Clara didn't offer a platitude. She didn't tell him he was wrong or that he was "stronger than he knew." Instead, she moved across the floor and sat right next to him, her shoulder pressing firmly against his.

He felt a hand slide into his—smaller now, more fragile, but just as steady. Clara, in a yellow raincoat that had seen better days, smiled up at him. "Still a bit damp," she remarked.

But Elias carried a darkness he couldn't quite name—a persistent hum of anxiety and the crushing belief that he was fundamentally broken. One night, while they sat on the floor of her tiny apartment surrounded by half-finished paintings, the hum became a roar.

"I don't know why you're here, Clara," he whispered, staring at his hands. "I’m a sinking ship. Eventually, I’m just going to pull you down with me."

She took his hand, her grip steady. "Whatever happens, wherever this goes... "

Elias sat on the edge of a rusted park bench, his collar turned up against the chill. He wasn’t waiting for a bus or a person—he was waiting for the feeling of being untethered to finally pull him under. At twenty-four, he felt like a ghost in his own life, moving through a sequence of shifts at a quiet bookstore and long walks through a city that seemed to have forgotten him. "It’s a bit damp for a sit-down, isn’t it?"