Smile

This morning I opened the freezer door and finally decided I was never going to eat the bag of blueberries from the 2006 crop. I tugged the bag out from the back corner and deposited it in the trash with a heavy, frozen thud. Then I opened the refrigerator door and yanked out the chocolate cake that once had Good Luck Sarah! scrawled across the top in baby blue icing. My coworkers got it for me my last day of work, three weeks ago, and all that was left was a lonely Luck in the upper right-hand corner. I grunted as I put the cake on top of the trash and drug it to the door.

"What are you doing?"

I turned around and saw a sleepy Scott tie the terrycloth belt around the robe he "borrowed" from me a year ago.

"It's trash day. The valet is going to come by in a half hour to pick it up; I'm just putting it by the door for him." I grabbed my tea and my purse off the kitchen counter. "Sorry, I didn't think I was being that loud; I didn't mean to wake you."

"You want me to walk you out?" he asked, his hair still disheveled from sleep.

"Yeah, that would be nice! Wow, I've never seen you awake at 7:30 in the morning before." I chatted as we left the loft and headed into the parking garage. Scott was barefoot and still in his robe. The Femme Fatale trotted a few paces in front of us without her leash on. As a family, they were seeing me off to work. It was the very first time and it felt great.

As we entered the parking garage, the Femme Fatale ran full speed to her patch of pine straw where she takes her morning pee. I turned right and got in my car.

"Smile!"

I looked up and saw Scott standing a few paces away from me with a camera pointed in my direction. I bought a new car last night- late last night. The dealership had stayed open an extra two hours just to ink my deal, and when I was handed the keys to the biggest purchase of my life, it was dark out, the lights had all been turned off, and they were trying to shoo me out of the lot so they could lock it up. I turned to Scott, placing my old truck keys in his hand, and said I was sad no one could take a picture of me with my first new car.

Scott must have taken the moment to heart because here he was, standing barefoot in front of me with my pink camera clutched in his hands. "Smile!" he said again.

I held up my car keys and gave him the biggest grin I had.