"Engagement party. Tomorrow. Here." I watch her process this. Watch the color drain from her face.
"My father is dying," she says slowly. Carefully. Like she's explaining something to a child. "And you expect me to party?"
"I expect you to show strength." I move back to the heavy bag, needing something to do with my hands before I punch something that isn't leather. "The Russians just proved they can hit us. Your father's in the hospital. We look weak. Vulnerable. The engagement party shows everyone that we're not backing down. That we're united. That hitting us only made us stronger."
"That's…" She stops and swallows whatever she was going to say. "That's cruel."
"It's strategic." I hit the bag once, twice, letting the impact ground me. "It's what your father would do if he could."
"Don't." Her voice is sharp now, angry. "Don't tell me what my father would do. You don't know him."
"I know men like him." I hit the bag again and again. "I know what it takes to survive in this world. And right now, we need to show strength, not weakness."
"So I'm supposed to smile and shake hands and pretend everything's fine while my father fights for his life?"
"Yes." I turn to face her. "That's exactly what you're supposed to do."
Her eyes are shining now with rage or tears. I can't tell. Maybe both.
"No." The word is quiet and final.
I laugh, not because it's funny but because it's absurd. Because she actually thinks she has a choice.
"Yes."
I turn back to the bag as sweat drips and muscles scream. I hit it harder, trying to beat out the image of her face, the hurt there, the betrayal.
"You need to be strong." The words come out between punches, rough and almost gentle despite the violence of my movements.
Behind me, I hear her breath catch. I hear the sound of her trying not to cry. Fuck. I hate this. I hate being the one to hurt her. I hate that she's looking at me like I'm the enemy when all I'm trying to do is keep us both alive. But this is the world we live in. This is what being a Murphy means. Hard choices. Cruel choices.
"That's easy for you to say, William." Her voice breaks on my name. "When you're high, and the rest of us mortals have to do this fucking sober."
The words slice through me.
I stop mid-punch. The bag swings forward and hits me in the chest. I barely feel it. She used profanity.
She's crying now, not sobbing, just tears streaming down her face while she stares at me with an expression that's part rage, part devastation, part something I can't name.
"Aoife…"
"Don't." She backs toward the stairs. "Don't say anything. Don't apologize. Don't tell me again what I'm supposed to do or how I'm supposed to feel or that this is all strategy."
"It is strategy…"
"I know!" The words explode out of her. "I know it's strategy. I know it's smart. I know my father would tell me the same thing if he were awake. But he's not awake, William. He's in a hospital bed with a tube breathing for him because someone put a bullet through his throat. And you're standing here telling me to smile about it."
"I'm telling you to survive it."
"By pretending it doesn't hurt?" She swipes at her tears, angry at them, at me, at everything. "By shutting off the parts of me that feel things? By becoming like you?"
The words hit like a knife between the ribs.
"You don't want to be like me," I say quietly.
"No." She meets my eyes. "I really don't."
She turns and climbs the stairs. Her footsteps echo through the basement and grow fainter, then disappear entirely as the door closes behind her.
