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"How is that ever going to fit?" I asked myself as I rolled the cart with my tote boxes up to the door of my storage unit. I grumbled to myself that this was a Hell of a way to spend a Saturday.
I was in one of those converted warehouses where you access the units by finding your way through a maze of corridors, watching for the unit number that matched the one on your key. My unit was deep in the labyrinth and my footsteps resounded with a hollow echo; the sound seemed unable to escape so many walls. I unlocked the padlock on my unit, opened the door and light stabbed into the dark space.
I sighed. Large matching tote boxes were piled in two stacks on the right side of the door, four high and four deep, filling all the space on that side except on top. The other side of the unit was filled with odds and ends, from tool boxes to small furnishings. The only way these additional boxes were going inside this unit was if I stacked them on top of the other tote boxes. I muttered a silent curse at my wife and her flirtation with the "minimalism" fad. I would be the one lifting these boxes above my head to settle her discarded items with the rest. No doubt in a few months I'd be bringing boxes home to fill our house back up.
There was no use griping about it. Out of shape as I was, I began hefting the totes up on top of the dusty bins. Then to make room for the next one, I had to reach up and push that one farther back. I had four of them on top and I was getting tired. I heard a wheeze in my breath, but I wanted to get the job done. I exerted myself on the next box, which was heavier than I could easily lift. I felt it slipping in my grasp as I struggled to raise it up. I was on the verge of losing it when I had some unexpected help.
"Easy does it," a gruff voice said.
I was startled but too preoccupied with preventing my tote box from falling back on me. A man had come in behind me and leaned in against me, raising his arms over mine and lending me his strength. Presently, the box was secured on the top tier of the pile.