When I shoved up the door of the storage unit, I wanted to kill my mom for the tenth time since I got back. The unit was big, my stuff was piled in the middle with ample room left over. She was wasting money on this. Wasting it. My stuff could have been in my house. Guarded over by my guard. Watched over by my housemates, Zach and Emma.

The boxes were unlabeled. I pulled one toward me and looked inside. A spatula, a pile of silverware, a bowl with potpourri, plus a few items from my dresser, plus a pair of shoes and a bottle of shampoo.

I clenched my fists and screamed at the ceiling. Then I let forth a barrage of profanity, that went from simple to completely off the rails, “Fucking waste of money, stupidest thing I ever saw. Who the hell did she hire to pack my shit, has that person never seen a freaking sharpie pen? Ever? How hard is it to write a label on the outside of the box? It’s like the one rule of boxing stuff. Look at this freaking box — it has a spot for writing the contents. It says ‘contents.’ There’s no way to ignore its intent, it’s a motherfucking rule.”

I shoved that box closed and ripped open another one. “Jesus Christ, it’s a goddam travesty. I’m off fighting an evil overlord in the 18th century and my spices are thrown in with my hand towels. Not kitchen towels, freaking hand towels. Oh wait, what the hell is this?” I pulled up a candle stick. “Oh my god. A candlestick. With spices and hand towels. What the fuck were the packers doing, grabbing one thing from each room?”

And then I yelled again, “Arrrrghhhh!” as loud as I could. “It was my house. My stuff. My family. My husband—” and then I sat in the middle of a storage unit in Florida and cried. My tears surpassed the travesty of poorly packed boxes and grief about my poorly planned life — where was Magnus? Was he alive?

I hadn’t allowed myself to really think yet. I had been trying to piece together my life, I hadn’t faced the reality — my husband might not have made it.

He might have thrown his life away to save mine.

I had watched a lot of movies in my day and the guy that stays behind so the others can flee? He was sacrificing himself.

And how was I to deal with that without knowing? Just waiting? Would it be easier to tell myself he was gone forever? Would anything ever be easy again?

No, never.

Because I was a widow. By marrying someone from another century I had become a widow as soon as I spoke the vows. It was clear. Every moment with him was borrowed time, he was right about that. Had been right about that.

Whenever I closed my eyes I saw him fighting, bellowing, roaring in rage trying to kill his captors — he couldn’t live through that.

And I couldn’t live with the memory.

I needed to change it, to try to replace it with a better one.

His lips on my shoulder. “You are a surprise Madame Campbell.”

Or his wrist tied to mine, his hands shaking, his voice rumbling above my bowed head, “I take thee Kaitlyn Sheffield. . . ”

Or his chest, the feel of it under my palms telling me that his feelings for me — that I was a brutal love.

He had loved me so much and he had shown me. I might have been the luckiest person in the world for that. In all of time.

I wiped the tears from my eyes. Becoming a widow without knowing what became of your husband would be desperately hard.

It would require a list. I dug through my bag for a pen and wrote on the closest box:

One, accept the truth.

Two, pull on your big girl panties.

Three, act like a grown up.

Four, take care of the people around you.

Five, always check the sky.

I looked at the list for a few moments and then wrote:

Six, if you’re checking the sky, go back through the list again.

I spent the next hour digging through the pile attempting to find enough of my things to be comfortable tonight alone in my house. I narrowed it down to three of the top boxes and stuffed them in the trunk of my Mustang. At the grocery store I bought three tubs of ice cream, two of my favorite flavors, plus a vanilla just to have, like a memorial ice cream.

I cried a bit in the freezer section of the grocery store.

Then, because I didn’t have the right kitchen stuff, I went through the McDonald’s drive-thru for dinner.