A Charmed Reincarnation (Season 1)

０２ • Ａ Ｐｌａｃｅ Ｆｏｒ Ｍｅ

𝓔𝓭𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭: 06/20/24

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*🅔🅝🅙🅞🅨 🅡🅔🅐🅓🅘🅝🅖 🅜🅨 🅦🅘🅣🅒🅗🅔🅢 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ

━━━━━━ ◦ ❖ ◦ ━━━━━━

Ambrose paused in the hallway, the thick book of yellowed pages cradled in his hands as a weighty silence seemed to emanate from the slightly ajar door ahead. He frowned, head cocked as he strained to make out the muted sounds drifting from within—a sniffle, the soft rasp of fabric against fabric.

Prue's room.

A pang of sadness lanced through his chest, quickly tempered by a surge of reluctance to intrude on what was clearly a private moment of grief. He should leave, give Piper and Phoebe their space to mourn in peace.

And yet...something held him rooted in place, some deeper intuition urging him to proceed despite his misgivings. Drawing a steadying breath, Ambrose shifted his grip on the book and edged the door open a few inches wider.

"Hey, Piper, Phoebe—I think I've found the..."

The words trailed off, dying in his throat as he took in the scene before him. Piper sat with one arm looped around Phoebe's shoulders, her younger sister hunched over with her face buried in the soft black leather of an oversized jacket. Phoebe's shoulders shook with the force of her sobs, each ragged exhalation seeming to reverberate through the stillness like a physical force.

Ambrose froze, a wave of discomfited awkwardness crashing over him as he realized he'd stumbled into an intensely private moment. He opened his mouth, already fumbling for an apology as he prepared to back out of the room.

"I'm so sorry," he began, taking an instinctive step backward. "Let me leave you two—"

"No."

The single syllable stopped him in his tracks, soft but laced with a quiet intensity that brooked no argument. Piper held up one hand in a subtle negating gesture, dark eyes finding and holding his gaze as she shook her head in a minute shake.

"It's okay, sweetie," she said, the gentle cadence of her tone at odds with the naked anguish etched across her features. "Stay."

Ambrose hesitated, fingers tightening reflexively around the book's worn binding as he cast a sidelong glance at Phoebe. The youngest Halliwell had lifted her head at her sister's words, cheeks streaked and eyes red-rimmed in the wake of her tears. She looked...brittle, he realized with a pang. Fragile in a way he'd never seen, her usual spark of impish mirth extinguished beneath the weight of her sorrow.

"Are you sure?" he asked, unable to keep the uncertainty from his voice as he met Phoebe's haunted stare. "Because I can come back another—"

"We're sure," Phoebe interrupted, swiping at her damp cheeks with the heel of one hand as she struggled to compose herself. "I was just..." She swallowed hard, holding up the crumpled jacket with a look of profound weariness. "Telling Piper how this was Prue's favorite."

Ambrose felt his breath catch in his throat, the innocuous article of clothing taking on a sudden, weighty significance in the wake of Phoebe's words. He watched, struck dumb and useless, as she traced the soft leather with trembling fingertips—each feather-light caress imbued with a tenderness that spoke to depths of loss he could scarcely fathom.

"I borrowed it," Phoebe continued in a ragged murmur, "when I went to one of my ex's houses. His cat...it peed all over it, and..." A choked laugh escaped her, the sound edged with a brittle sort of hysteria. "Prue was so mad, I thought she was going to have an aneurysm right then and there."