Chapter Text
The bass was a fist against my chest.
Or maybe that was just the tequila trying to break out. I didn't know. I couldn't tell.
The lights at Neon were ugly tonight. Violent flashes of blue and bleeding purple that cut the room into jagged pieces, turning people into moving shadows. I laughed—a loud, stupid sound—as I tried to spin on the sticky floor, the hem of my light pink mini dress flaring around my thighs. My heels caught. The world tilted hard to the left.
Someone caught my elbow before my face hit the floor. "Easy there."
I yanked my arm back and grinned, my vision swimming. "You're no fun!"
They disappeared. Everyone disappeared. Just bodies bumping into me, sweaty and loud.
How many shots? Six? Nine? Twelve? Not enough. The heavy, dark thing in my head was still awake. It wouldn't go to sleep.
A girl with silver makeup said something in my ear. I shook my head. A guy tried to hand me a plastic cup. I walked past him. Someone else caught my waist near the bar, whispering. I pushed their hand away.
I didn't want them. I didn't want any of them.
I wanted her.
And she wasn't here.
I stumbled against the sticky edge of the bar, my fingers fumbling with my phone. The screen was a bright, blurry smudge. I blinked hard, trying to make the numbers stay still. Three tries. Finally, I hit the speed dial for her.
It didn't even ring twice.
"Hello?" The voice pierced the receiver, sharp, calculating, and laced with a fraction of genuine surprise.
I let out another sloppy laugh, sliding my back against the bar until I was practically sitting on the floor. "LARAAAAAA!"
"What the—Sophia?"
"You're missing out!" I screamed over the roar of the speakers.
"Sophia? What's going o—"
"No, seriously! You are missing out."
"What do you want?" Lara’s tone flattened into a razor-thin line.
"I’d just like to say I'm so fucking happy in my miserable life!"
"If you called me in the middle of the night just to say that—"
"Normal people are boring. You’re boring," I slurred, rolling my head back against the cold wood. I didn't need to see her to know her exact posture. She was sitting upright in bed, duvet pulled to her waist, jaw clenched tight enough to crack a tooth while her knuckles rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
"Where are you?"
"Somewhere fun."
"Sophia."
"Like... really, really fun."
A massive wave of bass shuddered through the floorboards, bleeding straight into the phone and cutting me off.
A long, awful silence followed.
Then: "Oh my God. You're at a club?"
I grinned into the dark, tasting the sour residue of bitter lime and cheap tequila on my teeth. "See? I knew you cared about me this whole time."
"Sophia! What are you doing there? Who is with you?"
I looked up. A thousand sweaty faces. A hundred people I'd forget by tomorrow.
Nobody.
"Me and..." I squinted directly into a blinding strobe light, watching the pink light split into fractals. "Uhhhh..."
Lara went completely still. On her end, the silence felt heavy—thick and crushing, like wet lead.
"Me!" I cheered, thrusting my free fist into the air.
"What? Sophia, did you tell Manon—"
I pressed my thumb down hard on the bright red button. Hung up.
Problem solved.
I shoved the phone into my pocket and threw myself back into the crowd. The music swallowed me. It filled my ears until I couldn't think. It was great. It was exactly what I wanted.
For a few minutes, I forgot.
I forgot the quiet in my apartment. I forgot the empty bed. I forgot the questions that kept me up until the sun came out. I forgot my own name.
Then the lights went white. And I froze.
She was there. Near the dark corner by the back exit.
Those wild, messy curls. The freckles across her nose. Hands shoved deep into the pockets of that big, brown leather jacket.
Daniela.
My heart stopped. The music disappeared. Only her.
"Dani?"
It came out as a squeak. The bass drowned it.
She didn't move. She didn't smile. She just stood there in the dark, her hazel eyes staring straight through me.
Air caught in my throat. It burned. I started shoving people out of the way, tripping over my own feet.
"Daniela!"
A bunch of guys stepped in front of me. Someone spilled a warm, sticky drink right down my arm. Another person rammed into my shoulder, sending me sideways.
I hit them back. Hard. "Move!"
I couldn't breathe. My ribs felt like they were caving in around nothing. "Out of my way! Move!"
I broke through. I reached the corner.
Nothing.
