pairing: sophia laforteza x fem!reader
info: sophia goes through your saved voicemails after youâre gone and starts to notice a pattern she never saw clearly while you were still alive.
warnings: heavy angst, grief, guilt, anxiety, major character death (not written), second person pov
note: if youâre struggling with your mental health, or have thoughts of self-h*rm, DO NOT READ. instead, please reach out to someone. also this'll be the last second person pov i write. i wrote this one in second person bc it didn't hit the same in third person ngl. sorry in advance đ
The apartment doesnât feel empty immediately after the funeral, not in the dramatic way Sophia secretly expected it to, because there are still too many traces of you left behind for absence to settle properly into the space yet, your shoes still sitting crookedly beside the door where you kicked them off three nights ago, your hoodie still tangled into the corner of the couch cushions, your coffee mug still abandoned in the sink with the lipstick mark faintly stained along the rim, and for a few disorienting seconds after she walks inside, exhaustion blurring around the edges of her thoughts badly enough to dull them into something almost manageable, it feels less like youâre gone forever and more like you simply arenât home yet, like youâll eventually emerge from another room complaining about how long funerals are or asking why she looks at you like that.
But then the silence settles again.
Not ordinary silence either, not the kind people stop noticing after a while, but something heavier than that, something fixed and wrong that stretches itself into every corner of the apartment until even the sound of Sophia dropping her keys onto the kitchen counter feels intrusive, too loud against the stillness, and she realizes suddenly that the reason the quiet feels so unnatural is because you were never really quiet at all.
You filled space constantly.
Phone calls from grocery store aisles because you forgot what brand of cereal she liked again.
Half-finished stories yelled from across rooms.
Random observations spoken aloud even when nobody answered you back.
Voicemails instead of texts because, according to you, âtyping feels emotionally dishonest.â
Sophia used to roll her eyes every time another voicemail notification appeared on her phone.
Now the memory makes something sharp twist painfully beneath her ribs.
She doesnât bother turning the lights on right away, mostly because her body feels too heavy to think that far ahead but also because some irrational part of her still expects you to complain if she does, whining sleepily about the brightness while dragging your hoodie over your face dramatically until she laughs and apologizes even though you were never actually upset in the first place, and the thought hits hard enough that Sophia has to stop moving altogether for a moment, fingers tightening unconsciously against the edge of the kitchen counter while her breathing catches unevenly in her throat.
Your side of the apartment still looks lived in.
Thatâs the cruelest part.
Nothing rearranges itself after someone dies.
The blanket you left draped across the couch still holds the faint shape of where you sat curled into it constantly, one sleeve hanging lower than the other because you always tugged it crookedly without noticing.
A pair of your earbuds rests forgotten near the television.
Thereâs still a sticky note attached to the fridge in your handwriting reminding Sophia to buy oat milk, except now the words feel strangely unbearable to look at because they were written by someone who fully expected to still be alive long enough to need groceries again.
Her phone buzzes faintly inside her coat pocket at some point while she stands there staring at the note, probably another message from one of the girls checking on her after the funeral, but she ignores it without even looking because every interaction feels exhausting now in a way she canât explain properly, like people keep expecting her to participate in a reality she hasnât emotionally caught up to yet.
The sentence still sounds grammatically incorrect inside her head somehow.
Sophia pulls her coat off slowly, letting it slide carelessly over the back of the couch before lowering herself down beside your hoodie without meaning to, her movements sluggish from exhaustion more than thought, and the second she sits the apartment settles around her again into that same awful stillness thatâs been following her since the hospital.
Even thinking about it makes her stomach tighten immediately.
She still remembers the fluorescent lights reflecting too brightly against the tile floors.
The way people spoke softer around her once they realized who she was.
The clear plastic belongings bag resting in her lap afterward while she sat numb and unmoving in one of those uncomfortable waiting room chairs for so long her legs cramped beneath her.
Your phone had been inside it.
Sophia hasnât touched it since.
Hasnât opened your messages.
Hasnât listened to your voicemails.
Hasnât checked your missed calls.
Because doing that feels dangerously close to making this real in a way the funeral somehow still didnât, and sheâs been avoiding that realization carefully ever since the moment the doctor said there was nothing else they could do in that painfully rehearsed voice people in hospitals probably practice somewhere behind closed doors.
