only held by gravity, faded with uncertainty, no longer young and not that pretty

[forthsofar]

The plan had always been for all of them to stay the night at Nick's, movies and dinner and all of them either piling close or pairing off, then spending the next day together at least through the afternoon. It made it easier, once the three of them realized how very wrong everything had gone, for Rosie to avoid even the thought of telling anyone else. Of telling Neil.

He didn't need to know. Didn't need to hear it from a text message or over the phone, especially not all these months after his own pair of losses, and even less time since the agony of that bizarre videotape they'd watched together. And if Caleb had stayed, they both needed her sadness even less, something crashing in over all that happiness. It was better, easier, to leave her phone in her bag; to cling to Charlie and Sabrina, all three of them huddled close in Nick's bed, at Nick's apartment--and was any of it even Nick's any longer? She didn't know--none of them sleeping very much as the night went on. They stayed together through the next day, until Sabrina decided to go home to Marcus and Dan, to start the process of sharing their loss with the other people who matter. Charlie drives her back, then drops Rosie outside Candlewood, helping her unload the few things she claimed from Nick's apartment from the trunk.

It's nothing special, just the gift she'd bought him for Christmas and a few of his shirts and sweaters. She doesn't think about how small a remembrance it seems, taken all together.

Unlocking the door, she nudges it open with her foot, then kicks it closed once she's inside. It makes a louder sound than she'd anticipated in the closing, and she winces, aware it's going to pull Neil's attention if he's even here at all.

"Sorry," she calls, her voice sounding awfully small in just that single word.

Comments

[shadows_have_offended]

Neil is, in fact, around. He'd been in and out, busy, over the past few days, and between Rosie's job and her own consistent and constant in and out, her not having been there when he'd been between work and seeing Caleb before his last overnight hadn't been too strange.

But the door slamming is hard enough to skip the record he's just put on, something bright and lively to keep his good mood going after finally getting home from Caleb's. Beau looks up from the floor, whines softly, as receptive to Rosie's upset as he ever has been to Neil's.

"Hey," he says as the music goes back to playing with a momentary wobble.