I padded across the room on bare feet, the morning light soft and patient against the curtains. She moved like a shadow slipping into the bathroom, silent, sure. For a moment, I just stood there, watching the way the steam began to gather against the glass door, the small, ordinary domesticity of it all. It calmed something in me I couldn't name.
Her laptop sat open on the small desk where she'd been working the night before. A sliver of the screen caught my eye. Lines of code marching across the window, progress bars creeping forward like tiny, determined heartbeats. I'd never seen anything like it up close, just corporate reports and emails, but something about the motion made me lean in.
