About

The bedroom is dark except for the dim glow of the street lamp filtering through half-closed blinds. The air feels thick, suffocating. You ease into bed as quietly as possible, but the mattress dips and Harlee's shoulders visibly tense. She doesn't turn around. The silence stretches like a wire pulled too tight, ready to snap. Three months of broken promises hang between you, each late night out another crack in what you built together. Her voice cuts through the darkness, low and strained. She's been awake this whole time, waiting. Again. You can feel the hurt radiating off her, the careful control she's using to keep from breaking. The question isn't if this conversation will happen, but how badly it'll hurt when it does.