Prologue
There was always something broken in the apartment. This week it was the kitchen light—flickering every five seconds like it was trying to summon a ghost.
I stood in front of the fridge with one hand on the door and the other still tangled in my hoodie sleeve, staring at a half-empty bottle of almond milk and a jar of pickles I don’t remember buying. The light buzzed behind me. Blink. Buzz. Blink.
I didn’t even flinch anymore.
Saturday mornings were usually quiet, because nobody was awake that early on weekends. Nobody except for me. Devon was still asleep—probably. Or pretending to be. He’d been up again last night, whispering to his notebook, burning incense that made the whole apartment smell like some kind of funeral spa.
I took a sip straight from the bottle and immediately regretted it.
Psychology major. Retail job. Disowned. Broke. One roommate. One cactus. That was the entire summary of my life right now. Nothing unusual. Nothing haunted. Just a growing pile of unwashed laundry and a psych exam on behavioral conditioning I hadn’t studied for because I’d been folding overpriced scarves for minimum wage all week.
And yet, the apartment had started to feel... different.
It was the way the air hung heavy in the corners. The way I’d catch Devon sitting cross-legged in the living room at night, surrounded by candles, rose oil staining the wood floor. He said it helped him manifest. That the energy in the room mattered.
I told him the only energy I cared about was the electricity bill he hadn’t paid his half of.
But last night, I found a piece of burned paper in the bathroom sink. Curled at the edges, ashed through the center. It smelled like smoke and something sweet, something sticky—like honey and rot.
I didn’t ask him about it.
Mostly because I didn’t want to know. Devon had always been weird, but lately... it wasn’t cute-weird anymore. It was eyes-too-wide, muttering-in-his-sleep, “don’t-go-in-my-room” weird. The kind of weird that clings to you after you leave the apartment and makes you look over your shoulder for no reason. Sure, I don’t judge him, but it concerns me sometimes. Despite his nature, he’s a good guy.
I’m too tired to keep track of time, so, of course, I realised late that I’m running late for work, which made me go through the routine like I was on autopilot: wash my face, brush my teeth, get dressed, comb my hair a little. All was done in less than fifteen minutes.
I don’t remember the walk to work.
One minute, I was stepping over a crushed cigarette pack on the sidewalk, and the next, I was behind the counter at Verse, blinking at a row of mannequins with dead eyes and better posture than me.
The store was too clean. Too quiet. Music played softly from hidden speakers—some ambient synth-pop track that sounded like what loneliness might hum to itself if it had rhythm.
The light was different here. White, clinical, too-bright. Like a dentist’s office that sold linen pants for ninety bucks.
I smoothed down the hem of my shirt, brushed lint off my name tag, and tried not to look like I hadn’t slept in days.
“Blackbourne,” my manager called from across the store, not even looking up from her clipboard. “Try to smile today. We’re short-staffed and people can smell desperation.”
“Noted,” I said, mouth flat.
She moved on. I turned back to the counter, adjusted a crooked display of folded scarves, and let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.
Time blurred again. It always did here. Hours bent weird under retail lighting. You look up once and it’s eleven-fifteen, you look up again and it’s still eleven-fifteen, but three people have yelled at you and your soul’s already died twice.
Somewhere between the fourth customer and the fifth, I caught my reflection in the glass door.
I looked tired. Like something had been gnawing at me in my sleep and I hadn’t noticed until now.
And then—just for a second—I thought I saw someone standing across the street.
Tall. Still. Watching.
I blinked. Gone.
The door chimed.
I snapped out of my haze, shook my shoulders loose, and pasted on my retail smile. You know the one—teeth but not too many, soft eyes, eyebrows slightly lifted like I’d just remembered your birthday.
“Hi there, welcome to Verse,” I said, already turning the warmth up in my voice. “Let me know if you need help finding anything.”
The customer didn’t answer. Just swept past the entrance like a gust of bad energy in a designer coat.
Mid-thirties, maybe. Platinum-blond bob, sharp heels, sunglasses still on despite being indoors. She looked like she’d walked out of a dream someone had about being rich and unloved.
I stayed behind the counter, watching her flick through the jackets like they’d personally offended her.
