Well, that's a good attitude, if nothing else.

They get to the apartment building. "I don't have a key for you yet but there should be enough to eat even if you don't know how to cook ... I'll go grocery shopping later. What foods do you like?"

"I—don't know. I don't think I'm picky?" she says doubtfully.

"Well, I hope you like dry cereal, because I eat a lot of that."

She shows her around! There are three rooms: a kitchenette that opens into a windowed living area with a plush chair and a table set, a bedroom, and a bathroom. "I don't really have anywhere for you to sleep. I could maybe buy some blankets or quilts from someone if you don't like the chair?"

"It would be nice to sleep in, um, not a chair," she says. "But the chair is probably fine in a pinch."

Whoops, she should have offered to let the girl sleep in her bed. Or should she? Ugh, she's so bad at this. "I'm glad!"

More showing around produces locations for various foodstuffs, as well as instructions for how to work the stove and the names and locations of the aforementioned neighbors drawn on a bit of scrap newspaper.

Anne absorbs this information cheerfully. She has no complaints about anything and is determined to be as helpful a guest as possible under the circumstances.

After Rebecca's relayed all the emergency information -- this takes about an hour -- she grabs her briefcase and heads out to go back to work. She leaves the key in case Anne wants to talk to the neighbors.

She means to get organized and figure out what her goals are and exactly what her next steps should be—

—but instead she goes to the chair and curls up very small and cries for half an hour, because she's sixteen years old and all alone in an alien world with no means of getting home, lying to everyone she meets because she can't trust them to believe the truth.

Then she gets up and goes to the bathroom and washes her face and sits down with the newspapers to read about all the jobs she could potentially get. And the other things that appear in newspapers.

The front page is plastered with articles and op-eds about the Ishvalan ghetto in the city that's been forming after the civil war. There's a science section with a cute piece about automail limb replacements for animals. Another piece is about efforts to increase road coverage in rural areas. There are even a couple of engagement announcements.

No piece, article or editorial or advertisement, is ever critical of the military.

The classifieds are in the back. The ones Rebecca mentions are there, plus nanny, housecleaning, and repair jobs. (The last will apparently pay double for an alchemist.)

She definitely wants to learn alchemy, but until then, one of these other things will do. Computing, maybe housecleaning.

That lack of criticism of the military is an interesting omission. Puts her in mind of the history books about Kellen's War, how Armethalieh was so choked by censorship that they mistook good for evil and evil for good. Hopefully things aren't quite that bad in Amestris. Maybe their military is just that flawless. She doubts it, but stranger things have happened.

After organizing all the classified ads by how much she wants the job in question, she rereads the newspaper to familiarize herself with all the unfamiliar things in it, then opens the Book of Stars again, looking for a hint.

The greatest accomplishments often require the greatest sacrifices. A Wildmage must be sure to take only what is freely given.

...not very comforting, as hints go. Is it talking about her, and her journey here? Advising her that she might need to seek significant and possibly dangerous help? Warning her that there's someone around here who might sacrifice others for their own gain? Is it going to be like that line about the War Magic and only make sense once she has the context to understand it?

Well, sitting and waiting for Rebecca to come home isn't going to help her find out. She decides to try meeting the neighbours instead.

The Webers don't always have their door open but it's a very near thing, what with all the going in and out the kids do. There's one arguing with his sister in the doorway about who has to buy groceries.

(Presumably the Tuckers are to the other side of the apartment building, next to Rebecca's place.)

It's impractical to be shy. She should go introduce herself.

...but she is in fact shy.

The kids will continue to argue, oblivious to her shyness! Until their mother admonishes the volume of the arguing. They switch to furious whispering.

Yeah this is not working out for her. She retreats back into Rebecca's apartment.

She doesn't want to just hide uselessly in this chair and wait for Rebecca to come back. She wants to do something. But there's just - too much that's unfamiliar - maybe there's something around here she can clean, or something. That sounds preferable to curling up and crying again.

Rebecca sure hasn't washed her dishes in a while. There's a pile of them in the sink. Her bed isn't made. There's dust on the floor and on various surfaces, including the table on which the pile of newspapers sit. The bathroom is spotless.

Well. She's pretty sure she can manage the dishes. And the dust.

Before too long Rebecca's entire kitchen is spotless! If she decides to go back to her chair she can look over towards the next room and admire her handiwork.

Rebecca's still gone and won't be home for several hours.

Yeah.

Can she - no, she won't do any better than last time if she tries meeting the neighbours again right now. She sits in the chair again instead, frustrated by her limitations. It's probably unreasonable to expect herself to be able to power through every single obstacle in her path on force of will alone, but she still feels like shyness and uncertainty shouldn't be as big a problem as they are.

Does the Book of Stars have anything to say about this?

It is normally more useful to live in the world you see rather than the world you imagine.

Well, that's... less cryptic than usual. Okay. Regardless of how silly it is, she does have this problem, and resenting herself for it won't make it go away, and stubbornly trying to ignore it won't help her achieve her goals. So. It's not exactly optimally productive, but maybe for now she can skim through the Book of Sun and the Book of Moon to see how they're adapting themselves to the new context. The descriptions of ingredients and procedures for common spells in the Books are known to change depending on local conditions, but no one has ever written an edition of the Three Books for this locale.

It turns out they're managing the change pretty well. There are a few blank spaces in ritual descriptions or ingredient lists, which is unsettling. Maybe she's supposed to fill them in herself. Hopefully not through trial and error.

The minutes tick by. Literally -- Rebecca has an audible clock on the wall.

Eventually, the doorbell rings.

"It's me!"

Anne gets the door.

It's Rebecca! She grins, and holds up a book. "I got you this, there was a sale on my way home from work."

The title is Alchemical Basics. There's a bookmark in it that says "50 cenz" on the top.

She beams. "Thank you!"

"It was no problem, honestly, you only need to spend 100 cenz for a cup of coffee. And not even good Roman coffee."

"Well, it's useful and I like it, so thank you anyway!"