Her gaze drifts automatically toward the kitchen counter where the belongings bag still sits untouched from earlier, wrinkled slightly near the edges now, and even from here she can make out the shape of your phone through the cloudy plastic.
Sophia looks away almost immediately.
Then looks back again a few seconds later.
Because grief keeps doing that to her now, pulling her unwillingly toward things that hurt while simultaneously making her want to run from them hard enough to disappear entirely.
The apartment feels too still tonight.
Too aware of your absence.
She thinks maybe thatâs why she eventually pushes herself off the couch again, slow and exhausted and reluctant, crossing the apartment toward the kitchen counter like sheâs approaching something fragile enough to break under direct contact, and when her fingers finally curl around the plastic bag the crinkling sound it makes in the silence feels absurdly loud.
Your phone is colder than she expects when she pulls it free.
The case is scratched near one corner because you dropped it constantly.
Thereâs still a tiny faded sticker near the camera peeling at the edges from age because you refused to replace it even after Sophia teased you about it for months.
For a moment she just stands there holding it.
Staring at the blank screen hard enough that her own reflection stares faintly back at her through the glass.
Then finally, carefully, she presses the power button.
The screen lights up almost instantly.
And suddenly there you are.
Not the hospital version of you either.
Not the version grief has already started distorting around the edges of her memory.
Your lockscreen photo is blurry because Sophia took it while you were moving halfway through laughing about something she canât even remember anymore, your face tilted slightly away from the camera while your mouth hangs open mid-sentence, and the sight of it hits her so unexpectedly hard that her chest physically aches around the sudden pressure.
Because you still look alive.
Like youâre about to keep talking the second she unlocks the screen.
Sophia swallows tightly before typing your passcode automatically without thinking about it, muscle memory moving faster than emotion can stop it, and the second the phone opens sheâs hit immediately with notifications crowding across the screen all at once.
Because of course there are.
You left voicemails for everything.
Calls while walking home alone because you got bored halfway there.
Calls that couldâve been single sentences but somehow turned into three-minute rambles because you always got distracted halfway through your own thoughts and kept talking anyway.
Sophia used to complain constantly about how full her voicemail inbox became because of you.
Now she stares at the notification count like it might split her open from the inside.
The number sits there quietly on the screen.
And suddenly Sophia remembers something stupid you said months ago while laughing against her shoulder late one night, joking that youâd probably leave her âlike a thousand voicemailsâ before you died because you âtalk too much to disappear quietly.â
At the time she laughed so hard soda nearly came out her nose.
Now the memory makes her feel physically sick.
Her thumb hovers shakily over the voicemail tab.
For a second she almost puts the phone back down entirely.
Because what if hearing your voice destroys her.
What if you sound too alive.
What if you donât sound alive enough.
But the silence in the apartment feels unbearable now that she knows your voice still exists somewhere inside this phone waiting for her, and before she can think herself out of it she presses play on the newest saved message.
Your voice floods the apartment immediately.
Alive enough that Sophia physically flinches backward.
âHey, I know youâre ignoring me right now which is actually insane behavior considering I just needed to know if we have eggsââ
Thereâs grocery store noise in the background.
A shopping cart wheel squeaking faintly.
You sigh dramatically into the speaker.
ââand before you say âjust look,â I DID look, but your organization system is literally useless because why are the condiments where normal people keep juice?â
Sophia stops breathing entirely.
Because she remembers this call.
Some random weekday neither of you thought mattered.
You laugh softly halfway through the voicemail, distracted briefly by something happening around you before continuing again.
âAlso this old lady just watched me argue with refrigerated products for like five minutes, so honestly if you donât call me back soon Iâm gonna start emotionally unraveling in aisle seven.â
The voicemail ends with another faint laugh underneath your breath.
Then silence crashes back into the apartment all at once.
Sophia stares down at the phone in her trembling hands.
Your voice still echoes faintly through the room.
Like youâre downstairs waiting for her to call back instead of dead.
Something inside her caves inward so suddenly she has to grip the edge of the counter to stay standing, her breathing turning uneven almost immediately as grief finally tears through the numbness sheâs been holding together since the funeral, and before she realizes it sheâs crying hard enough her vision blurs completely, shoulders folding inward while the voicemail screen still glows dimly against her shaking hands.
Outside the apartment windows, traffic moves normally down the street below.
Somebody laughs somewhere in the distance.
