Iris wilted. Just enough to be visible.
“Oh,” she said, blinking once. Her hand lifted to her face, adjusting the hem of her hat over her forehead. “Of course, no pressure. I just thought—“
She paused again. Her eyes searched Hazel’s face, concern flickering beneath the smile that had mostly faded by now.
“Are you okay?” she asked, leaning in.
Hazel took a step back, emotion rushing to the back of her throat. She had to get out of here, fast, or she knew she’d lose the careful grip she held on her composure.
“I have an appointment,” she said, offering Iris a tight, practiced smile. “I’m actually late.”
“Right— yoga with Leigh?” Iris offered, like she was trying to help.
Hazel nodded… or maybe it was more of a hum. A sound made of nothing.
“I’ll see you,” she said, voice already fading as she turned away.
“Okay,” Iris said behind her, uncertain. “Take care, Hazel. Text me if you need me.”
Hazel lifted a hand in the shape of a vague wave. Her throat felt tight, dry, and heavy with regret.
But she didn’t look back.
The tears came halfway down the street. Just a slow prickling at first, a burn at the corners of her eyes. Then more. A quiet flooding. Her vision blurred, but she kept walking, one foot, then the other. Past shops strung with lights, past couples wrapped in scarves, their gloved hands clasped together between them, past windows filled with a warmth she couldn’t feel.
She pulled the scarf tighter around her neck.
It didn’t help.
By the time Hazel made it home, the late afternoon had gone still and bitter. It was the kind of cold that crept beneath the seams of your coat despite layers. Despite effort. Her fingers fumbled with the key, numb and slow, and when the door finally creaked open, the familiar hush of the old house greeted her like a held breath. Not welcoming, not unkind, just waiting.
She stepped inside and closed the door behind her, the latch clicking into place like punctuation. She didn’t bother taking off her coat right away. She just moved in stiff, aching silence through the dim front hall, past the quiet of the living room with its faded, wornarmchairs and the ghost of warming radiators, into the kitchen where the air still smelled faintly of apples and something herbal.
Without turning on a light, she reached for the half-empty bottle of wine on the counter— something she’d opened a few nights back, for no real reason besides that she could. She didn’t bother with a glass, just took a long pull straight from the neck, then leaned her hip against the counter and waited for the heat to crawl down her throat and settle in her chest like a false comfort. She drank again, slower this time, but deeper, too.
The silence pressed against her skin like a second layer. Not oppressive, just thick. Weighty. Full of everything she didn’t want to name.
She drank until her shoulders loosened. Until the sharp edges dulled.
And then she moved.
Not upstairs, not to bed.Down.
The basement door groaned on its hinges when she pulled it open. The air hit her like a memory— cool and damp and earthy, with the faint scent of mothballs and old cardboard. She flicked on the light at the top of the stairs. It sputtered once, then buzzed to life, casting long shadows over the narrow wooden steps and the crumbling stone walls below.
She hadn’t been down here in years.
The boxes were where she remembered them, tucked beneath the long wooden shelves that still held half-empty jars of nails and mismatched bolts and a rusted watering can that might’ve belonged to someone three generations ago. The moving boxes were slumped together like a collapsed spine, softened by time, their Sharpie labels faded and bleeding. Some were sealed with brittle tape that flaked apart beneath her grip and others had been opened years ago, peeked into, then closed again without the courage to finish.
Hazel dragged five of the empty ones upstairs and to the second floor, a couple at a time. The cardboard scratched her arms, tore faint lines into the fabric of her coat, but she didn’t care. She set them in the upstairs hallway and stared at them for a long moment, as if expecting them to speak.
Then she turned and faced her grandmother’s bedroom door.
She hadn’t opened it since coming home. Not fully. Not with intention. Maybe once or twice she’d cracked it, long enough to grab something from the laundry basket on the bed or to avoid the ache that came with pretending the room didn’t exist. But she hadn’t stepped inside, not really.
Not until now.
The door creaked open under her palm.
