Page 77 of Past Due

She seemed surprised by his request for permission. “Yes.”

“When you’re ready, let me know. I’ll come help you with the socks.”

Leaving her to enjoy her bath, he returned to the bedroom and picked up her backpack. He unzipped a few pouches in search of the first aid kit but didn’t find it until he opened the main compartment. It was down at the very bottom in a white plastic box marked with a bright red cross. He checked to make sure it had what he needed and set it aside for later.

As he returned all of the things he had unpacked back into her bag, he knocked her journal to the floor. It flopped open to one of the more recent pages, and he glanced over the purple ink, stopping when he saw his name. He shouldn’t have read it, but he couldn’t help it.

On one side of the page, she wrote about his proposal, sketching out the castle and their stick figures in the foreground with little dialog bubbles over their heads. She wrote of her deep love for him, her happiness, her excitement at being his wife and the future she wanted for them.

On the other side of the page, she had written the word KANUN in all caps. Twelve lines stretched out around the word like the spokes of a wheel. At the end of each line, she had written the twelve parts of the old honor code. Below that, she had notes about Lekë Dukagjinit and other academic sources on current and historical Albanian traditions.

He turned the page and found a roadmap of sorts for her planned research and the topics she wanted to cover. Outlaw motorcycle gangs and their codes. Mafias. Cartels. Street gangs. The effects of these codes on family and women. Sexual oppression. Economic oppression. Social constructs. Intersectionality.

As he finished scanning her notes, he glanced at the bathroom. Marley. Brilliant, curious, beautiful Marley. If this was what she planned to research for her dissertation, he would do whatever he could to help her. Some of these questions might have dangerous answers, but he would find a way to shield her.

“Besian?” she called out hesitantly.

He cleared his throat. “Yes?”

“I’m ready.”

He returned the journal to her backpack and zipped it closed. Standing in the doorway of the bathroom, he took a moment to simply look at her. Knowing it was probably the last time she would ever allow him to be this close, he decided to make it one they would both remember.

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