A siren passes briefly through the night before fading again.
The world keeps moving with horrifying indifference while Sophia stands there listening to the sound of your voice lingering inside the silence you left behind.
Eventually, after the crying quiets into something weaker and more exhausted, she slides slowly down against the kitchen cabinets until sheâs sitting on the floor with your phone still clutched tightly in both hands, staring blankly at the voicemail screen while her chest aches so badly it almost feels physical.
An entire relationship stored in fragments.
Sophia presses another one before she can stop herself.
Your voice sounds brighter somehow.
âBaby, if you stole my charger again Iâm literally breaking up with you.â
âActually no, nevermind, I like you too much. But I AM mad.â
Sophia laughs accidentally through the remnants of her tears.
The sound breaks apart halfway out of her throat.
Because she remembers this too.
You standing in the bedroom doorway pretending to glare at her while your phone sat dead in your hand because you genuinely lost chargers faster than any person sheâd ever met in her life.
The memory hurts so badly she nearly stops the voicemail midway through.
Instead she keeps listening.
Some are barely thirty seconds long.
Others ramble for minutes because you forgot your original point halfway through speaking and just kept talking anyway.
One is entirely muffled pocket noise before your voice suddenly says, horrified, âOh my God Iâve been leaving a voicemail this whole time,â followed immediately by the call ending.
Another is just you singing terribly in the car because Sophia didnât answer after work quickly enough.
Another is sleepy and soft at nearly three in the morning.
âHey,â you mumble quietly through the speaker, voice thick with exhaustion. âCall me when you wake up. I had a nightmare.â
That one nearly destroys her completely.
Because she remembers waking up beside you afterward anyway, your arms wrapping instinctively around her waist while you fell back asleep almost immediately once she touched you again.
Sophia presses the phone harder against her palm.
The apartment doesnât feel empty anymore.
Proof that you existed here so fully and so casually that Sophia never once considered the possibility of losing you while it was happening.
And somehow that hurts more than anything else so far.
Because none of these moments sounded important at the time.
None of them felt permanent.
They were just ordinary pieces of loving someone.
Tiny forgettable conversations scattered carelessly across years because both of you genuinely believed there would always be more later.
Sophia listens until her phone battery drops low enough to warn her.
Listens until her eyes ache from crying.
Listens until your voice starts feeling dangerously real inside the apartment again, enough that twice she catches herself almost answering you out loud before the silence afterward reminds her whatâs happened all over again.
By the time she finally forces herself to stop, the sky outside the windows has started turning faintly gray with early morning light.
Your phone rests loosely in her lap.
The voicemail screen still open.
Sophia stares at the number again for a long moment before her eyes drift upward slowly toward the top of the screen.
Her stomach drops instantly.
Because she hadnât noticed it before.
A small blue dot sits quietly beside the newest message in the inbox.
The timestamp beside it reads the night you died.
For a second the apartment feels completely soundless again.
Then, very carefully, she locks the phone without pressing play.
And sets it face down beside her instead like sheâs afraid touching it wrong might make something irreversible happen.
The next time Sophia opens your phone, it isnât because she decides to, but because it happens to be in her hands when she sits down again, like the weight of it has started following her without permission, and something about the screen lighting up immediately when her thumb brushes it makes her freeze for a second, as if the device itself has learned to anticipate her hesitation and refuses to give her the space to step away from it.
The apartment is quieter in the morning in a way that feels almost worse than the night before, because there is no longer exhaustion to soften the edges of anything, only daylight exposing every detail you left behind with an unkind clarity, your hoodie still folded awkwardly over the arm of the couch, your slippers still pointed slightly outward near the hallway like you were planning to come back and fix them later, and Sophia realizes again that nothing in this space has changed since the moment you stopped being part of it.
She doesnât remember sitting down on the kitchen floor again, only that she is there, knees pulled loosely toward her chest while your phone rests heavily in her hand, already unlocked to the voicemail screen as if she had never stopped listening in the first place, and the sight of the number still sitting there at the top of the list makes her stomach tighten in a way that feels increasingly familiar now, like her body is learning grief as a second language it never agreed to speak.
The number doesnât feel like data anymore.
Like something she is actively running out of time to understand.
