Chapter 127

• The next morning began in the kind of quiet that doesn’t belong to a sleeping city but to one that has just begun to stretch. The street below was not yet filled with the impatient hum of traffic, only the occasional car passing and the soft rhythm of footsteps heading toward early shifts. The light through the kitchen window was pale and a little hesitant, as though it was not quite ready to declare itself daytime. I stood at the counter with a mug of coffee warming my hands, letting the stillness of it seep into me before the day began in earnest.
• The lunch with Simone and Claudia the day before had done more than I expected. The air in the boutique felt lighter afterward, as though unspoken things had finally been given room to breathe. We had not solved everything — no conversation could erase every layer of tiredness or stress — but we had made it easier to carry. I thought of Simone’s expression when she admitted how stretched thin she felt, and Claudia’s relief when she realized she could say she was overwhelmed without it being seen as failure. There was something powerful in naming the weight you were carrying.
• I finished my coffee, dressed without hurry, and walked to the boutique with the kind of steady pace that comes when you are not running late but still have a purpose. The bell above the door greeted me with its familiar soft ring. Inside, the air smelled faintly of fresh flowers; Claudia must have opened the small bouquet delivery before I arrived. The blooms were set on the counter in a glass vase, not yet arranged but already brightening the space.