I don’t change.
“Coffee’s ready,” Saul says quietly.
I walk to the kitchen on legs that don’t feel like mine. Take the mug he offers. Stand on the opposite side of the island because I don’t know how to be close to him right now.
He looks terrible. Tired in a way that goes deeper than needing sleep. There’s something in his expression. Hurt, maybe. Or resignation. Or both.
“We need to talk about what happens next,” he says.
“I know.”
“You can’t stay here.”
“So I disappear. Again.” The words taste like burnt toast. “New city. New name. New beige apartment where I slowly lose my mind until I spiral quietly until I lose my grip on reality and hump someone’s tie again. Rinse, repeat.”
“It doesn’t have to be like that.”
I look up at him. “What do you mean?”
He sets down his coffee.
“Beth wasn’t working,” he says slowly. “The invisible thing. Clearly.” He almost smiles. “You lasted weeks before you started breaking into houses.”
“In my defense, the door was unlocked. I feel like I was invited.”
The corner of his mouth twitches. And something in my chest aches, because even now, even in the middle of this, he’s still him. Still steady. Still kind. Still here.
“What if we tried something different?” he asks. “With the new identity. Something that doesn’t feel like slow death.”
Hope flickers. Dangerous. I stomp it down. “Like what?”
“You said baking keeps you sane. What if that was real? A bakery. Small town. Somewhere you could actually build a life.” He’s thinking out loud now, working through logistics. “Hiding in plain sight. People notice when someone’s trying to be invisible. But someone who’s just living? That could work.”
“You could do that? Make that happen?”
“I’d have to clear it. Make a case.” He holds my gaze. “But yeah. I think I could.”
A bakery. My own bakery. In a small town where people might actually eat my cookies instead of me just stress-baking into the void like a grief goblin.
It’s perfect. It’s everything I wanted.
And I’m supposed to be grateful. Excited. Thrilled that I get a real identity this time instead of Beth Taylor, Data Entry Specialist, Featuring: Beige.
But all I can think is: Enzo won’t know where I am. He’ll come back tonight and I’ll be gone and he’ll never taste my lemon bars. Never burn another batch of eggs in my kitchen. Never know that I would’ve chosen him. Them. This. All of it.
I’m getting my dream and losing everything that made me want to live long enough to have dreams.
“But I still can’t contact them.” It’s not a question. “Enzo. Dario. They can’t know where I am.”
Saul’s expression softens with something that looks like pain. “No. They can’t.”
“He’s coming back tonight.” My voice cracks on the word. “And I’ll just be gone.”
“That’s safer for everyone. You, him.”
“I know.” I set down my coffee because my hands are shaking too hard to hold it. “I know it’s safer. I know it’s the right call. I know all the logical reasons why this has to happen.”
I press my palms flat against the counter. “But he said he’d come back and I was counting the hours, Saul. I was so happy I forgot what sad felt like. And it isn’t just about me. What we were starting was important to him too. He lost himself too. In that family. This is going to hurt him more than you know.”