Still smiling. Still pretending I didn’t want to die.
After a minute, she made her way to the front and dropped a silk blouse on the counter like it was something disgusting.
“This says it’s thirty percent off,” she said, clipped. “But your sign says fifty. So which is it?”
I glanced at the tag. “Actually, the fifty percent is for select items in the outerwear section. This blouse is part of the new spring collection, so the discount’s different.”
She didn’t blink. “Then your signage is misleading.”
I smiled a little wider. “I can definitely call a manager for you if you’d like.”
“I don’t want a manager,” she snapped. “I want the price that was advertised.”
The light overhead buzzed. The register beeped. My eyelid twitched. And just like that, the warmth drained from my voice like someone pulled the plug on my soul.
“Okay,” I said, flat now. Not rude—just done. “Thirty percent brings it to eighty-six dollars and ten cents. Credit or debit?”
She stared at me for a beat too long. Like she couldn’t decide if I was being sarcastic or broken. I didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink.
She paid. Didn’t say thank you. Walked out. The door chimed behind her like a bad joke.
I let out a breath and leaned on the counter, pressing my knuckles into my eyes.
Retail rule number one: the customers aren’t always right, but they’re always louder than your will to live.
By the time my shift ended, my feet ached and my brain felt like a sponge someone had wrung out and left on the floor to dry.
I didn’t bother changing out of my work shirt. Just grabbed my coat, shoved my earbuds in without turning on any music, and stepped into the city like I might dissolve into it if I didn’t keep moving.
It was colder than this morning. The kind of cold that felt like it belonged to another season, drifting in early like an uninvited guest. The sidewalk was mostly empty—Saturday foot traffic with only some teenagers passing by every now and then.
I kept my head down. Focused on the cracks in the pavement. On the rhythm of my shoes. On the warmth of my breath slipping out of my mouth and disappearing before it could matter.
And then—bam. I crashed into someone at the corner.
Hard enough to make me stumble back, phone slipping out of my hand and hitting the concrete with a flat smack.
“Shit—sorry,” I said, crouching to grab it.
“No, I—I wasn’t looking. My fault,” the stranger muttered, already reaching for what I assumed was his own phone or wallet.
Our hands didn’t touch. No dramatic pause. No romantic slow-motion nonsense. Just the awkward choreography of two people trying not to make a thing out of a thing.
I stood first. He did too.
For half a second, I glanced at him—tall, dark jacket, pale fingers curled around something I didn’t get a look at—and then turned back toward the crosswalk.
He didn’t say anything else. Neither did I.
We both kept walking.
By the time I reached the apartment, the sun had dipped low enough to turn the hallway windows gold, like the building was trying to pretend it was something softer than what it was—cracked tile, thin walls, and the smell of old weed baked into the carpet.
I unlocked the door with the usual click-clunk and stepped inside.
Devon was in the kitchen, back turned, hunched over the counter with a candle lit in front of him. Something spicy-sweet clung to the air—roses again, maybe cinnamon too.
“Hey,” I said, kicking off my shoes.
He flinched slightly, then relaxed.
“Hey,” he echoed, without looking back. “Didn’t hear you come in.”
“I think I walked through three parallel dimensions and a funeral to get here, but yeah. Hi.”
That earned a dry chuckle.
I didn’t ask what he was doing. He had his rituals, his incense, his moods. I was too tired to play detective or roommate therapist today.
“I’m crashing for a bit,” I said, already heading toward my room.
“Cool.”
I paused halfway down the hall, rubbing the back of my neck. “Did you light a new candle or something? Smells like... I dunno. Witch perfume.”
Devon finally turned halfway, and for just a second, his smile looked too sharp to be casual. “Just something to help me focus.”
“On what?”
He didn’t answer. I didn’t push.
Instead, I slipped into my room, shut the door behind me, and collapsed face-first onto my unmade bed. My backpack hit the floor with a soft thud.
I didn’t even take off my jeans. Didn’t pull down the blinds. Didn’t overthink the tension in my shoulders or the smell that somehow lingered even in here.
I just closed my eyes. And fell asleep.