Just a bare brick wall. Just the cold exit door.
I stared at the empty space. One second. Two. Three.
Nobody. Just another stupid, cruel trick my brain was playing on me.
A ragged laugh scratched its way out of my throat. Of course. Of course. I stumbled back to the bar and ordered another shot. Then another. Anything to make the walls stop shaking. Anything to delete her face from my head.
Everything got messy after that. Shuffling feet. Burning liquor. Noise. Just noise.
Then, a hand grabbed my wrist.
Hard. Tight enough to hurt.
I yanked back, blinking through the fog. "Lara?"
Lara looked like she'd been through hell. Her hair was messy, her chest heaving like she'd been running. She looked furious enough to kill me, but underneath the anger, her eyes were shaking. She looked terrified.
"Let's go, Sophia," she said, her voice cracking.
I blinked. "Oh. It’s you, Raj. Hi."
"Don't 'hi' me."
She dragged me. Literally dragged me through the crowd, her fingers digging into my skin. She didn't care who she hit.
The exit doors opened and the cold night air hit me full in the face, sharp enough to sting. I gasped, shivering instantly as Lara unlocked her car, shoved me into the passenger seat, and slammed the door shut.
She jumped in, cranked the engine, and ripped away from the sidewalk.
The city lights were just long, ugly yellow streaks across the glass. Nobody spoke. The silence inside the car was suffocating. It was worse than the club.
I dropped my forehead against the cold window glass. Everything was spinning. Everything felt wrong.
"It's all my fault," I mumbled. The words just leaked out.
Lara's knuckles turned white on the steering wheel. She kept her eyes glued to the dark road ahead.
I swallowed the tequila burning my throat. "She left me."
Silence.
"Didn't even say goodbye."
I stared at Lara for a long moment. Her eyes remained glued straight ahead, but I caught the faint, gold shimmer of the key necklace with a purple amethyst against her collarbone.
Outside, the red traffic lights changed to green. Street signs flew past. I watched them without really seeing them.
"Do you know how pathetic that sounds?" My voice broke, small and ruined in the quiet car.
Lara didn't answer. Her jaw was a hard, straight line.
"I kept waiting for her," I whispered, a hot tear finally slipping over my eyelashes. "I just... I kept waiting."
Nothing.
The only sound was the low, steady hum of the engine pushing us through the dark.
I turned my face completely toward the cold glass, hiding the wetness on my cheeks.
Outside, the city kept moving forward into tomorrow.
Inside, I was completely stuck. The next thing I knew, the city lights went dark, and I passed out.
🐾
Lara reached Sophia's apartment complex just as Manon was pacing the concrete corridor outside the door.
Manon snapped her head up the moment the stairwell door banged open. Relief flashed across her face for a split second before it dissolved entirely, replaced by something much heavier. Her eyes locked onto the way Lara was practically carrying Sophia's limp, heavy body.
"Oh my God, Soph," Manon breathed, her voice a hushed, frantic whisper that echoed off the bare walls of the empty hallway. "Seriously, Lara—thank you."
Lara let out a sharp, ragged exhale, the line crackling with tension. "Don't thank me. If your useless car hadn't broken down for the third time this month, I'd still be asleep." She paused, her voice softening just a fraction, undercut by raw irritation. "How did you get here?"
"I literally ran straight here," Manon panted, her heart hammering against her ribs.
Working in tight, practiced silence, they managed to get the door unlocked.
Sophia didn't even make it to the couch. She was on the floor inside the entryway, half-curled against the baseboard like she had simply run out of strength halfway through existing. Her skin smelled like stale alcohol, sweet sweat, and the smoky air of the club.
It took both of them to lift her—Manon sliding her arms under Sophia's shoulders, Lara steadying her legs as they guided her toward the bedroom. Sophia didn't fight them. She barely registered their hands on her. By the time her head hit the pillow, she was already gone again. Asleep, or something close enough to a blackout to mimic it.
Manon pulled a heavy blanket over Sophia's shivering shoulders, then stepped backward out of the bedroom, closing the door until it left only a sliver of yellow light on the floor.
The apartment settled into silence.
It didn't feel quiet. It felt like an aftermath.
