Esme couldn't sleep.
The guest room Liam had offered her was quiet—too quiet. The bed was soft, the sheets freshly laundered, the window cracked just enough to let in the scent of rain that hadn't fallen yet. But none of it felt right.
The silence pressed in on her like hands. Suffocating. Watching.
She sat up. Swung her legs over the side of the bed. Her knees were stiff, her ribs still sore from where one of the men had elbowed her. She touched the tender spot, not for the pain, but to remind herself it had happened. That it was real. That she wasn't dreaming. That her mother's scarves were really gone—shredded like tissue. That her home had been turned inside out. That she had left, again, with only the smallest, most broken things in her arms.
A jagged breath slipped past her lips.
She stood and padded barefoot into the living room. The apartment was dark, but not empty. A lamp glowed dimly in the corner, casting long shadows across Liam's couch, his desk, the jacket still slung over the back of a chair. He hadn't moved it.
She stood there, arms wrapped tightly around herself, until the walls began to close in.
Then she stepped out onto the balcony.
It was a modest view—just rooftops and streetlights—but the air was cool and open, and it let her breathe.
She pressed her palms to the metal railing. Cold. Solid. Her eyes fluttered shut.
"Esme."
She didn't jump.
She hadn't heard the door open, hadn't noticed the sound of footsteps behind her, but she wasn't surprised. Liam had a way of being present even in silence. He was always watching—always listening. The detective in him, maybe. Or something else.
She didn't look at him. Just said softly, "Did I wake you?"
"No," Liam said. "I couldn't sleep either."
There was a pause. Then the low creak of the railing as he leaned beside her, arms folded, mirroring her posture.
They stood like that for a while. Silent. The wind combing through the trees below them, a siren somewhere in the distance. The city never really slept. It only quieted, like a predator watching from the tall grass.
Esme didn't realize she was crying until the breeze cooled the tears on her cheeks.
She sniffed, wiped her face quickly, and said—too fast, too brittle—"They tore through her things like it meant nothing."
Liam said nothing.
Esme's fingers clenched the rail tighter.
"I know they didn't mean anything to anyone else. Just old scarves. Broken pins. Dried perfume bottles. But they were all I had left. All that's left of her. And they just—" Her voice broke. She shook her head. "They destroyed them like she was never real."
Liam looked at her then. His brow furrowed, the way it always did when he was trying to piece something together but didn't have all the clues.
Esme let out a shaky laugh. "You probably think it's stupid."
"I don't," he said quietly.
"I kept them in this box," she whispered. "Wrapped everything like they were relics. And now it's just pieces. I don't know why it hurts so much. She's been gone for years. But tonight… it feels like I lost her all over again."
Her chest tightened. The ache pulsed like a bruise, old grief resurfacing with a vengeance. She bit the inside of her cheek hard enough to taste iron.
Liam's voice, when it came, was careful. "You didn't lose her. Not tonight. Just… what she left behind."
"But that was her," Esme said. "Her scent. Her handwriting on old notes. The scarf she wore when she used to braid my hair. You don't understand—" Her voice cracked. "It's the only proof I ever had that she was good."
She hadn't meant to say that part. It slipped out like a secret too long buried.
Liam turned fully toward her now, leaning slightly closer. "What do you mean?"
Esme stared straight ahead. She couldn't look at him. If she did, she might unravel completely.
"My mother… wasn't perfect," she said carefully. "She had… secrets. I'm sure people hated her for them. But to me, she was warmth. She was the sound of wind chimes in summer and the smell of lavender in winter. And when she died, all I had left were those little pieces. Now even that's gone."
The wind picked up. She hugged herself tighter.
"I can't stop hearing the rip," she said softly. "Of her scarf. The sound it must've made. Like skin being torn."
Liam's jaw tightened, but he still didn't speak. He didn't offer hollow promises or say it's going to be okay. He just stood there with her, in the ache, in the silence, not trying to fix it—just letting it exist.
She was grateful for that.
Most people rushed to mend what they didn't understand.
He let it hurt.
Eventually, she let her head fall against his shoulder. Just for a moment. Just long enough to let her body remember what calm could feel like.
"I don't know who I am without her," she whispered.
Liam didn't move.
"I don't know if I'm good."
Still, he didn't move.
And Esme… Esme didn't pull away.
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Inside the apartment, the lamp flickered once.
Then steadied.
Esme drifted back to the guest room eventually, but she didn't sleep.
Neither did Liam.
They existed in parallel quiet, on opposite sides of a wall, listening to the echoes of everything they hadn't said.
——————————————————
Across the city, a phone rang.
In a dark room filled with smoke and silence, a man answered.
"She's alive, but shaken," said the voice on the other end.
There was a pause. Then: "And the detective?"
Another pause.
"Still with her."
A low breath. A curse muttered under the man's breath.
Then, coldly: "Next time, don't leave witnesses."
——————————————————
Back in Liam's apartment, Esme lay on her side.
Her mother's broken hairpin was wrapped in a cloth on the nightstand beside her.
Her eyes remained open long after the city had gone to sleep.