I surfaced slowly. Thick pressure behind my eyes. Breath shallow. Limbs not entirely my own.
The first thing I registered was the quiet. Not the quiet of my house, which was never truly quiet, my father's early alarm, my mother's slippers on the kitchen floor, the pipes that argued every morning. This was a different kind of silence. Padded and deliberate, the silence of a space that cost enough to keep the world out.
My bed at home was old and uneven, the springs complaining if I so much as turned over. This mattress held me. The sheets were high-thread cotton, cool under my legs. I lay still for a moment just feeling the difference.
Then memory came back, and the difference stopped feeling like comfort.
The café. The migraine. The barista's voice on my phone. Adrian stepping through
