The tone was calm. Too calm. The kind that carried weight. The movers reacted instantly.
The man with the clipboard straightened, his easy drawl vanishing. “Sir—we’re just finishing up here?—”
“Stop,” Archie said.
Just thatoneword.
They did.
He stepped past me into my bedroom, taking in the bare walls, the empty floor, the scuffed rectangle where my bed had been. His jaw tightened as his eyes tracked the last box being lifted out.
“What company are you with?” Archie asked.
The man rattled it off immediately.
“Who authorized this move?”
Another beat of hesitation. “Ms. Curtis. The resident.”
Archie exhaled slowly through his nose. “And where are you taking her things?”
The clipboard shifted in the man’s hands. “To the new residence listed on the work order.”
“Which is?”
He glanced down. Read it. Then looked back up at Archie, something uneasy creeping into his expression. He glanced past him once to me, but the irritation he’d worn earlier was gone. Now he just looked uncomfortable.
When he recited the address, he framed it more like a question than a statement.
The world tilted.
My brain tried to reject the information outright, like it didn’t belong to me.
I blinked once.
Twice.
That was?—
I moved on unsteady legs until I was right next to Archie. Slowly, like if I hurried too fast this would all shatter. I stared up at him.
He was already staring at me, the same dumbfounded look stamped on his face.
“That’s…” I started, then stopped because my mouth had gone dry.
“My house,” Archie finished quietly.
The words didn’t land so much assink.
My new residence.
His house.
I looked back into my bedroom. Or what used to be my bedroom. The boxes were gone now. Everything gone. What was left was… nothing. The aftermath. A few stray scraps of paper near the baseboard. A black hair tie by the wall. Dust outlines. A faint tumble of gray and orange cat hair clinging stubbornly to the carpet where Tabby liked to sleep.
Litter.
Actual litter.