The kitchen sink was overflowing with ceramic dishes, the soaking water gone cold, greasy, and cloudy. A half-eaten plate of food sat forgotten on the small dining table, the edges of the noodles hardened into plastic. The potted plants by the window had collapsed into dry, brittle versions of themselves, shedding dead leaves onto the floorboards.
On the wooden desk, notebooks were stacked in uneven, chaotic towers—some left wide open, some abandoned mid-sentence, some containing stories that would never be finished at all. Clothes were scattered everywhere, dropped across the back of the couch as if Sophia had changed and simply dropped her old skin in layers.
The kitchen window stood wide open. Cold, damp air drifted into the apartment without permission, making the curtains shudder.
For a while, neither of them spoke. It was hard to decide where to start looking first.
Lara crossed her arms tightly over her chest, her fingers digging into the fabric of her jacket. "How long is she going to be like this?" she asked, her voice dangerously low.
Manon stared at the stagnant water in the kitchen sink. "I don't know."
A harsh, humorless laugh slipped out of Lara. "Is she ever going to change?"
"I don't know, Larz."
That second answer snapped something thin and frayed inside Lara.
"We can't keep doing this, Manon." Her voice cracked right on the edge of her control, her knuckles turning white. "Every time she breaks, we put her back together. That's all we do anymore. We're not helping her. We're just keeping her from falling apart completely."
Manon finally looked at her. Her expression didn't soften, her eyes dark with an exhaustion that didn't look temporary anymore.
"I know that."
Silence pressed down between them again. Heavy. Familiar. Completely exhausted.
Lara looked toward the closed bedroom door. Sophia didn't move behind it. There was no sound of tossing or turning. Just the dead weight of a girl trying to disappear.
With a sharp exhale, Lara grabbed her bag from the counter.
Manon straightened slightly, her shoulders tensing. "Where are you going?"
Lara hesitated at the threshold of the doorway, her hand gripping the brass knob.
"I'm just…" She exhaled, her breath shaky, her eyes fixed on the floorboards. "I can't do this right now."
She opened the door, then paused, her back rigid, refusing to turn around and look Manon in the eye.
"It's been over two years, Manon."
Her voice was barely a whisper, thin and fragile.
"If you need anything… call me." A beat. "But I can't keep doing this."
The door closed softly behind her. The click of the lock lingered in the small apartment much longer than it should have.
Manon stayed exactly where she was for a long moment, listening to the silence settle over the dust motes in the air.
Then she let out a long breath, rolled up her sleeves, and stepped further into the living room.
That was when she saw it.
On the top shelf, buried among the clutter, the dust, and the forgotten things, sat a ceramic sculpture of a girl's face. It was beautifully crafted. Wild curls. A delicate bridge of a nose covered in faint freckles. Eyes that looked almost alive under the dim light.
Manon stared at the sculpture for a long time.
She didn't move. She didn't reach out to touch it.
Then she looked away. She exhaled slowly.
Then turned on the kitchen faucet.
Hot water hit the sink, breaking through the cold grime.
"This is going to be a long night," she whispered.
And she started cleaning.
🐾
Sunlight pressed hard against my eyelids, insistent as a hand shaking me awake.
I groaned, trying to roll over, but my limbs didn't obey the way they were supposed to. Everything inside me ached in that dull, heavy way that came after too much cheap alcohol and not enough sleep. My tongue felt thick and tasted like stale copper.
For a terrifying, blank ten seconds, I didn't know where I was.
Then I forced my eyes open and turned my head.
My own room. My bed.
I looked down at myself. Someone had changed me into an oversized cotton T-shirt I didn't remember putting on. A sharp, rhythmic pain pulsed behind my left eye, a reminder that I was awake. That I couldn't sleep forever.
Pushing myself upright slowly, I winced as the room gave a lazy tilt. My gaze drifted to the digital clock on the nightstand.
9:18 A.M. FRI • JAN 23, 2026
Great. I still had time to make my first lecture.
Beside the clock sat a folded square of notebook paper, a tall glass of water, and two chalky white aspirin tablets.
Manon.
Of course.
I hadn't read the note yet. I didn't want the words. I just took the pills, swallowed them dry, and chased them with the water. It tasted too clean. Too intentional.
