Jason’s POV
I’ve never liked sudden weather changes. Rain that comes without warning makes the city smell different, and the day feels off-balance. People hurry. Umbrellas pop open like mushrooms. Traffic snarls. You notice everything because everything else has changed.
That’s what Ava felt like to me lately, a weather shift I hadn’t seen coming.
It started small. A brighter laugh that came from her instead of a practiced smile. A tilt to her head when someone said something funny, as if she found the joke genuinely amusing rather than wearing a smile for the room. She answered questions with shorter, sharper lines now, the kind of answers that belonged to someone who could speak for herself.
I noticed it in the little things: the way she selected her coffee without deferring to whoev
