Four rings.
Then a click.
Julian froze.
The voice hit before he could even prepare.
"Why are you calling me, Julian?"
Sharp. Flat. Distant.
It wasn't just annoyed — it was tired of being annoyed. Like she'd built an entire life out of making sure he stayed exactly where she'd left him.
"I told you—we're done."
A pause. Just long enough to let the last word dig in.
"You're broke. I'm done with broke."
Julian didn't flinch. But something behind his ribs pulled tight.
He could hear the faint echo of her voice bouncing through whatever apartment she was in — a hardwood floor, maybe, high ceilings, thin walls. She wasn't whispering. She didn't care who heard.
The air around him stayed still. No more cars passed. The glow from the deli sign behind him had dimmed again, buzzing low like a dying lightbulb.
His fingers curled tighter around the phone. Cold plastic. Cracks near the hinge.
When he spoke, it wasn't loud.
It wasn't emotional either.
Just flat. Even. Measured.
"I'm not calling to beg you."
Nothing from the other end.
"I just need the one-twenty you owe me."
There it was.
The punchline.
Elena laughed — and it wasn't even a fake laugh. It was real. That sharp exhale when something is so pathetic, so beneath attention, that it becomes funny again.
"Wow," she said. "That's why you're calling?"
He didn't answer.
"You really are broke."
Julian's mouth stayed shut. His jaw, though — it clenched hard enough to make his teeth ache.
He could feel the pressure rising behind his eyes, but he blinked it away.
She wasn't done.
"You know what?" Her tone changed — not warmer, just bored now. "Fine. Come by in the morning."
Then—
Click.
Gone.
No time to argue. No fake goodbye. No pause for breath.
Just silence.
Julian lowered the phone slowly, like it might detonate if he moved too fast. The flip shut sounded too loud in the empty street.
He didn't curse. Didn't pace. Just stood there.
The cold cut through his sleeves now. The adrenaline had drained.
Wind brushed past, kicking a crushed soda can across the sidewalk. It rattled once, then spun into the gutter and stayed there.
Julian's feet shifted. He looked down.
For a moment, the sidewalk blurred.
Not from tears. Not from anything sentimental.
Just the kind of exhaustion that made every corner of the world look sharp and pointless.
He turned.
Walked.
Boots dragging over broken concrete.
No glow behind him now.
No numbers in the air.
Just the sound of his footsteps and the steady, empty breath of a man still too broke to break.
Julian turned down Brighton Avenue. Each step echoed off the frost-bitten sidewalk. A crumpled takeout cup rolled past him, nudged by the wind. He didn't bother looking down.
The further he walked, the more the city peeled away — less light, fewer windows, less noise. Behind a broken fence and a half-dead pine tree sat a sagging duplex with flaking yellow paint and a detached garage tucked behind it like something someone had forgotten to demolish.
His.
He stepped around the back gate, boots crunching glass and dead leaves. A raccoon scattered somewhere behind a bin, rustling metal. Julian didn't react.
He reached beneath a brick by the foundation. Pulled out a rusted key with a red tag that had long since faded white.
The padlock clicked open.
He pushed the garage door inward.
The air hit him immediately. No insulation. Just cold air hanging like fog in a place that was supposed to shelter, but didn't. The darkness felt heavier than the outside — like it had weight.
He stepped in. Closed the door behind him. Didn't bother to lock it.
No one was coming.
No one ever came.
The space was bare except for the essentials: an old folding chair, a stack of thrift-store books with the corners curled, a cracked paint bucket that acted as a nightstand, and the thing he hated most — the mattress.
It sat like a dead thing against the back wall. Flat. Grimy. Covered by one torn blanket and a pillow too thin to matter.
He peeled off his coat and let it slide to the ground. Then knelt beside the mattress and reached for the blanket, shaking it out once. Dust spiraled upward, catching what little moonlight leaked through a seam near the ceiling.
He sat down slow. The springs groaned under him. Cold shot through the fabric of his jeans straight into bone.
He didn't lie down yet.
Just sat. Hands on his knees. Eyes on the phone lying on the paint bucket.
The screen was black. The battery half-drained. The signal bar: flickering.
He lay back, finally. Blanket over his chest. Arms folded beneath it.
The cold still cut through. But he didn't adjust.
His body was tired, but not enough to shut down.
The ceiling loomed above him, splintered wood and sagging beams — dark lines like veins, tracing across the roof like someone had tried to map out disappointment.
He closed his eyes.
Tried to sleep.
Tried to forget the number.
But it was there — not in memory, not even in thought. Just there.
Burning into the silence.
#772144
January 2nd, 6PM
Every time he blinked, it flashed behind his eyes. Not bright. Not loud. Just waiting.
He turned to his side, pulling the blanket tighter around his shoulders.
The springs shifted. The air refused to warm.
One hour.
Then another.
Maybe two hours of sleep — light, broken, like sinking through paper.
When he opened his eyes again, the crack in the ceiling had changed color. No longer black. Not quite gray.
Dawn.
Outside, a bird shrieked once. Somewhere distant, a car engine sputtered to life.
He sat up slowly, rubbing at his face with both hands. His breath fogged in front of him.
Still freezing.
He reached for the coat and slid into it without looking. Then grabbed the phone from the bucket.
No new messages.
No missed calls.
No change.
He stood. Moved toward the door.
Opened it.
The early morning light spilled in — pale, thin, unpromising.
He stepped outside, the cold sharper now.
Closed the door behind him.
Pulled the key out. Locked it.
Today, I get that money.