The sky hadn't stopped weeping since yesterday.
Even as morning arrived, the rain lingered like a sorrow that refused to let go. It clung to the windowpanes of the broken district and soaked into the thin roofs that covered far too many lives pressed beneath them.
For Elara, mornings were never beginnings. They were continuations of battles carried from the night before—some against hunger, others against hope.
She sat on a worn concrete step, under the half-collapsed awning of a forgotten building. Mara's small head rested in her lap, her breath slow and shallow, curls damp from the storm. Elara had used her own coat to wrap around her sister's shoulders sometime during the night. Now, her thin blouse clung cold to her skin, and every gust of wind cut sharper than the last.
But she didn't shiver.
She stared at the wet, glistening street. At the puddles reflecting fractured skies. At a city that had long since learned to look away from people like her.
The half-apple was still in her pocket, the bruised side softening with time. She didn't eat it last night. She wouldn't today either.
A soft cough escaped Mara, rousing her slightly.
"Elara?" the child murmured sleepily, voice raw from the cold.
"I'm here," Elara whispered, brushing a damp curl from her sister's forehead. "You're safe."
Safe. The word hung awkwardly in the air, like it didn't belong here.
She adjusted Mara's scarf and kissed her temple. And just as she did, she felt it—that sensation again. The odd prickling at the back of her neck. The weight of unseen eyes.
She looked up.
Across the narrow street, a sleek black car slowed to a stop under the dripping shadow of a withered tree. It gleamed like a stranger in this world—polished, pristine, untouched by the rot around it.
Its windows were dark, and for a moment, Elara saw nothing.
But someone was inside.
And for a brief, unexplainable moment, she felt… seen.
Not pitied.
Not judged.
Just seen.
Then the car moved on. Quietly. Without pause.
By the time Mara stirred again, it had vanished.
⸻
Lucien Dorne did not believe in omens. But he couldn't shake her from his mind.
He hadn't truly seen her face. Just her figure hunched over a child. Just a pair of soaked shoulders trying to guard against the cold.
But something about that moment stuck like thorns in silk.
He sat in the backseat of his car as the driver rambled about the shortcut through the lower districts. Something about road closures and construction detours. Lucien hadn't listened. Not since he saw her.
He should've forgotten. She wasn't someone from his world. She wasn't someone he was allowed to care about.
But the city had felt different this morning. As if the sky had pressed down just a little harder. As if something was shifting—quietly, invisibly, but undeniably.
And she had been there when it started.
⸻
Lucien's day unraveled in high towers and hollow rooms.
Boardrooms full of old men shouting in polished suits. Plans for mergers, expansions, profit margins. Legacy.
He barely spoke. He nodded where necessary, signed where expected. But his mind was elsewhere—caught in the gray between memory and imagination.
It wasn't just her. It was the air. The way the city felt split—like a crack running straight through its heart.
And for the first time in a long while, he wondered which side he belonged to.
⸻
Meanwhile, Elara moved like a ghost through the day's pale hours.
She walked through market lanes where vendors didn't bother calling to her anymore—they knew she couldn't buy. She scavenged for warmth where she could find it—sunlight leaking through broken windows, the smell of baking bread wafting from places she'd never enter.
She found a rose near the alleyway. Half-wilted, dark red, its petals soft with rain.
She stared at it for a long time before picking it up.
Bruised. Not yet broken.
She didn't know why she kept it.
Maybe because it reminded her of herself.
⸻
That afternoon, she passed by the old train station. Her head was bowed, hand clutching Mara's, coat flapping in the wind.
Lucien passed by the same corner seconds before. His jacket brushed her shoulder.
Neither of them turned.
But both felt it.
A jolt. A flicker.
Something unnamed.
⸻
Later, Elara entered the small bakery near the edge of the main street—one she never went into before. Not because she didn't want to, but because she'd always assumed she couldn't afford even the smell.
Today, she went in.
She had enough coins for one small roll.
The warmth inside wrapped around her like a forgotten memory. And just as she exhaled, something caught her attention.
The scent of cologne. Subtle, expensive. It lingered in the air like someone important had just left.
Lucien had walked out four minutes earlier.
And she had stepped into the exact echo he left behind.
⸻
That night, as Mara slept curled against her side again, Elara stood alone on the rooftop.
She held the bruised rose in her hands, now darker from the cold.
She watched the lights of the rich part of the city glow in the distance like a different world. Their windows didn't rattle. Their ceilings didn't leak. Their children didn't cry from hunger.
And yet she didn't envy them.
She pitied them. Because no one from that world could ever understand how beautiful it was to still be gentle, even when life wasn't.
She thought of the shadow in the car.
Of the scent in the bakery.
Of something she couldn't name building just beneath her skin.
And far above her, Lucien stood at his balcony with the night wrapped around him. The wind tugged at his shirt sleeves, the lights below blinking like stars.
He pulled out a folded napkin from his coat pocket—one he didn't remember taking.
A faint smudge of apple.
A trace of cinnamon.
He stared into the rain.
And whispered to no one, "Where are you?"