The phone lights the guest room in blue. Ethan wakes to its glow, face mashed against a pillow that smells faintly of detergent and nothing else. The sheets are still tight at the corners, barely wrinkled from a night spent rolling instead of sleeping. He blinks at the digital clock on the side table—5:42, numbers flat and terminal—and resists the urge to throw the phone across the room.
He rolls onto his back, arms crossed at the chest like he’s bracing for impact. The phone vibrates, twice, then goes still. He picks it up: not a new message, just the screen refreshing itself to remind him of what’s waiting. The top of the thread—Adrian, no avatar, just the initials in a circle—reads:
We need to talk.
He reads it a third time. He sets the phone face-down, then, less than a minute later