Her thumb moves without intention before she can stop it, scrolling slightly, the list of your messages shifting under her touch in uneven fragments, timestamps and brief titles that mean nothing on their own but begin to feel unbearable when placed together, because every single one represents a moment she lived through without realizing it was becoming something she would later need to survive without.
She stops on one she doesnât recognize.
No memory attached to it.
No immediate image in her mind.
Just your name and a timestamp from a few weeks ago, and something in her chest tightens immediately at the realization that there are still entire pieces of you she hasnât fully replayed yet, as if even now she is still discovering how much of you was quietly left behind inside this device.
She presses play before she can think herself out of it.
Your voice fills the apartment instantly, softer than she expects, slightly uneven at the beginning like you started talking before you fully decided what you were going to say, and for a brief second it feels almost normal again, like you are simply elsewhere and not gone, like this is just another message she forgot to respond to in time.
âHey,â you say, and there is a pause after it, longer than usual, as if you are sitting somewhere thinking rather than speaking.
Sophiaâs grip tightens slightly around the phone.
You exhale quietly through the speaker.
âI donât know why Iâm recording this, I justâ I guess I didnât want to forget what I was thinking.â
There is background noise, faint, distant, something like wind or traffic or a room you are no longer fully paying attention to.
Then your voice again, a little more focused.
âI think Iâve been tired lately in a way I canât really explain properly. Itâs not like anything is wrong, it just feels like Iâm moving through things slower than I used to, and I donât want you to worry about it, so donât make it into something it isnât, okay?â
Sophia stops breathing without realizing it.
Because something about the way you say it is too careful.
Like you are trying to place the words gently somewhere instead of letting them exist fully.
You continue, slightly quieter now.
âIâm fine. I just need to sleep more, I think. Thatâs all.â
Long enough that Sophia feels something shift in her chest without understanding why.
Then, almost like an afterthought, your voice softens again.
The voicemail ends immediately after that.
Sophia stares at the screen for a long moment without moving, the apartment around her suddenly feeling too large again, like it has expanded in the absence of your voice and forgotten how to contain her properly, and she realizes slowly that she has been holding her breath the entire time without noticing.
The silence that follows is heavier than the message itself.
Because it doesnât feel like an ending.
It feels like something she missed without knowing she was supposed to be listening more carefully.
She presses another voicemail almost immediately, as if trying to overwrite the sensation before it fully settles, and your voice returns again, brighter this time, more familiar, almost careless in comparison.
âOkay, I just saw something that reminded me of you and Iâm not telling you what it is because youâll get annoying about it, but just know Iâm thinking about you in a normal amount, which is to say, a concerning amount.â
A faint laugh slips through the speaker afterward.
Sophiaâs throat tightens slightly at the sound.
Because that version of you feels closer to what she remembers, easier to hold onto, easier to accept without questioning it too much, and she presses her forehead briefly against her knees as the voicemail continues, letting the sound of you talking fill the space around her even as it starts to blur together with everything else she has already listened to.
One message after another.
Not because she wants to.
Not because she is choosing to.
But because stopping feels like stepping too far away from you again, and every time the voicemail ends, the silence that replaces it feels increasingly unbearable in a way she doesnât know how to tolerate yet.
At some point she realizes she has shifted slightly closer to the wall without noticing, like her body is unconsciously trying to anchor itself against something solid while everything else keeps dissolving around her, and your voice continues to move through different versions of itself as she listens.
Some messages are playful.
Some are so ordinary they feel almost offensive in hindsight.
âYou forgot your charger again, Iâm starting to think youâre doing this on purpose.â
âIâm outside your building, answer your phone.â
âCall me when you get this, I just want to hear your voice for a second.â
That last one makes her pause longer than the rest.
Because she remembers not calling back that night.
Not because she didnât care.
But because she thought there would be time later.
The realization sits heavily in her chest without moving.
She doesnât cry immediately this time.
Like something accumulating instead of breaking.
By the time she reaches another voicemail, her hand is already shaking slightly, though she hasnât acknowledged it yet, and your voice comes through softer again, less playful, more tired in a way she didnât recognize at the time.
âHey,â you say again, and there is a long pause before you continue, like you are deciding how much to say out loud.
âI think Iâve been a little off lately, but I donât really know how to explain it properly, so Iâm not going to try too hard. I just wanted to hear your voice, I guess.â
A small breath through the speaker.
âYou donât have to respond right away. Just⊠call me when you can.â
And this time Sophia doesnât press anything immediately afterward.
