Chapter 1
The TV blares in front of me — all noise, panic, and polished anchors pretending the sky isn’t falling apart. Words likecatastrophicandirreversibleflash across the screen as a panel of experts tears each other to shreds. Scientists, military heads, government advisors — everyone trying to sound like they still know what the hell they’re doing.
I’ve heard it all before.
Atmospheric destabilization. Magnetic collapse. Radiation spikes.The vocabulary changes every few days, but the fear underneath stays the same.
I shut the TV off. The silence that follows is thick, like the air itself has started carrying extra weight.
The sofa dips beside me with a warm, familiar weight.
“Any news?” Yvette asks softly. Her voice still has that sleepy lilt — the one that used to make everything feel manageable, even when it wasn’t.
“Same old,” I mutter. “Electromagnetic radiation. Asteroids. Ozone falling apart. Just your usual bedtime stories.”
She tucks her legs under herself, hair sliding over her shoulder. “I think it’s worse than they’re letting on,” she whispers. “Lana’s brother works in the weather division. Says he’s never seen magnetic storms this big. Ever.”
I shrug, but it’s a stiff, hollow movement. “This was bound to happen, Yvie. You can’t throw a damn nuke into space and expect karma not to kick your front door down.”
Her eyes widen. “But the asteroid—”
“—wasn’t big enough to kill us all. Yeah, I know.” I rub my jaw. “A city, maybe. But now these asshats might actually have to think about evacuating the entire planet.”
Outside, something groans — metal tightening in the wind. The sky’s been doing that lately, humming like it’s full of static. Sometimes the clouds glow green around the edges. They tell us it’s refraction. They also told us the asteroid wouldn’t hit.
Yvette sighs, rubbing her thumb along the seam of a cushion. “It’s all politics anyway.” Her voice drops to a thread. “Who even knows what’s real anymore?”
I look at her — really look — and for a moment, I can almost pretend the world isn’t dissolving around us. But then the illusion cracks. Her skin looks thinner today. Her collarbone sharper. The sweater swallowing her whole.
She lifts her mug and takes a sip — and immediately breaks into a violent coughing fit that forces me upright.
“That’s disgusting,” she croaks between coughs.
I glance at the mug. The liquid inside looks like a science experiment that mutated.
“What the hell is that?”
“Milk thistle roots,” she wheezes. “Reddit says it helps with these super colds.”
“Yvie...”I take her in piece by piece.The trembling hand.The way she keeps straightening her sweater like she’s cold even inside.The faint bluish tint beneath her eyes no matter how much sleep she gets.
Something’s wrong. Something’s been wrong.
“Stop with these... swamp teas,” I say gently. “Go see a real doctor.”
She shakes her head. “I’ve tried. They’re all overbooked. The radiation’s bringing new illnesses every day.”
I swallow irritation, fear, guilt — all of it. “Did you try the Ridgeway clinic?”
Her eyes widen. “Cal, that place is stupid expensive. Absolutely not.”
I reach for her hand. It feels too small, too light. Almost breakable.
“Doesn’t matter,” I say. “Call them. Make the appointment. I’ll figure out the rest.”
Her lips twitch into a soft smile, the one I fell in love with before the world went to hell. “It’s just a cold, Cal. You’re overreacting.”
“Maybe. Or maybe I’m the only one reacting at all.”
She lowers her gaze, but I don’t stop.
“You’ve been shaking every night. Sneaking off to grab extra blankets. And you think I haven’t noticed you hiding the coughing fits? Yvie... it’s been a month.”
She pauses — a tiny, fragile pause — then forces a thin smile. “It’s just the heating. And hormones.”
“Yvette.”My voice comes out steadier than I feel.Like if I lose calm, I’ll lose her too.
“We’re getting the appointment. Is that clear?”
She looks at me for a long, tired moment — like she’s weighing the fight left in her — then she nods.
“Okay, Cal.”
I squeeze her hand, trying not to think about how feather-light it feels.
The TV kicks back on by itself — another side effect of the solar storms — and the emergency broadcast chime shatters the quiet, that sharp, metallic tone we’ve all learned to ignore.
But tonight... it sounds different.
Like a warning meant for us.
***
Yvette spots me from across the parking lot—her pale face cracking open into a smile so bright it almost hides the shadows under her eyes.
Derek’s voice drifts back into my head—the guy who sits opposite my desk and thinks out loud way too much.“How do you keep loving the same person for years?” he’d asked me last week, half-bitter, half-lost after signing divorce papers.
I hadn’t known what to say then.But watching Yvette jog toward me now—breath hitching, sleeves flying, heart in her grin—the answer settles into me like it was always there:
Because she never stops choosing you. And somehow, you never stop choosing her back.
She practically collapses into the passenger seat, panting as she reaches for the heater.“Cold?” I ask.
She nods and leans in for a quick kiss, but I cup the back of her neck and pull her closer, kissing her slow and long instead.
When we part, there’s a pink flush on her cheeks and that sparkle in her eyes I’d give anything to keep.“What was that for?” she whispers.
“For being the only thing that feels steady,” I say. “Even with the sky acting like it’s about to quit.”
Right then, the clouds grumble—deep and wrong, stained faintly red from whatever radioactive mess the meteor left hanging in the atmosphere.Nobody around us even looks up. Cars inch forward, a runner adjusts her earbuds, some florist sets out discounted petunias like it’s an ordinary day.
I pull out of the lot.
“How’d the appointment go?” I ask once we’re on the road.
She fiddles with the air vents again. “Weird. The doctor says they’re seeing dozens of similar cases—some flu strain that mutates in response to the radiation particles and screws with the immune system.”
I cut her a glance. “And the treatment?”
“Basically... nothing.” She gives this tiny laugh that isn’t really a laugh. “Just wait it out.”
I drag a hand over my jaw. “We waited a month and paid half a rent payment to hear that?”
“He ordered more tests.” She digs through her purse and pulls out a crumpled sheet. “Another thing to book,” she mutters, trying to sound upbeat.
“Unbelievable,” I say under my breath.
She touches my arm. “Cal, don’t spiral. It’ll be fine.”
My teeth clamp together anyway.
“Lana told me something wild today,” she adds, trying to steer the conversation.
I pretend not to perk up—but I always do. It’s not the gossip I like. It’s her voice when she tells it.
“What now?”
“So,” she says, a smile tugging at her lips, “you know her brother-in-law works for some government department? Apparently all those FTF bots they were sending to patch the ozone—gone. Crashed. Every last one. So they’re shifting focus to building evacuation crafts.”She pauses, catching her breath. “Honestly? Sounds like garbage. We’ve got twelve billion people on Earth. They’re not flying all of us out.”
I don’t reply.The traffic light glitches between red and green like it can’t quite commit. The whole world feels like that lately—glitching, stuttering, fraying at the edges.
Yvette leans back, staring at the discolored sky. Within minutes, she’s asleep, head resting against the window, her test sheet trembling every time we hit a bump.
I keep my eyes on the road.
Trying not to notice how shallow her breathing is.Trying not to replay how quickly her strength has faded.Trying not to imagine a world collapsing from above—and her slipping away with it.
