Olivia sits with her spine curved, her entire body bent around a single focus: the phone, face-up on her knee, the text to Adrian hovering above the gray block of silence that is his unread reply.
We need to talk.
The words rest above the word “Delivered,” which is both a verdict and a threat. She checks it, sets it down on the cushion, and then picks it up again, as if the act of checking could force the response into existence. The blue glow paints her thumb, her cuticle, the half-moon of her nail, but the rest of the world remains gray and still.
In the background, Ethan orbits.
He moves through the apartment with a kind of low-wattage intent, each action too careful, each gesture performed by someone who is not sure what is allowed anymore. He unzips a duffel bag in the hallway, fo
