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“Everything okay?” I ask with a raised brow.
She wraps her arms around herself with a small shrug. “Yeah, why?”
I gesture to the empty space. “It’s obvious that you haven’t spent much money. You still don’t have furniture or anything.” I study her expression to see if I can pick something up. “Why haven’t you started creating this new life you kept saying you were after? Isn’t this what you wanted?”
“I thought it was,” she mumbles, her cheeks turning a shade of pink. “It doesn’t feel right to spend it.”
“Why not? It’s yours. You earned it.”
“Yeah, by doing something that isn’t me.” She runs a hand through her colored hair and shakes her head. “It doesn’t feel right anymore. Other than buying food, I haven’t spent anything. I can’t.”
“You know that’s not practical, Cleo.” I close the space between us and rub her shoulders. “You know we don’t think any less of you, right?”
“Speak for yourself. Tristan may feel differently,” she scoffs.
“I’m sure he feels the same way. You earned your money and went through a lot to get it. You should enjoy the money.”
“I don’t know.” Her shoulders sag a little. “I’ve been looking for a new job as well, but haven’t had much luck either.”
“It’s not like you have to rush. You have nearly half a million dollars,” I tease, but she doesn’t smile. I sigh inwardly and look around the living room, noticing the makeshift pallet on the floor that she’s been sleeping on. “Let’s go shopping for some furniture. I know this place is nice, but you shouldn’t be sleeping on the floor.”
“I’m fine sleeping on the floor.”
“When you start working, are you going to want to come home after a hard day and lie on an equally hard floor?” I ask with a raised brow. “Besides, it may help you feel better to seethat your hard work and sacrifice is actually paying off in ways you can enjoy.”
She nibbles on the inside of her cheek as if she is fighting with herself about what she should do. After a while, she gives me a small smile and a nod. “Yeah, okay,” she agrees. “Let’s go shopping.”
I take her to a local furniture store owned by a friend of ours and watch with a grin on my lips as she flops around on different mattresses. The child-like wonder on her face as she experiences different types of mattresses without worrying about the cost reminds me so much of how she was when she was younger. She was always so easy to please. Tristan and I sometimes used to get jealous because of how happy she’d be with the simplest things, something our parents used to comment about all the time. So far, she’s only shopping for a bed, but you’d think she’d just won the lottery and could buy the whole store if she wanted to.
“I think this is the one,” she says in a dreamy voice, her eyes closed as I approach her.
“How does it feel?” I ask as I press a hand against the mattress.
“Like a cloud,” she murmurs. “The softest cloud in existence.”
I chuckle. “You can’t go to sleep just yet. We have to buy it and get it delivered so you can permanently sleep on it.”
“Oh right, right,” she says and pushes herself up to a sitting position.
“You kids finding everything okay?” Jerry asks when he comes to a stop next to us.
“I want this one,” Cleo says as she gets off the bed. “How soon can it be delivered?”
“We can have it loaded up and to your home in less than two hours, young lady.” He looks at me. “That good with you?”
“If she’s okay with it, I’m fine with it.”
Cleo pays for the bed and the staff gets to work to prepare it for delivery. She looks up at me with a thoughtful look on her face. “We should probably go somewhere and get some sheets and stuff. And probably pillows as well, since the ones I have are kind of flimsy.”
“We can do that,” I tell her.
We leave the furniture store and stop at a nearby Target to get a few more things she’ll need. She grabs pillows, bed linen, towels, and cute things she finds on a clearance rack before we finally check out. It feels good to see her happy. These last couple of weeks have been hard for her, where I’ve only witnessed her sadness and despair. But right now, she looks…free. Content. I don’t know how long it’ll last, but I’ll revel in it for as long as she allows me to.
Thankfully, the bed arrives at the apartment at the same time we do. Cleo can barely stop bouncing around as they set everything up, probably anxious to faceplant into a brand new bed that’s all hers. She ended up getting the entire bedroom set that came with the bed frame and once everything is set up, her bedroom looks ready for her to relax in. I thank the delivery drivers and tip them before joining Cleo in the bedroom. She stands there with tears in her eyes.
“I can’t believe this is mine,” she murmurs before I can say anything. I put my hands in my pockets without a word, wanting her to have her moment. She runs her fingertips along the bare mattress as if she’s trying to convince herself that it’s real, that it’s hers.
“Yep. All of this is yours.” I give her shoulders a light squeeze. “You deserve this.”