When my feet hit the floorboards, the coldness of the wood shot straight up my spine.
The living room waited for me like it always did. A mess, but a quieter one than the night before.
The windows were all closed now, and the freezing draft that usually haunted the hallway was gone. Manon must have shut them before she left. Except for one. To the far right of the apartment, the kitchen window stood propped ajar—its rusted, stubborn hinges jammed against the frame, refusing to yield and seal shut.
I stared blankly at the gap, my mind completely hollow.
I should fix that.
I never did.
The thought passed, disappearing into the fog.
In the small kitchen, someone had left food on the counter under a sheet of foil: eggs, toast, and a single sausage. It was still radiating a faint, pathetic heat, suggesting she hadn't been gone long. Beside a clean ceramic mug rested a neat teabag—ready, but unused.
Carefully arranged. A visual checklist of care.
None of it was my doing. I couldn't imagine having the energy to crack an egg.
I didn't sit down. I didn't touch the food. I barely breathed.
Instead, my feet moved on autopilot, walking past the kitchen counter and stopping directly in front of the top shelf.
The ceramic sculpture was still there.
A girl's face.
Wild, unmanageable curls. Freckles pressed delicately into the bridge of the nose. Full, quiet lips. Eyes carved with a precision that made them look almost alive under the morning light.
I stared at it. And my body just stopped moving.
The silence in the apartment thickened, pressing against my ears until they rang. The apartment had been quiet for so long that sometimes silence felt louder than people. The longer I looked at the white ceramic, the less it felt like clay and the more it felt like a memory trying to pretend it was solid.
🐾2022🐾
The click of the upload confirmation button on the screen was the last thing I heard before my brain went completely empty.
Chapter 4 successfully submitted.
Fifteen chapters left to go. The library computer screen was just an aggressive white glare, the inspiration evaporating into the quiet air.
Then, my phone buzzed on the wooden desk, the vibration loud enough to make a nearby sophomore glare at me.
The notification banner read: The 4 Remaining Brain Cells.
hotstuffmanz: Soph.
hotstuffmanz: Tell me you have the lecture notes for the module. Please. I am currently weeping on the floor of the humanities building.
Megaflop: Oh thank god manon asked first because my notebook looks like ancient hieroglyphics. The exam is in 25 mins. If I fail, my mom will revoke my breathing privileges.
Megaflop: SOPHIA SAVE US.
maknaenae: If you both actually looked at the syllabus instead of analyzing the hot professor’s jawline during lectures, you wouldn't be having a collective stroke.
maknaenae: [Sent an image: English_101_Notes_P1.jpg]
maknaenae: There. Stop crying. We are in university now, act like you have a mortgage.
Megaflop: My savior!
Megaflop: Wait.
Megaflop: Yoonchae, your handwriting looks like a spider fell in ink and had a seizure.
Megaflop: Soph, please tell me you have a typed breakdown.
softsoph: [Sent a PDF: Harrison_Midterm_Review_Final.pdf]
softsoph: Here. Don't stress, the essay prompts are just variations of the seminar from last Tuesday
softsoph: Just copy-paste my thesis on structural irony.
Megaflop: I would literally take a bullet for you Sophia Laforteza. I am eating this paper so it goes directly into my bloodstream.
hotstuffmanz: See you in hell, ladies! ✌️
I smiled, locking the device and sliding it into my jacket pocket. Leaving early was always easier than navigating the chaotic hallway rush between classes.
The midterm was a blur of scratching pens, but we passed. All of us. Megan practically tried to kiss my shoes in the hallway afterward, while Yoonchae merely offered a nod of approval, already shifting her focus to the afternoon. Manon just laughed, slinging an arm around my shoulder and promising that my next coffee was entirely on her.
Then came our elective art class.
With no afternoon classes on her schedule, Manon was left with a dangerous amount of free time and zero supervision to pursue her true passion: absolutely nothing.
But me, Megan, and Yoonchae marched down the basement corridor of the Fine Arts building toward the ceramics studio, the heavy scent of damp clay and mineral glaze greeting us at the door.
The professor, Mr. Brooks, was already clapping his hands together.
