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“After you, White Knight.”
We go inside, and after two hours of trying to understand the instruction pamphlet and watching YouTube videos of other people putting a similar desk together, I finally get the whole thing assembled and positioned how she wants it.We move to the kitchen where she’s got something cooking in the slow cooker.She grabs us each a beer, then she leans back against the counter while I sit at the table and we drink in silence.
Her eyes scan the room, and she looks lost in thought as she takes another sip of her beer.Then she surprises me.
“I think I need to move,” she says, her voice whisper soft like she’s choking out a truth.
“Why?”
She takes another sip of her beer, her gaze carefully cataloging her surroundings before it lands on me.“I can’t be here anymore without him.It’s too hard.His memory is…everywhere.”She looks down at the ground.“I feel like I’m stuck.I can’t bring him back and have our life together, but I can’t move forward either.I’m stuck in limbo surrounded by the life we were building and all his things.”
She nibbles her lip and does another sweep of the room, and I understand now.She’s trying to figure out if she can let this go, if she can lethimgo.
“I know I should’ve gone through his stuff months ago.My mom’s been offering to help me since he died, but I couldn’t do it.”
She looks at me, and the pain in her eyes makes my gut clench.I would giveanythingto take her pain away if only I could.Unable to stay away any longer, I stand, and in three steps I reach her and wrap her in my arms.She crumples against me, her arms wrapping around my waist, her fingers gripping my shirt and her face buried in my chest.
Nothing has ever felt more perfect than having her in my arms.My eyes close in bliss, even if I know this hug can never mean anything more than one friend comforting another.But for one minute, I can pretend.
I can pretend she feels something for me.
I can pretend she’s mine.
All too soon she breaks our embrace, wiping a stray tear off her cheek.
“I’ll help you go through his things, if you want.”
She looks up at me like I just answered a prayer.“You’d do that?”
“Yeah.It’s no big deal.”
She squeezes my arm.“It’s a very big deal.You already do so much for me, Tristan.I seriously don’t know how I would’ve gotten through the last eleven months without you.”
I don’t know what to say, so instead I don’t say anything.She gives me another small smile and then asks me to stay for dinner.Over our stew, we make a plan for going through Robbie’s things, and the whole time, all I can think about is how much I wish I could eat dinner with her every night.
