The elevator doors slide open directly into my penthouse.
For years I believed this place represented success. Floor-to-ceiling windows frame the skyline like a painting. Every piece of furniture was chosen by designers whose names I can never remember. The marble floors shine exactly as they should. Fresh flowers arrive every Monday whether I notice them or not. It is beautiful, and it has also spent a long time feeling strangely unoccupied but today it feels different. Not because anything inside it has changed, but because the silence isn’t mine alone anymore.
Hector drops the bookstore bag onto the kitchen island and wanders toward the coffee machine with the quiet confidence of someone who has stopped feeling like a guest. He opens the cupboard without asking where I keep the mugs,
