Seraphina Pov
The dishes were a non-event. Or, they should have been.
It was just the mundane, quiet geometry of a kitchen at the end of a long day: two people tidying up, following the wordless choreography that comes with living in each other's pockets for weeks.
He washed, I dried. He'd hand me a plate without looking; I'd stow it away without asking. The only soundtrack was the clinking of porcelain and the hum of the city lights bleeding through the window.
It felt domestic. Normal. A scene so unremarkable it was almost boring.
But there was a current running beneath it, a low, oscillating hum that had nothing to do with the city.
Every time we brushed past each other shifting for the dish rack, navigating the small space, negotiating the narrow corridor between the sink and the refrigerator there was that subtle, frantic recalibration.
We were two people trying very hard to act as if we weren't hyper-aware of the exact trajectory of the other.
