She noticed it on Wednesday.
Not dramatically just a small ordinary moment that landed with more weight than it should have. Darian had stopped by her office at eleven with a coffee he hadn't been asked to bring and a question about the Morrison account that could have been handled by email and had stayed for twenty minutes talking about nothing in particular with the easy comfort of someone who had stopped calculating whether he was welcome.
After he left she sat at her desk and looked at the door and felt something shift in her chest that was not warm.
It was fear.
She called Imara at lunch.
"He brought coffee again," she said.
"The unreasonable monster," Imara said.
"I'm serious."
"I know you are." A pause. "Talk."
Nia looked at her salad. "It's getting comfortable. Too comfort