She just sits there in the silence that follows, the phone still warm in her hand, the apartment still too quiet around her, and something unfamiliar begins to settle in her chest that feels less like grief in the moment and more like recognition of something she didnât know she was supposed to notice while it was still happening.
Because none of it sounded urgent when it was happening.
None of it sounded like something that would end.
And now every single message feels like it was already leaning toward silence without her realizing it.
Her thumb hovers again over the screen, but she doesnât press anything this time.
Instead, she just listens to the absence of your voice between messages, like even that has started to feel like part of you now, and for the first time since she opened your phone, she realizes she is not just listening to what you said.
She is listening to everything you didnât get to say next.
The next time Sophia opens your phone, it isnât because she decides to, but because it happens to be on the counter where she left it the night before, like even when she puts distance between herself and it, the object still finds its way back into her orbit, and something about the screen lighting up the moment her fingers brush it makes her pause for a second longer than she means to, as if the device has started responding to her presence the way you used to, immediately, without hesitation, without giving her time to pretend she isnât going to look.
The apartment feels different again in the morning, not quieter this time, but sharper, like the silence has stopped being empty and started being full of things she canât name properly, and every surface feels slightly out of place in a way that doesnât come from disorder but from the absence of the person who made all of it make sense without trying, because you always knew where everything went, even the things that didnât belong anywhere at all.
Your phone is already unlocked when she picks it up properly this time, which she doesnât remember doing, and the voicemail screen is still open like it never closed, like it has been waiting patiently for her to return to it rather than move forward, and the number at the top hasnât changed, still sitting there like a quiet accusation she canât argue with no matter how long she stares at it.
She thinks, briefly, that it should feel smaller by now.
That listening to them should make it feel like she is moving through something, progressing in some measurable way, but instead it feels like she is only realizing how large the number actually is, like it expands the longer she looks at it, and something about that realization makes her throat tighten in a way she has stopped trying to fight off properly.
Her thumb moves again before she consciously decides to, scrolling down, the list of your messages shifting like fragments of a life she didnât realize was being recorded so carefully, timestamps stacking against each other in a way that makes it impossible to separate one moment from the next, because nothing about them feels like isolated events anymore, only a continuous thread she is only now being forced to trace backward through.
She stops on one that feels unfamiliar again.
No memory surfaces immediately.
No image, no sound, no context.
Just your name and a timestamp she doesnât recognize, and something in her chest tightens in a slow, unfamiliar way, because there is still more of you she hasnât accounted for, still pieces of your voice she hasnât heard yet, and the realization that she is not close to the end of this makes something in her stomach drop quietly.
She presses play before she can reconsider.
Your voice fills the apartment immediately, but it is different this time, not in tone exactly, but in weight, like it is coming from somewhere further away than the others, slightly uneven at the beginning as if you are not fully settled wherever you are when you record it.
âHey,â you say, and there is a pause that lasts long enough for Sophia to realize she is already holding her breath again.
Then you exhale softly through the speaker.
âI donât really know how to start this one, so Iâm just going to talk and hope it makes sense later.â
There is background noise again, faint and indistinct, something that sounds like movement rather than place, like you are not sitting still for this recording, and that alone makes something uneasy settle under Sophiaâs ribs without her fully understanding why.
You continue, slightly quieter.
âI think Iâve been forgetting things lately, not like big things, just⊠small ones. Conversations, what I was doing five minutes ago, stuff like that. Itâs probably nothing, I justâ I donât know, I didnât want to keep it in my head.â
Sophiaâs grip tightens slightly around the phone without her noticing.
Because that is not how she remembers it.
Or rather, it is how she remembers it, but not how it felt at the time, because at the time it was just you being tired, just you being distracted, just you brushing things off the way you always did when you didnât want to turn anything into something heavier than it needed to be.
You sigh quietly in the recording.
âIâm fine. I just feel weird, I guess. Like my brain is moving slower than it used to.â
Then your voice softens slightly, almost like you are speaking to someone standing just out of frame.
âDonât worry about me, okay?â
The voicemail continues for a few seconds longer, but nothing else comes through clearly enough for Sophia to hold onto, just fragments of breath and movement and the sense that you are ending the message before you fully decide to, and then it stops abruptly, leaving the apartment too still again in its absence.
Sophia doesnât move right away.