"Alright, settle down, everyone! Today we are moving away from sketchbooks and getting our hands dirty. We're doing portrait ceramics. And before you grab your usual friends—no. I've already pre-assigned your partners for this project. Part of university is learning to expand your creative horizons with new perspectives."
I looked at Megan and Yoonchae; both of their faces were utterly crestfallen.
Mr. Brooks started rattling off names from his clipboard.
"Jeung Yoonchae, you're with Nayoung Lee at station four."
Yoonchae sighed, shooting me a sympathetic look before picking up her canvas apron and walking over to another girl who looked just as reserved as she was.
"Megan Skiendiel, station seven with Ethan Grimes."
Megan's shoulders slumped. Ethan was a guy who currently appeared to be trying to inhale his own snot every five seconds while aggressively digging through a box of rusted tools without any apparent strategy. Megan looked back at me like she was being marched to the gallows.
"And... Sophia Laforteza?"
I swallowed hard, raising my hand. "Here."
"Station two. You'll be paired with Daniela Avanzini."
Moving to station two, I sat on the wooden stool, staring blankly at the grey lump of clay resting on the plastic turntable. I felt a sudden, sharp prick of annoyance. I didn't want to expand my horizons. I wanted to sit with my friends, mimic Megan's face, and laugh through a boring three-hour block. Now I had to make small talk.
Then, I heard footsteps. They were rhythmic, light, and entirely confident.
"Hi. Sophia, right?"
I looked up, and for a fraction of a second, I genuinely forgot how to inhale.
She looked entirely carefree. A cascading halo of dark curls framed a face dotted with a delicate constellation of freckles. She wore an oversized white sweater with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows, camo cargo pants, and a silver cross necklace that tangled with thick hoop earrings. She smelled faintly of vanilla and peppermint gum.
I cleared my throat, my voice a little too quiet. "H-hi! And you're Daniela."
She giggled—a rich, melodic sound—and swung her leg over the stool next to mine, her shoulder brushing against my sleeve. "Just Dani is fine."
Mr. Brooks clapped his hands again. "The assignment is simple, class. You have two hours to sculpt a bust of the person sitting across from you. Capture their essence. Go."
Panic, cold and sharp, dropped straight through me. The only molding I had ever done in my entire life involved Play-Doh when I was seven years old, and most of those creations ended up looking like mutated potatoes.
I looked at the white mound of clay, then slowly turned my head to look at Daniela. She was already looking at me.
"Nervous?" she asked, a small, knowing smirk playing on her lips.
"Uh... kind of?" I let out a sheepish, defensive laugh. "More like terrified."
"Yeah, me too," Daniela said, though she didn't look terrified at all. She reached out, her fingers lightly tapping the edge of my clay wheel. "But hey, just close your eyes. Picture it step-by-step in your head before you touch it, and you'll be fine. And, you know, hope for the best that it doesn't turn into something monstrous that haunts you for a lifetime."
A real laugh finally escaped me. "Noted."
We began.
The studio filled with the wet, squelching sounds of clay being shaped and the low hum of nervous chatter. I kept my eyes fixed on Daniela, trying to measure the distance between her cheekbones with my gaze. Every time I looked up, she was looking right back, her hazel eyes locked onto my face as her fingers worked with an alarming amount of dexterity.
Warmth crept up the back of my neck. I quickly looked down at my hands, digging my thumbs into the clay to hide my face.
But I couldn't help but peek. Daniela was good. Like, ridiculously good. Her fingers moved with a casual grace, smoothing out the contours of a jawline that already looked exactly like mine. What the actual freak? Was she secretly a prodigy?
I looked down at my own monstrous creation.
It looked like a melting candle.
Oh god.
She is going to kill me.
This was definitely not impressive for someone trying to make a good impression on a pretty girl.
Wait. What? No, I wasn't trying to impress her. I just didn't want to look incompetent.
Taking a deep, shaky breath, I remembered what she had said. Close your eyes. Picture it. I closed my eyes, visualizing the slope of her nose, the curve of her jaw, the way her lips sat. When I opened them, my hands felt a little steadier.
By the time the professor called out the thirty-minute warning, I managed to smooth out the shoulders.
"OH MY GOD!" Daniela suddenly leaned forward, her hoop earrings swinging, her hands coming down on the table with a wet thud. "You actually did it! Look at that! It looks just like me!"
