I woke at five to an empty apartment.
Not unexpected. Some part of me had known — the part that had been paying attention to Marcus Calloway for four years and understood the pattern of a man whose conscience operated on a schedule. He had come. He had stayed. And somewhere in the early hours, the weight of what yesterday had been had pulled him back out into the January dark before I could witness it.
The blanket on his side was folded.
Not left in a heap — folded, neatly, the specific tidiness of someone who had been raised well and couldn't stop being raised well even in the middle of a personal catastrophe. I looked at the folded blanket for a long moment.
Then my phone lit up on the nightstand.
Marcus: I'm sorry. I shouldn't have stayed.
I read it twice.
Not — last night should