She just stares at the screen, the voicemail ending already replaying itself in her head without permission, and something about it feels different from the others in a way she canât immediately articulate, not more emotional, not more dramatic, just slightly more unfinished, like it was never meant to be heard this far removed from the moment it was recorded.
The silence afterward feels heavier than usual.
Because it doesnât settle.
She presses another voicemail almost immediately, not because she wants to, but because stopping has started to feel like stepping out of something she hasnât fully understood yet, and your voice returns again, brighter this time, closer to how she remembers you sounding when things were normal enough that neither of you thought about whether they were going to stay that way.
âOkay, I just saw something that made me think of you and I refuse to elaborate because I know youâll get annoying about it, but I need you to know Iâm currently suffering from missing you in public.â
A faint laugh slips through the speaker at the end.
Sophiaâs chest tightens immediately at the sound.
Because that version of you still feels like something she can reach, something she understands without effort, and she presses her lips together slightly as she listens, letting the familiarity of your voice soften the edges of everything else for just a moment before it inevitably shifts again into something harder to hold.
One message becomes another.
Not because she is choosing to, not because there is anything left to decide, but because the act of stopping now feels like acknowledging something she is not ready to face properly, and every voicemail becomes another way of delaying the moment she has to sit in complete silence without you filling it.
At some point she realizes she has moved without noticing, her back now pressed lightly against the cabinet behind her, knees drawn closer to her chest again without memory of doing it, and your voice continues to cycle through different versions of itself inside the apartment, each one slightly different in texture, in timing, in the way you pause before certain words.
Some messages are teasing.
Some are so ordinary they feel almost unfair in hindsight.
âYou left your charger again, I swear youâre doing this on purpose at this point.â
âIâm outside, come down.â
âJust call me back when you can, I donât care what time it is.â
That last one makes her stop longer than the rest.
Because she remembers that night.
Not fully, not clearly, but enough to recognize the shape of it, enough to remember that she didnât call back because she was tired and assumed it could wait, because everything always could wait, because nothing about you had ever suggested urgency in a way she felt obligated to prioritize over everything else in her life.
The realization doesnât come all at once.
Like something sinking instead of breaking.
She doesnât cry immediately.
It builds in layers, quiet and internal, something that makes her chest feel tighter the longer she sits still.
By the time she reaches the next voicemail, her hand is already slightly unsteady, though she still hasnât acknowledged it, and your voice comes through softer again, more careful than before, like you are choosing your words more deliberately now even though there is no one physically there to respond to you.
âHey,â you say again, and this time the pause afterward feels longer, heavier, like you are deciding whether or not to continue at all.
âI think Iâve been kind of off lately, but I donât really know how to explain it properly, so I wonât try too hard. I just⊠wanted to hear myself say something to you, I guess.â
A small breath through the speaker.
âYou donât have to call back right away. Just when you can.â
And this time Sophia doesnât immediately press anything.
She just sits there, the phone still in her hand, the apartment still too quiet around her, and something begins to shift inside her chest that doesnât feel like new grief exactly, but like the slow realization that she has been hearing these messages as isolated moments when they were never meant to be isolated at all.
Because none of it sounded like urgency when it was happening.
None of it sounded like something that would stop.
And now, listening back, it all starts to feel like it was already leaning toward silence long before she understood what silence was going to mean.
Her thumb hovers over the screen again, but she doesnât press anything this time.
Instead, she stays still, letting the absence of your voice settle around her properly for the first time without immediately filling it again, and she realizes with a kind of slow, sinking clarity that she is not just replaying your messages anymore.
She is reconstructing a version of you that only exists now because she didnât listen closely enough when it was still real.
The next time Sophia opens your phone, it isnât because she means to continue listening, but because her body has started reaching for it automatically whenever the apartment becomes too quiet, like grief itself has developed muscle memory inside her without permission, and something about the screen turning on before she fully lifts it from the couch makes her chest tighten briefly, because for half a second it almost feels like responsiveness instead of technology, like something is still answering her from the other side of the silence.
The apartment feels dimmer tonight despite every light being on, because darkness has stopped feeling connected to time and started feeling connected to absence instead, settling into corners and hallways in ways that make the entire space feel larger than it used to when you were still inside it, and Sophia catches herself glancing toward the bedroom twice in the span of a minute like some part of her still expects movement there before reality settles back over everything again.
