ELARA
I wasn't waiting for him.
That's what I told myself when my eyes drifted to the clock on the wall. 10:01. Just a glance. Meaningless. The way you check the time a hundred times a day without thinking.
But my chest tightened anyway.
Tomorrow. 10 AM. I'll be there for the examination.
I'd blocked his number last night. I remembered doing it—the small satisfaction of watching those digits disappear from my screen. But somehow, before I'd pressed that button, the words had already etched themselves into my memory. I hadn't meant to memorize them. I hadn't read the message more than once.
But I knew it by heart anyway.
Eleven years. That's how long I'd been doing this. Holding onto scraps. My mind had learned to hoard his words without my permission, the way a starving person's bod
