The elevator hummed quietly as I pressed the button for the thirty-second floor.
My bags were heavy, though not unbearably so, just the right weight to remind me that life is a series of burdens dressed as necessities.
I barely glanced at the mirrored walls, watching my reflection only to confirm that my expression remained perfectly neutral.
My wedding ring, small, subtle, entirely functional, glinted against my gloved hand.
A reminder.
A mark.
A promise that meant nothing beyond paperwork.
The doors opened, and the air smelled faintly of new paint and polished concrete.
It was the kind of sterile scent meant to give an illusion of comfort, though I knew better. Comfort was an illusion I didn't have time for.
My unit sat directly next to his.
The walls were thin, the doors identical, and the layout symmetrical.
By some cruel design or perhaps a joke only Calix's family could conceive, our lives now paralleled, separated only by drywall and indifference.
I stepped inside, placing my bags neatly against the wall, one by one, aligning them like soldiers awaiting orders.
Everything had a place.
Everything had a purpose.
And in this unit, I had one rule: he did not exist.
Which, as far as I could tell, was working perfectly… until the door across the hall clicked open.
"Aurora."
I froze for a fraction of a second, not because of fear, not because I cared, but because his voice had that infuriating inflection: careless, teasing, like the world was just one big joke he was allowed to laugh at.
I didn't answer.
"I can see you're avoiding me already," he continued, stepping into the corridor, hands in his pockets, smiling like he owned not just this building but every room in it. "Don't worry, it's new, I get it. First day jitters and all that."
I turned my head slightly toward him, long enough to give him a clear, unspoken message: continue, and I will ignore you.
He tilted his head, as if assessing a particularly stubborn chess piece. "Interesting strategy."
I ignored him.
"Fine," he said after a pause, his tone softening just a fraction. "I'll just… be here, I guess. Or not. Whatever works for you."
I turned fully toward my unit, the click of the lock sounding far too loud in the quiet corridor.
It wasn't that I wanted to be unkind.
It was that kindness had a cost, and I wasn't paying it, not for him.
Not for anyone.
Inside, the air smelled faintly of lavender, my choice, my own small rebellion against the sterile smell of the building.
I unpacked methodically: clothes first, arranged by color and type; shoes next, perfectly aligned against the wall.
Even the smallest details mattered, because in the absence of meaning, control becomes a kind of armor.
I did not consider that he was likely watching from across the hall, leaning casually against his doorframe, his grin just visible in the corner of my eye.
I did not care.
–
The hours passed.
I read, I wrote, I practiced my polo moves silently in my mind, visualizing the rhythm of horse hooves on grass.
The world outside these walls could crumble, could burn, could scorn me for what I was a Zobel, a bride in name only and I would not flinch.
At some point, there was a knock on the door. Sharp, deliberate.
"I'm not coming in," I said without opening it.
"I wasn't planning to," his voice came from the other side. "Just saying hi. Neighborly thing, you know?"
I paused, fingers tightening slightly on my notebook.
It was annoying how calm he sounded, how perfectly careless he could be, how he could exist in the same space as me without acknowledgment of the chaos he represented.
"I don't need neighborly greetings," I replied coldly. "And I don't need you."
"Fair enough," he said, and I imagined the smile. "Just thought I'd try."
I returned to my routine, deliberately louder this time, the sound of moving, shifting, arranging, a deliberate barrier.
My life, my rules, my space.
Yet in the background, faintly, irritably, I felt his presence.
Not his body, not even his voice, but the idea of him, the shadow of a man who refused to be irrelevant. And for reasons I refused to acknowledge, it annoyed me more than anything else in the world.