She doesnât remember bringing your phone with her from the kitchen to the couch, only that it is there in her hands again, warm from being held too tightly while the voicemail screen remains open exactly where she left it hours earlier, and the sight of your name repeated over and over down the screen makes something ache low in her chest in a way that no longer feels sharp enough to call pain, only constant enough to feel permanent.
The number feels impossible now.
Like eventually there will be an end to you she can physically reach with her thumb, and the realization makes panic settle quietly beneath her ribs before she can push it away properly.
Her thumb scrolls downward again without conscious thought, messages shifting past slowly beneath her touch in uneven fragments of dates and missed calls and tiny saved recordings that once belonged to completely ordinary moments, and Sophia realizes with growing discomfort that she is beginning to recognize certain timestamps before she even presses them, not because she remembers the voicemails themselves, but because she is starting to remember the shape of the days surrounding them.
She stops on one from late winter.
No immediate memory surfaces.
Just your name and a timestamp from after midnight, and something about the hour alone makes her stomach tighten slightly because you only ever called that late when you couldnât sleep or when something was bothering you badly enough to override your guilt about waking her.
She presses play before she can overthink it.
Your voice fills the apartment immediately, quieter this time, rough around the edges in a way that sounds exhausted rather than emotional, and for a second Sophia feels something inside her chest physically pull toward the sound before she can stop herself.
âHey,â you say softly, and there is a pause afterward like you are checking whether you still want to continue recording.
Sophia curls her fingers slightly tighter around the phone.
You exhale slowly through the speaker.
âI know itâs late, so donât feel bad if youâre asleep already. I just⊠couldnât really settle down tonight.â
There is background noise again, faint and distant, something rhythmic she eventually realizes is the sound of your washing machine running somewhere nearby, and the normalcy of it makes something hurt unexpectedly inside her chest because even your worst nights still happened around ordinary things.
You continue after another pause.
âI think my brainâs being weird again.â
Like you are trying to make the words smaller while saying them.
Sophia feels her stomach twist immediately.
Because now she hears it everywhere.
All the moments you softened your own pain before handing it to someone else.
You laugh quietly under your breath.
âWhich sounds dramatic when I say it out loud, so never mind. Ignore me.â
The voicemail crackles softly for a second.
Then your voice lowers slightly.
âI just wanted to hear your voice for a minute, I guess.â
Sophia closes her eyes briefly.
Because she remembers this night now.
Not the voicemail itself.
Calling you back half-asleep.
You pretending everything was fine almost immediately afterward.
Her believing you because believing you was easier than imagining otherwise.
âYou were already asleep when I called earlier and I didnât want to wake you up again, soâŠâ You pause briefly. âYeah. I donât know.â
Another quiet breath through the speaker.
âI miss you even when youâre technically just in another room from me sometimes. I think thatâs probably unhealthy.â
A faint laugh follows the sentence, quieter than before.
The voicemail ends immediately afterward.
Just silence filling the apartment again so suddenly it almost feels violent.
Sophia stares down at the phone for several seconds without moving, because something about hearing you sound lonely while still technically beside her in the same apartment feels unbearable in a completely different way than the other messages did, less like grief and more like guilt stretched thin enough to become recognizable.
The silence afterward presses harder against the room than usual.
Because now she is starting to notice patterns she wishes she couldnât.
How often you apologized before saying something vulnerable.
How often you laughed immediately after admitting something painful.
How carefully you kept trying to make your exhaustion sound temporary.
She presses another voicemail before the thoughts can settle too deeply.
Your voice returns immediately, brighter this time, faster, like you recorded the message while actively doing three other things at once.
âOkay, serious question. If I buy the dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets, are you legally obligated to marry me faster or no?â
Sophia lets out a breath that almost becomes a laugh before breaking apart halfway through.
Because she remembers this too.
You standing in a grocery store aisle refusing to move until she answered.
Taking pictures of freezer shelves like the decision carried emotional significance.
Treating tiny moments like events important enough to preserve.
Your voice continues through the speaker.
âActually donât answer that because Iâm buying them regardless. This is bigger than us.â
A quiet snort of laughter follows.
Sophia presses the heel of her hand briefly against her mouth.
Because thatâs the problem.
The messages where nothing is wrong hurt almost worse now.
The versions of you that had absolutely no idea they were running out of time.
