Ebba digs right in, though, picking up a box and setting it outside of the unit. She probably has the right idea—just get it out of the way.
The temperature is quickly rising, and it isn’t long before sweat tickles the back of my neck. Ebba shows no sign of pain, but I make a mental note to make sure she takes some Advil to get ahead of it. I’m sure she doesn’t need me micromanaging her, but I can’t help it. Taking care of Ebba is something Iwantto do.
Finally, we get the couch and area around it cleared of items and I can pick up one end and pull it out. It is outrageously heavy; she wasn’t lying about that.
“Don’t hurt yourself.”
My chest puffs at the worry in her voice. “Careful,” I tease, starting up the ramp with the couch. Luckily the legs are covered with something soft enough that they slide easily up the ramp. “I might start thinking you care about me.”
She rolls her eyes.
“Do you see anything else you want to take?” I ask with a grunt when the couch gets stuck between the ramp and actually making it onto the truck.
“I didn’t even want to take this.” Her tone is light and teasing and I wish I could see her face, but my vision is obscured by the large couch.
“Just look,” I plead.
“Fine.”
Her footsteps fade away. With one more grunt I manage to get the couch onto the truck.
We’re definitely calling in reinforcements to get this thing into her condo. There’s no way I’m getting it in by myself.
Pushing the couch against the wall of the truck, I give myself a minute to catch my breath before I join Ebba. The second I step off the truck, though, I know something is wrong.
Despite the sound of birds chirping and traffic speeding by on the nearby road it feels entirely silent—the kind of quiet that only comes when your body sinks into fight or flight mode.
I look around, worried a man has approached Ebba and grabbed her, but I find her standing stock-still inside the storage unit staring at … a box?
My steps quickly eat up the distance between us. “Ebba? What’s wrong?”
My answer comes the second I look at the box and the illustration on the cardboard.
A crib.
It’s a fucking crib.
“Ebba, I…”
“I’m getting in the truck,” she says in a whisper. “There’s nothing I want here.”
I regret pushing about the couch now.
“Okay. I’ll put this stuff away and we’ll leave.”
She moves away from me, her eyes downcast.
Blowing out a breath, I drop my head back. I’ve fucked up already with her, without even meaning to.
CHAPTER 23
EBBA
I can’t believeI forgot about the crib.
It was something I ordered soon after I found out I was pregnant. Almost immediately I had begun imagining and designing a nursery. I’d seen the crib online one night and hit order without a second thought. It had been waiting for me when I got home to Miami but by then I was no longer pregnant, and Fisher and I had broken up. In a fit of emotional rage I’d packed up anything that reminded me of him, which as it turns out, was everything.
The chipped yellow mug with suns doodled all over it that was his preferred mug to drink his coffee out of. The dishtowel with little dogs wearing birthday hats that he would toss over his shoulder while cooking. The coffee table he liked to rest his feet on. The blanket he always covered up with.