I instinctively tried to block her view with my hands, my ears burning under the harsh classroom fluorescent lights. "No, it's not done yet. Don't look."
"Really? Because it sure does look done," she teased, leaning her upper body completely to the left, trying to peek around my shoulder with a massive, lopsided smile.
"No, wait. Not yet," I pleaded, a helpless giggle slipping out as I reached out and gently pushed her shoulder back. Her sweater felt scratchy and warm under my palm.
"Okay, okay. I'll wait," Daniela said, relenting with a dramatic sigh, though she kept her eyes anchored to mine while her fingers gave a few final, idle strokes to the clay face of mine.
With her sitting still, I took the opportunity to look closer. The irritation from earlier had evaporated, replaced by a sudden, quiet curiosity.
I noticed the tiny, dark mole situated just above her left eyebrow. The way the freckles gathered densely across the bridge of her nose before scattering lightly across her cheeks. The small, faint moles near her jawline.
And then, the eyes. I was having a horrible time trying to carve them without making her look like she was glaring.
Daniela caught me staring, her head tilting slightly. "What is it?"
"I'm... I'm just having a hard time doing your eyes," I admitted, swallowing hard against the dryness in my throat. "The shape is complicated."
Daniela's expression softened, a warm, incredibly gentle smile gracing her lips. She leaned her chin into the palm of her hand, propping her elbow on the table, and looked straight into my face.
"Well, look into my eyes then," she murmured. "I'm done with my sculpture anyway."
"W-what?" I stammered, the sudden proximity pulling the air tight around us.
"Just stare at me closely," she whispered, her voice dropping into a quiet, intimate register that made the rest of the noisy, chalk-dusted room completely fade away. "Take your time."
So, I did.
I leaned in, just enough to lose sight of my own reflection in her eyes.
When I finally looked—really looked—the dull gray basement seemed to fade into the background. Her eyes weren't simply brown or green. They shifted between amber, gold, and a deep forest green, catching the light differently with every heartbeat.
Hazel.
Green-leaning hazel.
They looked like the last green leaves of autumn, bathed in the dying light of the sun. Emerald at first glance, but threaded with amber and gold wherever the light chose to linger.
I hadn't realized eyes could hold that many colors at once.
🐾
Scratch.
The memory shattered into a million jagged pieces.
The warm, golden light of the freshman art studio dissolved, replaced instantly by the stark, blinding glare of my empty apartment. My hand was still hovering in the cold air, an inch away from the white, lifeless ceramic cheek of the sculpture on my shelf.
Scratch. Scratch.
A dull ache throbbed behind my eyes as the fog of the hangover rushed back to fill the void. I turned my head slowly toward the kitchen window—the one with the split glass that I never fixed.
It was open. Widely open, swinging slightly on its rusted hinge.
Another sharp scratch echoed from the darkness of the living room.
What the hell is that? Please don't tell me it's a raccoon.
This was the absolute worst part about living on the ground floor.
I crept into the living room, my bare feet silent on the wood, and scanned the space. Nothing out of the ordinary. Everything was exactly where Manon had left it. Except for the coffee table.
I blinked, focusing on a slightly yellow puddle of liquid pooling on the dark wood. I looked up at the ceiling, checking for leaks, but the plaster was perfectly dry. Then, the smell hit me.
Pungent.
Sour.
I looked down. The puddle was soaking directly into the cover of a Colleen Hoover book—a joke gift Megan had bought me specifically to annoy me.
The fuck is going on? Am I actually hallucinating?
CLANG!
I jumped, my heart leaping into my throat.
Okay, there were definitely no ghosts in this apartment; I'd lived here way too long for a haunting to suddenly start on a random Friday morning.
Now finally sobered up by pure adrenaline, I lunged for the first weapon I could see on the counter: a can of heavy-duty bug spray.
Better than nothing.
CLANG!
I crept toward the kitchen, knuckles white around the spray can. On the linoleum floor lay a shattered ceramic plate.
Fuck you, ghost. Not this morning.
I raised the can, rounding the corner to face the counter.
"Meow."
I froze. "Huh?"
"Meow."
I slowly lowered the bug spray.
