Page 38 of Tusks And Conditions

"Open the closet."

I reach for the closet door. Slide it open.

Her clothes hang on the left side. Organized by color, then by garment type, then by season. Blouses give way to blazers give way to exactly three cardigans in varying shades of oatmeal. Everything faces the same direction on matching wooden hangers.

The right side is empty.

Not unused-empty. Prepared-empty. She cleared it out. Rearranged the shelf above to make room for something taller. A set of five heavy-duty wooden hangers hang at a wider spacing than hers, sized for broader shoulders. Below them, is a boot tray on the closet floor, large enough for my size fifteens.

"I measured your boots before you left," she says behind me. "The tray is custom. It took four days to arrive."

I cannot turn around. If I turn around she will see my face and my face is doing something I have not allowed it to do in over a decade.

"Check the bathroom."

I walk to the bathroom. My reflection stares back from the mirror above her sink, grey-skinned and silver-pierced and completely wrecked. On the left side of the vanity: her toothbrush, her face wash, her lavender soap in a ceramic dispenser. On the right side: a new toothbrush in black packaging. A bar of unscented soap. A hand towel in dark charcoal hung on a separate hook, positioned at my height.

Below the sink, the cabinet door is slightly ajar. I crouch. Inside, next to her neatly organized toiletries, she has stacked a basic first-aid kit with supplies scaled for someone my size. Large-gauge bandages. Industrial antiseptic. Butterfly closures wide enough for Orc skin.

"You get hurt constantly. Your previous medical strategy appeared to be 'ignore it and bleed on things,' which is neither sustainable nor hygienic."

I stand. My knees crack. The bathroom is too small for me. Everything in this apartment is too small for me, and she rearranged every square inch of it to make room anyway.

I turn around.

She stands in the doorway with her arms crossed so tight her knuckles press white against her sleeves. Her eyes are red-rimmed but dry. She is not crying. Sabine Lin does not cry. She reorganizes.

"You said you wanted to earn the right to sit at my table. I am saying I already set you a place."

My arms glow. Not amber. Not the warning color. Something warmer. Something I have never seen them do before, a deep, steady gold that pulses in time with my heartbeat.

"You bought me a toothbrush."

"It's a basic household item. Don't read into it."

"You measured my boots."

"Spatial planning requires accurate dimensions. That's just math."

"Sabine."

"What."

I cross the distance in two steps. The bathroom doorway groans as my shoulders fill it. She tilts her head back to look up at me, and the angle is steep because the difference between us is absurd, and her jaw is set but her pulse hammers visible at her throat.

"You kept my shirt."

The fracture splits wide open. Her lip trembles once. She catches it between her teeth and kills it.

"It was already laundered. It seemed wasteful to throw away a perfectly good⁠—"

I cradle her face in both hands. My palms span from her jaw to her temples. She is so small. She is so impossibly, terrifyingly small, and she bought heavy-duty hangers and a custom boot tray and a first-aid kit built for a monster.

Her hands uncross and land flat against me, fingers spread wide. Not pushing. Pressing. Feeling the heartbeat that matches the gold light crawling up my arms.

"Don't leave again," she whispers.

"No."