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I cross to the window and stare past my reflection into the compound’s interior stone courtyard. Our father had it landscaped for our mother, filling every corner with roses. Now, a security guard passes the empty pots along the eastern path, his breath pluming in the cold air, hand resting on the gun at his hip.
Winter has left the courtyard colorless, the trees reduced to gray sticks, the fountain at the center capped with snow, the water frozen solid in the basin.
My breath fogs the glass, obscuring the view for a moment before clearing.
But even in summer, no flowers will grow. After our parents died, the roses had been removed. I never asked who gave the order. I told myself it was grief, or practicality, or the gardeners taking it upon themselves to remove them, with no one bothering to replant them afterward.
Standing here now, the truth settles as my breath clears from the glass. I always knew.
And I’m standing in their very footsteps, waiting to learn if Alexei will dig me up and dispose of me as well.
I turn away from the empty courtyard and head for the door. Silence greets me in the corridor beyond, the family having already moved on to whatever comes next.
My footsteps echo on the marble as I head back to the side entrance, each step carrying me farther from the identity that has shaped my entire life.
The night air bites my cheeks as I step outside, cold enough to burn my lungs.
When I arrive at my car, no one has warmed it up for me, and snow covers the windshield. Such a petty signal that I’m out of favor.
My sigh forms a white cloud in the air as I climb inside and start the engine. The whir of the wipers flings the snow to the sides, and I turn a tight circle in front of the garage before heading out of the compound.
I drive without a destination for several minutes, following the highway east until it reaches the coastline before heading south toward Ashford Heights.
The cold steering wheel warms beneath my palms, the heater pushing back the icy cold. At the first exit ramp, my foot hovers over the brake without engaging it.
I could still turn around, go back to the compound, tell Alexei I needed time to think, and let him believe I’m considering his plan.
The ramp passes, and I keep driving.
The second exit comes and goes in the same way. My hands tighten on the wheel, knuckles white.
The choice isn’t really mine.
By the third exit, the pretense shatters. I’m following the path I was always meant to take. The destination was set the moment I left the compound, maybe the moment Alexei walked out of the council room.
The realization doesn’t bring peace. It brings a different kind of burden, the heaviness of a door closing.
The air thickens with the salt and rotting kelp blowing up from the shore as I pass Skyhaven. The billionaire mansions crouch on their hill behind high walls, every window dark.
I used to dream of someday living on that hill instead of out in the middle of nowhere, but now, when I look at those high walls, they only remind me of the compound’s gates.
An empty bus passes in the opposite lane, its interior lights casting long rectangles on the asphalt. One passenger sits slumped in the back seat, head resting on the window, completely still. Settled. The taillights disappear around the curve.
Rockhaven slips past, the historical neighborhoods with their cute boutiques glowing amber under their streetlights.
My hands cramp on the wheel, and I flex my fingers. The motion becomes mechanical, a reflex my body performs while my mind circles.
Calm stays out of reach. So does any sense of safety. This is the breathless fall after the jump, the wait for the ground to hit.
The highway curves toward Ashford Heights. Each mile marker is a stitch pulling tighter, binding me to what I’m about to do.
One exit would take me off this path. The thought surfaces, a final, primal urge to survive, but my hands don’t turn the wheel. The car stays in its lane.
By the time I take the exit for Ashford Heights, the first buildings rising into view, I’ve stopped checking the rearview. Whatever I leave behind me is gone.
I don’t go to the Blue Note Lounge.
I don’t go to my apartment, either.
