Faces lift and fall at the edge of my vision. A red scarf. A notebook balanced on a knee. A pair of hands clasped in approval. The front row becomes a soft blur of perfumes and flashes. I keep to the mark at the end, pause, let the light find the neckline, let the satin catch and release like snow drifting away in sunshine. The room hushes and the music carries me through the turn. Flash, flash, flash. I turn and walk back. On the second pass, I let myself glance into the front row.
Marco’s there, exactly where Maya promised. He sits up straight, both hands raised in a wave he thinks is subtle. His shoes blink. His mouth forms a perfect O when he recognizes me in the gown, then it stretches into a grin that makes my ribs feel too small. Maya whispers something to him and points. He keeps waving. I let my eyes soften, and he sees it. He breaks into applause, small palms slapping softly together.
I make one more pass in a silver slip that looks like frost, a clean line of light over liquid fabric, and then the finale. The cueripples through the wings, and the models stream out in pairs, then in fours, a slow snowfall made of silk, velvet, and sequins. The violins climb in unison, a celesta answering in silver notes beneath them, the sound sharp and clear as light on glass. The runway widens, turning from a narrow river into a bright lake. We take our marks and hold the shape, a staggered V that reads as a snowflake from above.
Confetti cannons release paper snow. The first pieces drift lazily, then thousands more, a glittering storm that catches in hair and lashes, that settles on satin and melts into nothing under the heat of the lamps. Lights shift from winter blue to champagne gold, and the gowns answer with low fire. Cameras flash without blinking. Applause builds from a polite patter to a rolling cheer that presses at my ribs.
The designer steps out from the wings in a black suit and white shirt, with a small smile that looks almost shy. We open the ring to welcome him in, and the lights sharpen for the bow. He takes one, then gestures to us. We dip as one, a single tide of fabric and shine, a practiced grace that still feels like a small miracle when the room answers with more.
After, everyone kisses both cheeks and talks in three languages. I pull on jeans and boots and thank the dresser and the stylist like I was raised. I sign a release and avoid a camera pointed too close. Jules tries to steer me toward a group shot. I slip away and find Maya and Marco by the exit.
“You were a star,” Maya says. “His small palms snapped together, the loudest clap in the room.”
“I saw,” I say. I crouch to Marco. “How’d I do?”
“You walked good,” he says with the blunt honesty of a four-year-old. “But the silver dress was cold.”
“Agreed,” I say. “Ready to go home, General?”
He nods and yawns. His head tips to my shoulder in the car. Maya talks from the front seat about a casting that wants a model who can skateboard. I say I’ll try. She snorts. We laugh. The city smears past the windows, lights stretched by snow and speed. I straighten Marco’s hat, which slips sideways.
Maya pulls to the curb in front of my building. The stoop’s shallow and covered in a thin sheet of white. I thank her and unbuckle Marco, who’s half asleep but stubborn about walking on his own. We climb the stairs, step by step. I find my keys and fit them into the top lock. The hallway smells like radiator heat and someone’s takeout. The door’s old and fussy. It needs a firm hand.
I turn to flip the deadbolt and see it. A small box sits on the mat just outside our door. Crisp white paper, tied with thin black ribbon. Snow rests on the top like sifted sugar. No label. No return address.
2
LILA
Istare at the photograph under the bare kitchen light. Black and white, my face laughing at someone just out of frame, head tipped back, hair loose. A hotel window catches a slice of the cathedral spire, its reflection lit silver. Two glasses sit close together on the table, their nearness saying what words didn’t that night—careless, borrowed freedom for one evening.
The box sits open on the stainless counter. Snow from the walk dusts the paper and freckles the metal before it melts. The ribbon lies beside it, black and narrow, one edge cut clean where I slid the knife, the knot still perfectly tied. It looked like care, the kind a neighbor might take—until I saw what was inside.
I know the angle of that couch, the line of that window, and the way the city glowed like a string of coins. I hear the clink of ice, my own laugh moving through a night I thought I’d sealed away. His mouth had been too serious, until it wasn’t. His hands stayed steady when nothing else did. I remember the note on hotel stationery and how morning light painted the tram lines gold while I slept through the ending I hadn’t seen coming.
I turn the photo over. It came in the box. A strip of white card’s tucked beneath it. The letters are square and neat, written with a fine pen.
We know about the boy.
The words are thin and controlled. The meaning’s not. As I stare at the words, they throb in time with my pulse. I push the card away with my thumbnail and look again at the picture, as if a second try could change a detail. It doesn’t. Someone stood in that suite, watched that laugh open in me, and kept the proof. Someone waited five years to slide it under my door, wrapped like a gift.
Footsteps thud in the hall. I breathe long and slow through my nose until the sound fades and my balance returns. I get up, check the lock, and slide the chain into place. Back in the kitchen, the refrigerator hums its low, steady note. The microwave clock glows11:07in cold blue digits. I’ve been sitting with the box for two hours, and it hasn’t led me anywhere but back to the past I thought I’d buried.
I cross to the window. Snow melts in a thin seam along the sill, a clear thread that tracks down the paint. I press my knuckles to the glass until the cold bites and my breath steadies. Back at the table, I set the photo on a clean tea towel and square it with the edge, as if neat corners could set the day straight. My fingers curl, then flatten on the cloth.
I ground myself in the room—tile cool through my socks, counter edge solid under my palm. I won’t shake. I won’t shred this into pieces. Not while my son sleeps one room away.
I take my phone, snap a picture of the photograph, snap another of the note, and file both in a folder labeled with a string ofnumbers that means something only to me. I put the real photo back into the box and set the box at the end of the counter. Then I walk the apartment, once through each room, the way my mother used to walk the bakery before dawn. Stove off, outlet light red, window latches clicked. Shoes lined by the door, coats hung. I pull a chair under the knob and feel foolish for a second, then leave it in place.
The radiator ticks. The pipes knock once and fall quiet. The floorboard complains as I move from one room to another. I listen for anything that doesn’t belong. The building’s old and likes to make small noises that mean nothing.
I open Marco’s door with my knuckle so the hinge doesn’t squeak. The night light throws a soft strip along the rug. He lies bundled in his blanket, dark hair sticking out like a small cap, a gold star sticker on his cheek from the sheet Maya tucked into his coat for front-row bravery. His mouth opens, then closes. His hand twitches like he’s catching a snowflake.
I stand by his bed and let all the hard pieces of my day settle down in a corner. In another life, I'd have ironed a dress for tomorrow and saved my voice for ten lines of press. In this one, I check the humidifier, close the dresser drawer he left a fingerbreadth open, and count the soft rise of his chest until something inside me stills like sifted flour.
I tuck Marco’s blanket neatly over his arm, pass the couch, and straighten a crooked frame on the shelf without thinking. I know this apartment better than the back of my hand. I ease the chair out from under the knob just far enough to look through the peephole. Only a dim hallway, the neighbor’s mat, and a smear of wet from someone’s boots. I set the chair back into place again and check the chain. The knife’s where I left it. The box is where I left it. My phone lights, goes dark, and lights againwith messages that ask for hearts and sparkles and this and that about the show. I let them stack.
I call the super. His tired voice answers on the third ring. He says a man came by earlier asking which floor I lived on, then left. When I ask what he looked like, he pauses, then offers to come check. Ten minutes later, a single smart rap, like someone who knows this building and doesn’t need to knock twice. I press my eye to the peephole. The super fills the fish-eye view in his brown hoodie and puffy vest, knit cap pulled low, keys clinking on his belt. I unlatch and open it just enough to put my shoulder in the gap.
