Inktober 2025 - 18 - Deal

We had a deal, you and I. An understanding, an arrangement, an agreement, whatever you want to call it. We had that. And I'll be honest, when you first started floating the idea around, I did not think it would work. And yet, at every turn, you kept proving me wrong.


I would wash the dishes, and you would dry them. I would do the grocery shopping, and you would do the cooking. We would take turns taking out the garbage, and work together for dusting and cleaning windows; you would do the high places and I would do the low ones, meeting in the middle. Brooms would be my thing and the vacuum cleaner would be yours. Laundry duties would be distributed equally.

For obvious reasons, you would be the one to drive, and I would in return be in charge of snacks and the playlist. You would answer the doorbell and I would pick up the house phone.

We would never EVER prank or lie to each other, and always talk things out if we ever were to have a difference of opinion, as arduous as that may be.

You would take the left side of the bed and I would take the right one, but we would both have our own set of covers, to make sure neither of us stole it from the other.

We would each have a job within biking distance from the house, but not talk too much about it at home. We would always split the bill wherever we went.

We would adopt a dog and a cat, and I would take care of the dog, and you would take care of the cat. Indoor plants would be my territory, while the garden would be yours.

We would have Christmas traditions like neither of us managed to put in place before: watching both Gremlins movies, building a gingerbread house, making hot chocolate with an amount of whipped cream bordering on unreasonable, and wearing matching pyjamas.

We would never debate the fact that you take your popcorn salty and I take it sweet, and simply each prepare our own bowl for movie nights. We would never stop the other one from singing in the shower, talking while watching television, or dancing around for no reason at all.

We would not recommend books to one another, but fiercely discuss every single one we happened to have both read.

We would never attempt to convince the other to do anything they did not initially want to do, and give each other the space to do our own thing when our moods were not in alignment, although making an effort to do so in the same space, whenever manageable.


To this day, I am still amazed that you never reneged on any part of our deal. Not a single one. You kept all of your promises. You were the only person that had never ever betrayed or disappointed me. Until the very end, when you went and died before I did.