Through

The council painted the arrows while Mara was at work.

They came through the front door, went down the hall, turned left at the refrigerator and left by the back gate. Each arrow was pale green and about the length of a shoe. The one beside the refrigerator had a thumbprint in it.

An envelope on the table explained that the passage would save six minutes between Bell Street and the station. There had been a consultation. Mara remembered the envelope for that, too. She had used it to write down the measurements for a replacement oven.

The route opened on Monday.

The first person was a man in a red waterproof. He knocked on the open door.

“Is this all right?”

“Apparently.”

He wiped his feet so thoroughly that she said he needn't bother. He looked at the arrows, thanked her and went through. For several minutes she felt better.

By eight, people were entering as others left. A boy carrying a cello had to turn sideways at the kitchen door. The red waterproof came through again at five past eight, moving against the flow. He had forgotten something.

Mara put her toast on top of the refrigerator, where it was out of reach of bags. She could see it there from the stairs.

On Tuesday she brought her chair back from the sitting room.

The morning inspector measured the space between its back legs and the cooker. He asked if she could move it eighteen inches.

“That's where I sit.”

He offered to hold the tape while she tried.

The new position was quite comfortable. From it she couldn't open the oven, but the inspector pointed out that she wouldn't need to do both things at once. He took a photograph without her in it.

People were mostly considerate. A woman caught a glass before it fell off the draining board. Somebody brought Mara a packet of felt pads for the gate. The cello boy began lifting his case over the fruit bowl without being asked. Once, when Mara was upstairs, a stranger answered her telephone and came to the bottom of the stairs to call her.

“It's your sister.”

“I know.”

“She says she'll ring later.”

By Friday Mara knew when to carry a full pan across the kitchen. She would stand with it against her stomach, watching the front doorway through the hall. A person going towards the station meant there might be another close behind. A person coming from it meant a train had arrived. It was best to wait until the gate stopped moving.

On Saturday she found the man in the red waterproof outside a supermarket, collecting signatures to keep the route open.

“It's only a trial,” he said. “We have to show people are using it.”

She told him where she lived.

“Of course. The kitchen.” He took his pen back. “You've been very good about all this.”

She stood beside him while he explained to a couple how much easier it had made his mornings. He could catch the later train now. He could take his daughter to school. The couple signed.

On Sunday Mara bought a little trolley for carrying pans. It had two shelves and wheels that swivelled. She tried it empty before dinner, then with a pan of cold water. It crossed the green line easily. One wheel caught on the uneven tile beside the sink, but she learned to lift that corner.

On Monday the inspector returned with a counter. He clipped it to the gate and showed her how it worked: a number appeared each time someone passed.

“It doesn't know which direction,” he said. “We divide by two.”

At lunchtime she went out for milk. Coming back along Bell Street, she fell into step behind a woman with a folding bicycle. The woman held Mara's front door for her. Mara thanked her.

There was a queue at the kitchen door. Someone had left a small trolley across the passage. A man went ahead and moved it, and they started forward again. Mara followed the bicycle past the cooker, through the back door and out of the gate.

She stood in the lane with the milk. The latch clicked shut behind her. From this side she could see the counter through the bars. It had counted her.