Promise Me Sunshine

by Cara Bastone

But the thing about losing the person you love the most on earth is—somehow—you still have to do mundane things like tie your shoes and make enough money to continue to exist in this punishing world.

I don’t usually enjoy babysitting with an audience, but he is my future husband after all, as prickly as he may be.

The next day is here but I haven’t done anything to say farewell to the last one. Time dogpiles me and I marvel at the fact that anyone, ever, has the strength to get up off the floor.

He’s wearing his new reading glasses, and I almost reflexively slap them off his face. He’s not supposed to be hot. That’s not part of our deal.

“She knew, Miles,” I say when I come up for air. “She knew that there isn’t actually a checklist for learning to live again. She knew that some days you do it and some days you don’t.”