car door open for me, shielding me in a way from the open road as I stepped out onto the asphalt, shouldering both my purse and my briefcase with my laptop, etc.
“You’re early,” I murmured, and he smiled, closing my door behind me as I chirped the alarm.
“If you’re early you’re on time, if you’re on time, you’re late,” he declared, and I smiled slightly and nodded.
“I’m the same way.”
I led the way up the walk to my mother’s front door and unlocked it, stepping in and clearing out of his way so he could come through.
“Hungry?” he asked.
“Starving, actually,” I replied, and he didn’t miss a beat, just went into the kitchen and looking at the oven for a moment, turned the appropriate dial.
Meanwhile, I set down my things on one end of the couch and sighed, once again overwhelmed by the sheer number of boxes and the absolute disarray everything was in. I had no idea how I was supposed to whittle through all of it even with his help. I wasn’t even sure what he was supposed to do by way of help. I mean, this was really all on me.
“You okay?” he asked as I surveyed the room and I shook my head.
“I don’t know how I’m supposed to do it all,” I answered.
He came around and picked up a box, handing it to me. I took it and blinked up at him a little shocky. I think and he gave me a sardonic little half-smile, so gentle there was no sting to it when he said, “One box at a time, starting with this one. You got a roll of trash bags right there. You don’t want it, fill one up and I’ll take it out to the truck. You finish going through this box? I’ll bring you another. Steady as she goes.”
I nodded and went over to the recliner and sank into it, the box in my lap, letting out a shaky breath as he unrolled a trash bag off of the roll and opened it up.
One box at a time, starting with this one, I thought to myself.
I opened the top, took a deep breath and woodenly started to sort. Meanwhile, Fenris moved around the living room and kitchen quietly, putting the pizza in the oven, starting a timer, answering texts and surfing the internet on his phone, just being a presence while I worked.
When I had sorted through the first box and set it aside with just a few items I wanted to keep inside of it, the trash bag holding the rest, he brought me another.
“Oh…” I murmured when I opened it up to my wedding album on the top.
“Wanna set it aside and burn it later?” he asked, and I wrinkled my brow.
“I-I mean, I don’t know the answer to that,” I said overwhelmed. “You don’t think it’s childish? I mean, what if I want those memories later?”
“Why?” he asked.
“Why would I want them?”
“Yeah. I mean, look how it ended.”
“I mean, I definitely know how it ended, but it wasn’t all bad.”
“The look on your face says otherwise, baby,” he said so softly, so sympathetically, I looked up sharply.
I met his blue eyes, and he smiled at me, the gesture forced and the tightness around his eyes belying his anger. Not at me, but for me. I couldn’t ever remember a time that happened. That anyone got so righteously angry on my behalf. It was a little strange but a relief at the same time, you know?
That expression of his lent more to strengthening my resolve to get through this than I had to date.
I looked down at my wedding album, at my happy, smiling, unassuming face and back up to Fenris and held it out to him.
“I guess we need to start a burn pile.”
His smile was a proud one that made me melt just a bit and he said, “Atta girl!”
He started a burn pile and went to get the pizza out of the oven.
We sat and ate off paper towels, talking over some things that shifted from boxes to trash, boxes to other boxes to keep, and boxes to a neat little pile by the door to burn.
I mean, I could always change my mind later, but for now… it was cathartic in a sense. You know?
When a trash bag filled, or we ran across a box that needed to be completely tossed, he didn’t wait. There was no preamble. As soon as I declared it was