Page 10 of Ladybirds

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone,” Sara assures her, giving her another squeeze before letting go. Aside from Oma, Jen has the kindest heart she’s ever met—naturally empathetic in ways that Sara (admittedly) has to work for.

She wipes her eyes with the heel of her hand, not bothering to be discreet. “I promise, if I need anything, you’ll be the first to know. Ok?”

Jen nods. “Deal.” She looks around at all the remaining boxes. “Do you want to finish? We could just binge on some Netflix on your laptop? We could even watch that one you keep bugging me about. That ghost one.”

The fact that Jen, who absolutely hates anything remotely scary, is offering to binge a series about a haunted house is more telling than it should be. “Jen, I’m fine. Honestly.”

“It’s just, with you and—” She almost says his name—Sara can see it, the vowels flirting around her lips—before she catches herself. “And, well, this.” She gestures to the apartment. The one they both know she was supposed to be sharing. “I just, I know I would feel really sad spending the first night alone.”

Honestly, the aspect of what would come after Jen left hadn’t even occurred to her. For the past two weeks, her life has been an impossible blur of planning and packing. She hasn’t had the chance to stop and think about what her life would look like after the list of to-do’s were done. Hasn’t thought of the silence, or the loneliness, that would fill the voids that David left behind.

Sara looks around the apartment, at the barren walls and stacked boxes, and feels her stomach sour. It’s not home—not yet. Maybe in a week or two, when her life isn’t hidden behind cardboard, she will be able to call the little one-bedroom apartment hers, and it will ring more true than hollow. Maybe then, the emptiness of it will be more comfortable than lonely.

“Actually,” she says, fingers rubbing circles over the ceramic mug in her hands. “Let’s do it. It’s been a while since we were able to have a girls’ night, anyway.”

They unpack for another hour and a half before binge watching four episodes. Sara’s mattress is on the floor, bare except for the two pillows and two of the crocheted blankets Oma sent with her back when she started her freshman year at college. She doesn’t have a bed frame (or a table, or nightstands, or any other furniture other than the old wingback chair Oma donated from her living room) but, for now, they balance her laptop on a stack of old textbooks and it all works out. And even though Jen jumps at every little sound the entire night, Sara’s glad she stayed.

CHAPTER SIX

Sara stares at the remaining boxes in her living room, a mug of chai tea cradled in her hands. Her finger taps against the ceramic, a rhythmic reminder of each second she wastes procrastinating instead of just getting started already. It’s already past noon, the tea in her hands is the third that morning and already more warm than hot.

She takes another sip; breathes a promise against the rim. The boxes can wait a few more minutes, but her tea is cooling (and she’d hate to waste it).

Leaning against the kitchen counter, she tries to imagine how different it will look—how it will feel—once her treasures fill the space. She’s glad Jen stayed long enough that morning to at least get her room looking in order. The bed’s still on the floor, but at least there’s sheets and a quilt tucked around the mattress, Oma’s crocheted blankets folded neatly at the foot. In the closet, her clothes hang neatly from their bargain store hangers; the pine dresser she (permanently) borrowed from her childhood bedroom is lined with everything else. They even reused one of the plastic milk crates she used to pack clothes as a makeshift nightstand.

It’s not much, but it’s hers. Somehow that brings equal amounts of pain and pleasure. Mine, her heart whispers, one traitorous second before reminding her, but it was supposed to be theirs.

Sara flinches, forcing a shaky sigh from her lungs. It would be easy to crawl into bed, to throw the covers over her head and spend the rest of the day letting out all the tears she’s been holding back, but she won’t. She can’t. If she falls apart now, she’s not sure how long it will take to piece herself back together. Her life is strewn across the living room, unlabeled boxes staring up at her like headstones—the items inside begging to be brought back out into the light. If she doesn’t do it now, before classes start, Sara knows it will take her five times longer to get it all sorted.

Movement from the living room catches her eye—Ansel sniffs one of the boxes cautiously, his lithe body taunt and his ears pinned back. He’s been weaving through the mess like it’s his own personal labyrinth, exploring between the niches and scaling up the sides. Last night, she overheard him knock something over, but still hasn’t been able to figure out what. She takes some comfort in the fact that the sound was more of a thud than a shatter.

He gives a trilling mewl, jumping up onto a stack of boxes, tail swishing. Sara smiles, pushing herself off the counter to close the distance between them. “Enjoy it while it lasts, buddy,” she says, scratching under his chin. “We need to get through at least half of these today, so no dilly dallying, alright?”

Ansel answers with a purr, his back arching as he pushes his head more firmly into her hand. Sara laughs under her breath. Living here won’t be what she imagined when she signed for the apartment three months ago, but at least she won’t be alone. She should text a picture of the both of them to Oma; it would make her smile. Sara owes her that and more.

She pivots, intending to grab her phone, but freezes mid-turn.

There’s a man in her apartment.

A shadow of pale skin and charcoal finery. Hands in his jacket pockets, his eyes survey the mess with a casual grace that is in direct opposition of the terror seizing her heart. “My, quite a bit of work to do, hm?”

Sara can barely hear him over the drumming pulse in her ears, numb panic twisting into fear. Her eyes dart, searching for something to defend herself with, but she has nothing. Anything she could possibly use as a weapon—her kitchen knives, the expired pepper spray she never managed to shove back in her purse—all of it is still packed away in the sea of boxes littering her living room. The only thing in reach is the mug in her hand and, in a panic, she throws it at him—tea and all.

He dodges it easily; liquid splattering on the floor and the ceramic shattering against the kitchen cabinets—pieces raining down like sharp-edged confetti.

Frowning, he pins her with a reproachful glare. “Honestly, I grant you a miracle and your response is to attack me with stale tea?” He tsks. “Incredibly rude, even for an American.”

In her chest, Sara feels her heart skip a beat as realization dawns. “You—you’re that guy!” She had written him off as a bad dream—a figment of a man born from exhaustion and gut-wrenching worry in her darkest of moments. To see him, standing in her kitchen, is almost as horrifying as the realization that she hadn’t just imagined him.

“That guy?” he echoes, voice flirting the line between amused and offended. “Of all the ungrateful—”

“Have you been stalking me?!” Her gaze flits over the room, but there’s no open windows, and she knows she locked the front door after Jen left. “How did you get in here?”

His lips tilt, a shadow of laughter dancing across his eyes. “Stalking? My, someone thinks highly of themselves, but no. I said I would leave you be for a time, and I was nothing if not true to my word. As for getting in,” he waves a flippant hand, “I wished it, so it was.”

“What does that even—”

“You’re welcome,” he cuts in, fingers curled under his chin, “by the way. Since you seem to have forgotten yourself in all this excitement, I will assume your gratitude is implied. But, please, feel free to thank me. I do love validation.”

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