The elevator rises slowly—agonizingly, each floor ticking by like minutes instead of seconds. The fluorescent lights cast strange shadows across Julian's tense profile. My reflection in the scratched metal doors shows a woman I barely recognize: pale, wide-eyed, terrified.
The cables groan and whir around us, and I count each painful second in my head. Three... four... five... The mechanical ding finally announces our arrival, and the doors slide open witha reluctant screech that makes me flinch. We step out onto the second floor.
The hallway stretches ahead, worn carpet and peeling wallpaper. Daniel's door sits at the end like a tomb.
My heart hammers against my ribs.
"If anyone comes," Julian whispers, his voice barely audible in the oppressive silence of the hallway. “We start making out. Make it look like we're just a couple who can't keep our hands off each other long enough to get into an apartment."
Despite everything, I almost laugh. "That's the plan?"
"Best I've got."
He reaches into his worn leather satchel, fingers searching until they close around a small, battered leather pouch I've never seen before. He pulls it out carefully.
The hallway remains empty. Silent except for muffled television sounds behind closed doors.
Julian drops to one knee in front of Daniel's door, his movements fluid and controlled. From that worn leather pouch, he extracts two slender tools—one looks like a thin metal pick, no thicker than a paperclip, and the other is a small L-shaped tension wrench that catches the dim hallway light.
His hands are steady as he positions them at the lock, fingers moving with the kind of practiced ease that makes my stomach flip. This isn't his first time doing this. The realization sends a chill down my spine even as I'm grateful for whatever shady skills he's picked up along the way.
"Where the hell did you learn that?"
"Colorful childhood." He doesn't look up, fingers working the tools with surprising precision. "Let's just say the neighborhood I grew up in had more than just sweet old ladies teaching piano. Some of my friends had... different skill sets. More street-smart than book-smart, if you know what I mean."
Click. Click.
"Almost there," he whispers.
My pulse roars in my ears like a freight train, drowning out everything else. I can't stop myself from glancing over my shoulder every few seconds, my eyes darting from one end of the hallway to the other.
The empty corridor feels like it's closing in on me. Every shadow looks like a person emerging from the walls. I'm convinced someone will appear at any second—a neighbor stepping out to take their trash to the chute, Mrs. Murphy from 2C heading ‘out to run errands. She’ll catch us red-handed, breaking into Daniel’s apartment like common criminals. They'll call the police. They'll—
The lock gives with a final, satisfying click.
Julian looks up at me, hand frozen on the doorknob.
This is it. The moment where everything changes, where we cross a line we can never uncross. The point of absolute, irreversible no return.
"Ready?"
No. Never. Not in a million years.
"Yeah," I whisper. "Let's do this."
He turns the handle. The door swings open into darkness.
And we step inside Daniel's lair.
The apartment swallows us whole.
My breath catches.
The first thing that hits me is the light—how it spills through the tall windows and pools on the concrete floors, pale and honest, revealing everything: the scuffs he never bothered to hide, the places where life actually happened. I stand still, just inside the apartment, as if moving might disturb the memories of what this space used to hold.
Everything looks the same—the leather sofa where we used to watch movies, the abstract art he picked out without my input, the dining table where he'd criticize my posture. But something's different. Off.
The place is a mess.
