The third one just came through.
If you don't answer in five minutes I'm calling.
I set the phone face-down and go back to the lens I've already cleaned twice. Four minutes later the phone rings.
Wren. I could let it go to voicemail. She'd call back. She always calls back.
I answer on the fourth ring.
"You're doing the thing," she says. No hello. No preamble.
"What thing?"
"Shutting me out," her voice is flat, the way it gets when she's already three steps ahead of the conversation. "You barely spoke at the walkthrough yesterday, and now you're dodging my calls. What happened?"
I switch the phone to speaker and set it on the table so I can keep cleaning the lens. "Nothing happened. The presentation was fine."
"Fine?" She draws the word out, skeptical. "Last week you said you and Sam were crushing it. Now it's fine?"
"We had an off day."
"Okay." She pauses. I hear her moving around her apartment, probably pacing. "So what are you doing to fix it?"
I set the lens down and pick up the cloth, folding it into a smaller square. I don't have an answer.
"Tommy." Her voice softens, just slightly. "What happened with Sam?"
I don't answer. I can't answer because if I start talking, I'm going to tell her everything, and then she's going to ask me why I'm sitting in my apartment hiding from it.
"You always do this," Wren says quietly. "You pull back the second things get complicated. But Sam seems like someone who'd handle the truth. She just can't understand what you refuse to tell her."
I close the photo of Sam. The screen goes black and I'm left staring at my own reflection. My face looks tired. My jaw is tight and my shoulders are up around my ears, the same way Sam's were by the elevator.
"I have to go," I say.
"Tommy—"
I hang up before she can finish.
I open my laptop and find the email I've been avoiding all week.
Subject: Dubai Commission—FINAL DEADLINE EXTENSION (Need Answer EOD)
The dates overlap Harbor District's final presentation. The one Sam will have to deliver alone if I take this job.
I've never turned down a commission this size. Not in ten years. The reply box is open. Cursor blinking.
I open the dawn photo of Sam again—her face in the early light, unguarded and focused. I look at it, and the truth Wren just tried to tell me finally clicks into place.
I pulled back today to protect the project. To protect myself from crossing a line. But watching Sam stand alone in that boardroom felt worse than any risk I could have taken. By trying not to ruin this, I sabotaged it myself.
I look back at the Dubai email. The escape hatch.
I delete my draft. I close the window without sending anything.
I pick up my phone instead. Sam's text from this morning is still on the screen.
I'm sorry,I type.Can we talk?
