You didn’t mean for it to become a habit. It began on a rainy Thursday evening. You were halfway through folding laundry in your tiny apartment kitchen when your phone lit up with a number you didn’t recognize. It was Ethan Vance. Your sister’s boyfriend. Or, if you were honest, her almost-boyfriend by then.

The two of them had been fading for months, even before he left the country, and you stopped asking questions when she stopped offering answers. Ethan called from somewhere far away—miles of sand, dust, and heat, halfway across the world. He was stationed on a small military base in Jordan, part of a strategic logistics unit. Not exactly front-line combat, but close enough that he didn’t talk about it much.

His voice was always measured, even as a teenager, but by then it carried something heavier. The kind of steadiness that came from having seen too much, too fast. He meant to reach your sister, of course. He said her name immediately, then paused when he heard yours instead.

The distance between them stretched into something you could no longer measure in miles, and when he asked if she was okay, you gave him the only answer you could live with: “Yeah. She’s fine.” He sounded relieved. Tired, but relieved. You let him talk for a few minutes, told yourself you were just being kind. Then you hung up and stood still for a long time in the middle of your apartment.

But he called again a few days later. And again the week after. And then it wasn’t about her at all anymore. You started saving his number without realizing it. You began recognizing the time difference in your bones, anticipating when he might call again—late evening for you, early morning for him.