“Where?”
“My apartment.”
The location created a different kind of awareness. Dani caught it.
“Conversation only.”
“I know.”
“Rose knows where I live.”
“So does Blake.”
“Less reassuring.”
We took the bus.
Dani’s apartment was warm, messy, and alive: running shoes by the door, Lola’s drawings on the refrigerator, unopened mail beside a bowl of safety pins and energy gels. She moved laundry from the sofa, brought two untouched glasses of water, paced once between the kitchen and window, then sat at the opposite end of the couch. Every movement delayed the same sentence.
“The first marathon,” she said. Then stopped. Her foot pressed hard into the floor. “I keep trying to give you the clean version.”
“I did not request a clean version.”
“No. You requested Thursday.”
Dani picked up the water, set it down untouched, and stared at the ring it left on the table. “There was a paper cup at mile twenty-two. White with blue printing. I crushed it without noticing. My fingers went numb around it.”
I waited.
“The crowd got far away. Then too close. A volunteer asked my name three times. I could see her mouth. I could not make the words become language.” Dani rubbed her palms against her trousers. “I thought I was dying. Then I thought I was making dying embarrassing for everyone.”
A joke shape. No laugh.
“What happened?” I asked.
“I sat against a barricade. Threw up. Medical staff removed me. Later someone used the words panic attack.”
Her fingers began tapping against her thigh. I placed my hand over them. Not because a rule classified the contact. Because she was here and I was asking her to remain.
“Is this okay?”
“Yes.” Her fingers turned beneath mine and held on.
“Treatment?”
“Eventually. Rose found the first therapist. I stayed until I could function without feeling watched by my own body, then decided functioning meant finished.”
“Do symptoms still occur while running?”
“Early ones—tingling, sound distortion, the route narrowing.”
“With me?”
“The day I changed the route near mile twenty-two.”
“You said traffic.”
“I used traffic because it was technically true somewhere in the city.” Her mouth twisted. “That is how I lie while pretending I’m honest.”
