That was a wall.
I should’ve left it.
Instead I stepped closer.
“Did I do something?”
That made him finally look at me properly.
Really look.
Like the question annoyed him in a different way than usual.
“No,” he said again. Quieter this time.
Silence.
Hallway noise faded in and out around us—footsteps, distant voices, doors opening.
Neither of us moved.
Then he shifted his weight off the wall.
“You always assume things are about you,” he said.
That stung more than it should’ve.
I held his gaze. “You’re the one who disappeared.”
“I didn’t disappear.”
“You did.”
A beat.
Then he laughed once—short, humorless.
“Three days, Rowan.”
“So?”
“So that’s normal for everyone else.”
Not for you.
He didn’t say it.
But I heard it anyway.
Something in my chest tightened.
I crossed my arms tighter. “Right. Sorry for noticing.”
That landed wrong.
I saw it immediately in his expression.
A flicker.
