”

“Oh.” I sigh happily, coming close to swooning. “And it is a beautiful sound.”