Inside the subway, the air was thick with iron, wet fabric, and a hint of smoke.
I hold the pole because every seat is taken. My shoulder brushes a stranger's backpack every time the train lurches forward. The doors slide shut with a tired sigh. Brooklyn pulls away. Manhattan waits ahead. Unavoidable.
I am not visiting this city. I am here because my alarm went off at 6:10 a.m. Because there is a desk somewhere expecting me to do something useful.
The train rattles underground. Lights flicker briefly. No one reacts.
A man sleeps standing up across from me. His forehead presses to the glass. The reflection doubles and warps his face. His mouth hangs slightly open. Each time the train slows, his knees buckle and correct themselves. Muscle memory holds him upright.
Two seats down, a woman cries without sound. No shaking shoulders. No sobs. Just tears slipping down her face, disappearing into the scarf wrapped too tightly around her neck. She wipes them with the back of her glove and stares straight ahead, daring anyone to notice. No one does.
Near the door, a girl about my age sits cross-legged, reading a manuscript. Red ink slashed across the margins. Whole paragraphs circled. Arrows pointing everywhere. She chews the end of her pen, then adds another note with ruthless precision. I catch a phrase upside down. Something about a woman leaving a town she swore she would never abandon. I look away.
The recorded voice announces the next stop in a cheerful tone that feels vaguely offensive. Life being rude by continuing.
It strikes me. Not the sadness. Not the grief. The ordinariness.
No one is special here. Not the sleeping man, not the crying woman, not the girl gutting someone's story with red ink. Not me.
No one looks at my face and pauses. No one asks if I am okay. No one knows my grandmother died. No one knows the girl I loved is married to someone else. No one knows that I woke up this morning already exhausted, as if I had spent the night holding something heavy just to prove I could.
In Willowbrook, grief followed me.
It sat beside me at the diner. It crept into conversations. It softened voices when people said my name. Even silence felt like attention there.
Here, grief dissolves into the crowd. It does not echo. It does not demand space. It becomes another weight carried quietly between stops.
The realization hits gently, almost kindly. No one is watching.
Relief comes in a rush I did not expect. My shoulders loosen without permission. My breath deepens. For the first time in days, I do not feel like I am performing survival.
The train jolts to a stop. People shuffle off, others shuffle on. Someone bumps my elbow and mutters an apology without meeting my eyes. I nod automatically.
Anonymous. Unremarkable. Safe.
The doors close again. I catch my reflection in the darkened window. Same coat. Same tired eyes. Same version of me that left Willowbrook carrying more than he could explain.
But here, that version blends in. Brooklyn does not ask me to heal. Manhattan will not ask me to confess. This city does not react to pain. It absorbs it, layers it, buries it under movement and noise and schedules and purpose.
The train surges forward, and I let it carry me. If anonymity is the price of survival, I can afford it. For now.
I realize I have forgotten my phone halfway down the block.
The thought hits like a dull, amused irritation. My brain is tired of reacting to anything with real urgency. I stop, turn around, and head back up the narrow stairs two at a time, keys in hand.
The apartment greets me the same way it did an hour ago: quietly unimpressed. Morning light leaks through the blinds in thin, uneven stripes, illuminating dust I do not remember inviting in. The place smells faintly of cardboard, instant coffee, and something fried from the bodega downstairs that refuses to leave. The couch sags in the middle like it has given up on being supportive.
Josh is asleep on it. Not curled up. Not tucked in. Just collapsed. One arm hangs off the side, fingers grazing the floor. His laptop rests on his chest, screen glowing. A half-written sentence frozen mid-thought.
I pause. The sentence reads:
He did not know whether leaving was an act of courage or cowardice, only that staying felt like—
The cursor blinks. Patient. Relentless. I tilt the screen down before it burns itself into permanence. Josh stirs, muttering something incoherent that might be a protest or a line of dialogue. His hair sticks up in three directions, faint indentations marking his cheek from the keyboard.
So much for "one more paragraph."
I find my phone on the kitchen counter, next to a mug holding yesterday's coffee like evidence. I pocket it. Josh groans and opens one eye.
"You're back," he says, voice thick. "That was fast."
"Forgot my phone," I reply.
He squints. "Rookie mistake."
"You slept on the couch," I point out.
"Professionally homeless," he says, stretching without leaving the couch. "Part of my brand now."
I snort. "Your brand cannot afford a bed yet?"
"Your brand insisted on paying first and last month's rent," he says, closing the laptop and finally sitting up. "Some of us are artists."
"Some of us like electricity," I shoot back. "And not getting evicted."
Josh rubs his face and looks around like he is seeing it for the first time. The bare walls. The folding table we call a desk. The mismatched chairs that have never agreed on anything in their lives.
"We really live here," he says.
"Terrifying, isn't it?"
He grins faintly. "We need groceries."
"We need everything."
"I call dibs on the desk."
"You write on the couch."
"My spine would like a word with you."
"You chose this life," I remind him, slipping on my jacket again.
He tilts his head. "You are going to be late."
"Been on time for more than a month now," I say. "I'm allowed to be late once."
Josh nods, accepting that logic with suspicious ease. "I will make a list."
"For groceries?"
"For rent," he says. "And who owes who for what. And which of us is pretending this is normal."
I pause at the door.
"We are not pretending," I say. "We are adjusting."
He watches me, something unreadable passing through his eyes, then shrugs. "Same thing."
As the door clicks shut behind me, I realize something quietly important. There is no ceremony. No declarations. No neatly unfolding healing arc.
We are just here. Two brothers dividing space, money, and responsibility. Rebuilding something that looks like family without naming it.
It is not poetic. It is logistics.
And somehow, that feels like progress.
Tomorrow will not be this quiet.