Time blurs like watercolors bleeding together, reds and blues crafting a mural of dusty plum. I drift through the days, detached from everything that used to tether me.

The only constant is Oliver’s shadow in my doorway each night, his presence both an anchor and a cage as my fingers trace familiar paths. The edge always comes, threatening to bust through my shield with an explosion I might not survive.

And that’s why I pull back, night after night, denying myself the release I crave as his dark gaze burns into my skin.

I don’t understand this ritual we’ve created. Why he needs to witness my restraint. Why I let him. But it’s become the only thing that feels real anymore.

During the day, I’m as much of a ghost as Sebastian.

Astrid oversees my meals, dutifully watching me eat food I can’t taste. Sleep comes in fits and starts. I’ve thought about picking up my sketchbook to design my wedding dress, but it’s hard to plan a future I’m no longer excited about. The fashion line I once dreamed of feels like someone else’s ambition now, a remnant of a girl who no longer exists, so the pages remain blank.

Oliver disappears into his work, supposedly buried in Brotherhood ledgers and spreadsheets. But the few times I’ve passed his home office, I find him frozen in place, staring at the same document as if his mind isn’t in the room at all.

Each night, I rush past the locked door that lingers at the edge of my awareness and slip into the rhythm of our rendezvous. It’s the only thing that cracks through my apathy, this ritual straddling the line between intimacy and indecency. Not that I mind the numbness. It’s become my refuge, a quiet space between breathing and breaking.

But even apathy has its limits, because on the afternoon of the memorial, my tears come back with a vengeance.

I cross the threshold of the grand ballroom and take in the sea of solemn faces as a splinter of grief lodges deep. Calla lilies and winter roses hang thick in the air, mingling with the scent of melted wax. Chairs creak as guests shift in their seats, the occasional sniffle or muffled sob rising like static.

At the podium, a man I don’t recognize speaks, his white hair glowing silver-blue beneath the lights. He drones on about loss, legacy, and sacrifice, but the words are soulless vibrations buzzing in my ears.

For the entirety of his rehearsed speech, I fix my gaze on the eight-foot photographs at the front of the room. Sebastian’s azure eyes stare back, impossibly alive, his crooked grin spearing me in the heart.

A direct hit.

Next to him, Tatum leans casually against a stone pillar. Both are captured mid-laugh, frozen in black frames—snapshots of moments that will never happen again.