The morning after next, Emily showed up at my door bright and early to walk me to her shop. I had spent the last day at home riddled with excitement about my first commission trying to calm myself down by cleaning around the house only to fall asleep early that night. Even in my past life, I can remember that I was the kind of person to get caught up in excitement and exhaust myself. After hearing the knock on the door, I quickly make my way to the door and rush opening it making Emily jump backwards startled.

 

“Morning Lilly! Looks like someone’s eager to go to work.”

 

“More like I couldn’t relax yesterday and I’m a bundle of excitement and anxiety right now. It’s my first commission so I want to do my best,” I said rocking back and forth on my crutch.

 

“Okay, okay...Let’s get a move on then. Remember Harold said there was no rush on it, so take your time.”

 

I nodded my head and we made our way to the shop.

 

---

 

Once we made it to the shop, I quickly made my way back to the workshop room and the workbench with the broken door opener sitting in a box. I removed all the parts from the box and laid them out on the bench to examine them.

 

After a cursory look, I could tell that the opener had seen plenty of use. Discoloration and scratches by the hinges and mounts. From just looking at it, I could make out where the main issue was as the elbow joint had been sheared in half, with the bolt stripped and force crystal cracked...I was probably going to have to replace most of the main arm and reconnect the crystal connection. The rest of the parts seemed to be okay overall and just needed a little love...looks like today was going to be a long day. 

 

From the workbench, I heard Emily saying goodbye to a customer leaving the shop. I figured it was a good time to call her back to talk.

 

“Emily!,” I yelled. “Can you swing back here when you get a chance?”

 

“Sure, give me just a second to put away a couple things,” she called back from the front and after a few moments made her way back to the bench I was sitting on. She looked down at the opener I had laid out on the bench and gave a little sigh. 

 

“I guess that has seen better days. It takes quite a bit of force to crack a crystal.”

“Yea, that’s actually why I called you back. I’m gonna need a few things if I’m gonna fix this so it’ll probably take a couple work days for me to get it done. For now, I guess I’m gonna spend time removing the broken parts and grinding the new joints. Do you think you can help me grab a few things to get started? I’m gonna need two pieces of alloy each about the size of half of the elbow.”

 

“Not a problem, I’ll grab them from the parts shelf. Anything else?”

 

“I’ll also need a new force crystal and bolts eventually, but let’s hold off until I get the main body rebuilt.”

 

“Sounds good, give me a yell and I’ll be back here to grab anything else you might need. Also, you will be eating lunch with me...no if, ands, or buts. I’m not about to have you forget our lunch time together just because you are caught up in work.”

 

“Mmmm...fine,” I mumbled. She could probably tell from the last few weeks together when I get busy I forget about things like eating as she has had to pull me away from my studies pretty often.

 

With that Emily grabbed the parts from the shelf and set them on the table for me.

 

---

 

The next week passed by in a blur. I spent hours filing down the new joints, getting the fitting to lined up, and replacing the crystal circuit. This might sound crazy coming from a person with only one arm, and yea it took more time than normal. It turns out vices and clamps are a girl's best friend when it comes to keeping things from moving. Also, having Emily nearby helped a bunch as she could help me hold and grab things from the back room when she wasn’t busy at the front. Even though she wasn’t able to manipulate aether like I could, she still knew her way around tools which helped me out.

 

That brings us to the afternoon of my third working day where we are boxing up the finished opener for delivery. Emily went ahead that morning to talk with the restaurant owner about the finished commission. He requested to have one of his employees deliver it to his restaurant that evening and we could stop by the next working afternoon to install it after the lunch rush was over.

 

“Almost done,’ I said sighing in the workbench chair after the restaurant employee picked up the opener. “Now just the final install and last checks.”

 

“Still, that was a lot of work but you got it done. Good job and here,” Emily said, handing me a cup of freshly brewed tea.  “Also, don’t make any plans for the evening of the install. The owner mentioned to me he’d like to treat us to dinner that night as a thanks for the quickness. I tried to talk him out of it, but he was adamant.”

 

“Do you think it’s okay for someone like me to be there? I mean the restaurant is in the upper district so I wouldn’t think someone like me would be allowed.” 

 

“I kinda also mentioned something similar about both of us since we aren’t nobles or rich merchants. He chuckled at that and said it was fine. Apparently he and my grandfather became quite good friends over time, so he was excited to have me eat at his restaurant for old times sake. He even reserved us a table a bit away from the other patrons so we would be more comfortable.”

 

“Oh wow, I guess your grandfather really knew a bunch of people.” 

 

“Yea, I keep meeting more and more lately. Word has been spreading about us starting to take commissions again so some former customers have been dropping in to check our availability. I have to tell them, we are still working on a bit of a trial basis and want to see how our first order goes before taking on more. It looks like if this goes well, we’ll become very busy.”

 

“I’m not unhappy about that,” I said. “I’d rather be busy and useful. I was kinda getting a bit bummed being just a portable crystal charger. This commission has made me feel much more confident in myself, so I’m kinda excited for more.”

 

Emily moved up and started hugging me. 

 

“You were never just a portable charger to me, but I can see where you are coming from,” she said. “You also seemed so much happier this week working and I had a blast working with you, partner in crime.”

 

This made me blush a bit as I remembered how everything started.

 

“Well then, let’s keep it going partner,” I said giggling.