[pm] Heyyyygggjj Connnie!! jsSoooo sorry but I can’t makee uit tonightt b I forgot I had a Date!! Yep&$!!! a date. Today! Tonightnn!! Can’t seed you. !!! Storeyyy so much i’m so sroryy
The message came in quietly—a soft vibration pattern and the familiar chime of a new message, uniquely programed for Nova. She read it once. Then again. Then once more. She stared at it until the screen faded black and she caught a glimpse of her own face.
Nova was drunk. She was on a date. Nothing more. It hadn't been anything more. The message settled in her chest, pushing out anything that dared to form, making room only for understanding.
She understood. She always understood.
Nova had a life before Constance came in. Constance was always something that just… took whatever spare space she had to offer. Who was she to think after sixteen years she could step back in and… and—
Her gaze shifted. The table was still set. The food had been kept warm in the oven. Given the time, Constance should have put it away by now. She just thought—it didn’t matter. Constance set her phone aside and focused on the most important thing. Clean up. No one was coming.
For all the time it took to prepare the meals, to arrange the flowers—split carefully into three vases (the same amount of orange tulips and roses and ranunculus in each one)—the clean up rendered it inconsequential. Twenty minutes later, everything was put away. The manor looked as it always did. Empty. Cold.
Constance placed the last of the food in the fridge and paused. The cake. Vanilla sponge with an orange curd filling, topped with a lightly colored orange whipped frosting. Happy Birthday Nova was piped slightly uneven. Her excitement made her unable to steady her hand. It hadn’t mattered then. Now, that was all she saw.
It was on her table before she even realized. The fork she had just dried was back in her hand. There was a familiar feeling in her chest. She could name it. She didn’t.
The first bite was small. Just enough. She waited. Nothing.
Still nothing. Her gaze lifted across from her. An empty space, where someone was supposed to sit. To laugh. To complain about the sweetness, and reach for another bite anyway.
A third and larger bite this time, less precise. It made no difference. So, she took another. Then another, quicker now, as if the issue was pace, or quantity, or method—something correctable. Something she could control.
It wasn’t. The curd turned bitter in her mouth. Heavy on her tongue. She swallowed too quickly, breath catching just slightly in her throat, breaking the rhythm. The fork slipped from her hand, clattering softly against the table.
