There was one moment last week that felt different. When I looked at the camera—when I let whoever was watching know that I saw them too—there was a shift. Like the surveillance stopped being violation and became... acknowledgment. Someone seeing me. Really seeing me, not the performance of the widow or the ghost of Mrs. Pope, but me. Whoever that is now.
It was the first time in five years I felt seen instead of monitored.
And I want that again. Even though wanting it feels dangerous. Even though the rational part of my brain—the part that sounds like Dr. Cross—is screaming that seeking out surveillance is a trauma response, that I'm recreating the conditions of my marriage because familiar pain is easier than unfamiliar freedom.
But maybe I need to be seen before I can figure out who I am without Gabriel's reflection showing me.
I walk back to the kitchen and pick up the invitation one more time.
Your presence would honor us.
Lucien Armitage is a stranger who sends formal invitations and builds exclusive clubs and probably has reasons for inviting me that have nothing to do with being honored by my presence. But he's offering me a space. A booth. A gallery. Somewhere to exist that isn't this apartment where I'm slowly disappearing.
I take out my phone. Type:Mr. Armitage, thank you for the invitation. I'll attend. — Lana Pope
I send it before I can reconsider.
His response arrives thirty seconds later:Wonderful. I look forward to seeing you. A car will collect you at 7:45 PM.
Of course he's arranged a car. Of course he knows where I live. Lucien Armitage is the kind of man who knows things.
I set down my phone and look at the invitation one more time.
Friday. Two days away.
Two days to decide if I'm brave or just addicted to being watched.
The rest of the day dissolves into the kind of numbness I've become familiar with. I eat yogurt from the container because cooking for one person feels performative. I read half a chapter of a book I won't remember. I sit on my couch—second-hand, purchased from a furniture store in The Hollows where no one knew my face or my last name—and watch the afternoon light change angles across my walls.
At 4 PM, my phone rings. Solange.
I answer. "Hey."
"You sound dead." Her voice is warm, still carrying traces of The Hollows despite two decades working in The Crest. "Tell me you left the apartment today."
"I left the apartment yesterday."
"Lana."
"I'm fine. Just tired." The lie comes easily. I've been lying about being fine for so long it's become my most fluent language.
"You're not fine. You're isolating again." I hear papers shuffling on her end. Solange is probably at the foundation office, surrounded by funding proposals and donor files and all the work I should be helping with but can't quite manage. "Come in tomorrow. We have the donor lunch. You need to be here."
I'd forgotten about the lunch. Some tech CEO who's interested in funding our expansion into legal aid for domestic violence survivors. Important. The kind of meeting that requires Mrs. Pope's widow face—gracious, grateful, appropriately bereaved but inspiringly resilient.
"What time?" I ask.
"Noon. And Lana? Wear something that isn't black."
"I'm in mourning."
"You're in hiding." Her tone softens. "I'm not saying you have to wear pink. Just... maybe charcoal? Navy? Something that says, 'I'm healing' instead of 'I'm haunting my own life.'"
I almost laugh. Almost. "I'll think about it."
"That's not a yes."
"It's the best you're getting."
