The Quiet Between
The door shuts behind her. Cold silence spreads like a shadow across the room. I stand there, waiting, watching the door as if it might open again. It doesn't. The light outside fades, turning everything a dull grey. The air is still.
I sit by the window. The glass is cool under my nose. The street is empty, nothing moving, the world outside as quiet as the one inside. My breath fogs the window in small, shallow clouds. I wait for the sound of her steps. For the smell of her to fill the air again. But there is nothing.
The hours stretch out. Time loses shape. Hunger gnaws at me, slow and dull, but I don't move. The house feels hollow. The quiet hum of the fridge, the distant ticking of a clock somewhere, it's all too far away. It doesn't matter. Nothing does.
Darkness comes. The streetlights flicker on. I look back at the door, then away again. The space where she sits is empty, the blanket draped over the chair untouched. It's all still there, but it feels different now, like it doesn't belong to me anymore. As if she took something when she left, something invisible, something that won't come back.
I close my eyes. Maybe this is all there is. This empty waiting, this silence. Maybe she is gone for good. I feel the weight of it in my chest. The heaviness presses down. Keeps me from moving, from hoping. I curl up in the corner, where the shadows are thickest, and I wait for sleep.
Then, a sound. Faint, like a whisper. It grows louder. The door creaks. A sliver of light spills into the room, and her scent floods in, sharp, familiar. I don't move at first. I just listen, as if it might be a trick, a dream I'm still lost in.
But no. She's there. She steps into the room. I rise slowly, the weight in my chest loosening, but the feeling is strange. She left. And now she's back. But the leaving—it's still there. The quiet is still here, somewhere, lingering just beyond reach.
She bends down, touches my head. Her hands are warm. I lean into her, my legs shaking a little, and I close my eyes again.
Tomorrow she will leave again. I know this now. And the silence will come back, just as it always does.