There, sitting squarely on the counter, was a scrawny orange tabby cat. It was slightly plump—plump enough to look well-fed, but not so big that it lost its street cred. Its fur wasn't overly thick, clipped short and neat over a pair of average, sharp pointed ears.
If this wasn't Garfield in real life, I didn't know what was.
Before my brain could fully process the absurdity, my basic instincts kicked in.
"Shoo! Get out!"
The cat didn't even blink. It just kept chewing, entirely unbothered by my existence.
I needed to get it out. Ground-floor strays carried diseases. Plus, I wasn't even a cat person. I was a dog lover; dogs actually had boundaries.
Pulling my oversized sleeves up my arms to prepare for a clean catch, I stepped forward to grab it. But the cat beat me to the punch.
It stopped chewing, the half-eaten sausage still dangling from its mouth, and looked straight at me. I caught the details of its face—long, chaotic whiskers, a remarkably round head, and torn, small pointed ears. Its fur was short and coarse, not too fluffy. But it was the eyes that made my breath catch.
A restless, shifting hazel. Amber where the light hit, deepening to green at the edges.
We just stood there, locked in a bizarre staring contest, the only sound being the low hum of my refrigerator.
Great. Now I had no breakfast.
"Shoo!" I snapped again, clapping my hands.
The cat swallowed the final piece of sausage, turned its back to me without a care in the world, and began aggressively licking the butter off my toast. Because of the angle, I now had a full, unprompted view of its anatomy. Two distinct little spheres. So, it was a “he”.
"Okay, that's it."
I lunged forward, grabbing him firmly around both sides of his ribcage.
"Meow!"
The cat instantly turned into a liquid weapon, wiggling his entire form and twisting out of my grip with terrifying speed. I scrambled after him, my hangover forgotten in a flash of pure irritation.
"Get out of my property, Garfield!"
The cat leaped onto the floor, stopped, and looked back at me with a deadpan expression. "Meow?"
"Oh, you think this is a game?" I ran at him, but he was a blur of orange. He bolted across the living room, using the back of my couch as a launching pad, and scrambled straight up the tall wooden bookshelf.
Where all my textbooks, my writing journals, and my most important things lived.
I rushed to the base of the shelf, looking up. The cat saw me approaching, panicked, and tried to adjust his footing on the narrow top ledge. His back paw slid.
OH SHIT—
CRACK.
The sound didn't just echo in the room; it vibrated straight through my bones.
I looked down at the floor. White ceramic shards were scattered across the dark wood. The face was split down the middle. A delicate cheekbone was pulverized into dust. The freckles were fractured into tiny, unrecognizable white pebbles.
It was gone.
Something white-hot roared up through me, fast enough to blur my vision.
I wasn't an animal murderer, but in that exact microsecond, I felt like I could become one.
I grabbed the nearest broomstick from the utility closet and began aggressively swinging it toward the top of the shelf.
"Hiss!"
"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOU JUST DID, YOU TWERP?!" I screamed, my voice cracking, entirely ruined.
I didn't actually aim for him. Somewhere deep down, some leftover shred of humanity kept me from hitting the animal. Instead, I just slammed the broomstick violently against the cushions of my couch, over and over again, the heavy thud-thud-thud masking the sound of my own ragged breathing.
The cat remained at the top of the shelf, tucked into a tight ball, watching my breakdown with wide, silent eyes.
Eventually, the adrenaline dissolved, leaving me entirely empty. The broom clattered to the floor. I dropped to my knees, sinking directly into the wreckage, and let out a broken, choked sob. I didn't sweep them up. I couldn't move. I just sat there on the cold floor, staring at the shattered pieces of the only thing I had left of her, letting the silence swallow me whole.
Minutes later, the apartment had grown cold.
I tried to force myself through the motions of being a person. I walked into the kitchen and picked up the mug Manon had neatly left on the counter, intending to fill it with water, but my fingers were shaking too hard. The rim clinked violently against the tap. I set it back down, unable to swallow, and looked over at the empty top shelf. The dust had already settled into the bare square where the sculpture used to sit, leaving a clean, mocking outline of what had been lost.
I didn't answer the concerned pings from the group chat.
