POV: Jovan Bradford
Seven days.
A full week has passed since that conversation with Shae, yet her voice still rattles inside my skull like a persistent echo.
I sat in my office, the silence of the Meridian Miami building pressing against my eardrums. My eyes were fixed on the monitor, staring at the glowing lines of the project draft, but I wasn't seeing any of it.
The cursor blinked. Steady. Rhythmic.
It felt like a countdown, mocking the duration of my paralysis. My fingers hovered over the mechanical keyboard, unmoving, frozen in a state of indecision that was entirely foreign to me.
I read the same paragraph four times. The words didn't register.
I leaned back, the leather of my executive chair creaking under my weight, and stared at the white ceiling.
Shae’s question—the one a
