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Every day he leaves the shelter earlier than eight and he's alone, it feels like Henry leaves a little piece of himself behind.
Estrella's younger than most of the shelter residents, barely over ten, but she's always ready to argue like Alex is and has warm brown eyes that look like they could belong to Alex. According to her story, she'd figured out about being a girl early on and got in an argument with her parents about it a little before her tenth birthday. Her parents had given her an ultimatum and Estrella left, ending up at the shelter after one of the older teens who volunteers at the library had found her.
"I'm Estrella," she'd said that first day, blinking the big, brown eyes up at him and smiling. "Cause I like the stars. My favourite const-conste-constellation—" she makes a proud face over nailing the word "—is Orion. I like looking at it when I'm having a bad time and imagining him hunting all the bad things I deal with."
Even if she hadn't been a miniature of his husband, Henry would have fallen head over heels for her.
He spends far more of his day than he should with her, to the blatant amusement of the other shelter workers and residents, talking to her and trading her stories for his own, including about his dad and his own attachment to stargazing.
When Alex visits him on lunch break, they end up spending it with Estrella, listening to her talk a mile a minute and everything in him wants to ask Alex about fostering her to start—they were licensed months ago—but he's nervous because what if.
He's aware that's his anxiety talking, that Alex won't say no, because Alex adores her as well, calls her estrellita, has spent plenty of his time after work with her at the shelter while Henry tries to make up for the paperwork he's been ignoring in favour of her.
But still. What if.
He gets home and hangs up his jacket and bag and is barely inside the front door when Alex calls from the dining room, "baby, I made dinner, come on."
When Henry gets in the room, there's a folder sitting on the plate in front of his seat. he sits down before he opens it, a choice he's glad for when he processes the words on the form.
Application to Foster
It's already filled out for both of them and Estrella.
"Alex—"
"She's already family, sweetheart. We'll foster to start just to make sure everything goes smoothly and adopt her officially down the line.
Henry doesn't even have words when he wraps his arms around Alex, eyes burning as his tears start to soak Alex's shirt.
"Thank you."