The 5 Remaining Brain Cells:
manz_the_grand_emperor: Hi soph. How are you?
chae_the_voice_of_reason: do you want us to come over?
meimei_the_sage: we’ll be here if you’re ready. You know you can talk to us.
I collapsed into my desk chair and opened my laptop.
Instead of opening a document, I spent the next hour mindlessly watching videos I barely paid attention to. When that stopped working, I started cleaning up my laptop. It had been pestering me for weeks about running out of storage, so I figured I might as well delete a few things.
Old screenshots. Duplicate photos. Lecture recordings I'd never watch again.
Then I stumbled across a folder simply labeled "Novels."
I clicked it.
Draft after draft stared back at me. Some finished. Most abandoned halfway through. Titles I'd forgotten I'd even come up with.
On instinct, I opened the newest one, which was dated 2023.
A blinking cursor waited for me.
Nothing.
Not a single word came to mind.
It had been like that for a long time now. Ever since she left.
I used to have stories overflowing in my head. Entire worlds demanding to be written before they disappeared.
Now, there was only silence.
🐾
By midnight, the forced distraction finally failed.
The silence in the room grew too loud, pressing against my temples. With trembling hands, I brought the small box of fragments to my desk, along with a tube of superglue.
It was an agonizing, pathetic process. I knew it wouldn't be the same. It was going to be jagged, covered in ugly grey seams, and completely imperfect.
Fuck that cat.
But I concentrated entirely on the alignment, holding my breath as I pieced together the jaw, then the slope of the nose.
Then I picked up the shard containing her left eye. The shifting depth I had tried so hard to capture in the college studio.
The dam broke.
It crashed over me so suddenly I couldn't breathe. I folded onto the desk, pressing my face into my arms as every tear I'd been holding back finally escaped.
I cried because she was gone. Because she'd left, and the world had somehow kept moving as if that were a normal thing. I cried for every habit that still belonged to her, every instinct to reach for my phone, every part of me that still expected her to come back.
God, I missed her.
I wept until my eyes burned and my throat was raw, eventually passing out right there at the small desk, my hand still resting near the scarred ceramic face.
🐾
Morning came again.
The harsh, aggressive brightness of the sun cut through the living room window, hitting my face and forcing me awake. I blinked, my neck stiff from sleeping at the desk. In front of me sat the sculpture—barely held together, heavily fractured, but whole enough to recognize.
Then a scent drifted past my nose. It was bad. Pungent and metallic. The smell didn't just enter the room—it filed for residency.
I winced, standing up and rubbing the sleep from my eyes as I followed the smell into the kitchen. Because the broken window was wide open to the alleyway all night, the cold morning air was rushing inside unchecked.
I stopped at the threshold.
Resting perfectly in the center of the linoleum sill was a massive, completely stiff, dead rat. Drops of dark, dried blood smeared the white paint of the frame.
I took a step back, my stomach churning. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me."
"Purr."
I whipped my head toward the sound, my heart hitting my ribs. Tucked into the shadows on the very top of my refrigerator was the orange tabby cat. He wasn't acting like a proud hunter; his ears were flattened against his skull, and his eyes looked completely glazed over under the fluorescent light.
"YOU AGAIN!" I yelled, pointing a trembling finger at him. "Now what is this? Is this supposed to be a peace offering?!"
The cat didn't respond with a loud cry. He just let out a short, raspy breath and shifted his weight forward, attempting to slide down from the top of the fridge to the marble counter.
He didn't land right.
The moment his paws hit the surface, his back right leg buckled completely, folding inward as a sharp, breathless hiss escaped his teeth. He collapsed onto his side, his breath coming in fast, shallow, ragged thuds against the counter.
The anger from the rat vanished, leaving a cold, heavy quiet in the kitchen.
I stepped closer, my hands lowering. A dark, tacky streak of dried blood was matted deep into the orange fur of his thigh, and a jagged, raw tear split the center of his paw pad. He was shivering violently, his small nose covered in grey alley dust.
He had fought the thing. And he had barely won.
I looked out the window. I looked at the bleeding, exhausted animal trembling on my counter, holding my gaze with those strange, familiar eyes.
"Fucking fabulous," I whispered, the words small and hollow in the morning light. "Now I have to save your life."