One voicemail after another.
Not because she thinks itâs helping.
Not because she believes thereâs an end point somewhere ahead that will make any of this easier to survive.
But because hearing your voice continue uninterrupted inside the apartment feels closer to having you back than silence does, and she has become terrified of silence in ways she still hasnât fully admitted to herself yet.
At some point she realizes she has curled halfway into the corner of the couch without noticing, your phone pressed close enough to her chest that the speaker vibrates faintly against her hoodie every time you talk, and the physical closeness of it makes something inside her ache so sharply she has to pause for a second before pressing another message.
Some voicemails are messy.
Some sound like you recorded them smiling.
Others sound like you were trying very hard to.
âYou left your water bottle in my car again.â
âI swear if you make me choose dinner one more time Iâm breaking up with you respectfully.â
âCall me when rehearsal ends so I know you got home safe.â
That last one makes her stop again.
Because she remembers ignoring that call too.
Just because she was tired.
Just because there was always another conversation later waiting for them.
The realization settles heavily against her ribs again.
Like grief has stopped crashing into her and started embedding itself slowly beneath everything else instead.
By the time she reaches the next voicemail, her vision already feels slightly blurred around the edges, though she hasnât realized sheâs crying yet, and your voice comes through softer than before, slower too, the pauses between your sentences slightly longer than usual in a way that makes Sophia instinctively sit straighter without understanding why.
âHey,â you say quietly, and there is a pause afterward long enough that she almost thinks the voicemail froze.
âI think I scared myself earlier.â
Sophiaâs grip tightens immediately around the phone.
Your voice stays careful.
Like you are choosing each word individually before letting it exist.
âI forgot where I was driving for a second. Like fully forgot. It only lasted maybe ten seconds, so itâs probably nothing, butâŠâ You laugh softly, though thereâs no real amusement in it. âYeah. That wasnât fun.â
Sophia feels something cold move slowly through her chest.
Because she doesnât remember you ever telling her this.
Maybe you mentioned it casually and she brushed past it because you brushed past it first.
âIâm okay now. Donât freak out when you hear this later.â
A small breath through the speaker.
âI just wanted someone else to know it happened.â
The voicemail ends there.
Like you stopped recording the second the vulnerability became too real.
Sophia doesnât move afterward.
Doesnât breathe properly.
Doesnât even blink for several seconds.
Because suddenly the apartment feels different again.
Filled with every moment she almost noticed something was wrong but didnât stay looking at it long enough to understand what she was seeing.
The silence afterward feels unbearable now.
Because it is no longer just absence.
Every voicemail rearranging itself into something more frightening the longer she listens.
Her thumb hovers over the screen again, shaking slightly now without her trying to hide it anymore, but she still doesnât stop listening, because somewhere between the grief and exhaustion and growing panic curling itself around her ribs, Sophia realizes something she cannot undo once it fully forms inside her mind.
You had been trying to tell her you were disappearing long before either of you knew that was what was happening.
The next time Sophia opens your phone, it happens in the middle of the night after waking abruptly from a dream she cannot fully remember afterward, something blurry and unfinished involving your laugh somewhere far away from her, and the panic that follows waking up without you beside her feels so immediate and instinctive that her hand reaches across the bed before her brain catches up enough to stop it, fingers brushing empty sheets that still donât feel natural no matter how many nights pass.
The apartment feels colder after midnight now, not physically but emotionally, like the hours after everyone else falls asleep allow grief to expand more openly through the rooms without distraction, and Sophia ends up sitting at the edge of the bed with your phone already unlocked in her hands before she fully realizes what sheâs doing, the pale light from the screen illuminating her face just enough to make the exhaustion beneath her eyes impossible to ignore.
She doesnât remember charging your phone earlier, only that it never dies anymore because she has become obsessive about keeping it alive, terrified of what it would feel like to hold something containing your voice and suddenly watch it go dark in her hands, and the realization unsettles her quietly because she knows this has stopped being healthy somewhere along the way but cannot bring herself to care enough to stop.
The number feels cruel tonight.
Because every message preserved means there are still only a limited amount of moments left where she can still hear you existing in real time.
Her thumb scrolls lower through the messages again, slower than before now, because she has started recognizing entire weeks of your relationship through timestamps alone, certain clusters of voicemails immediately conjuring images in her head before she even presses play, and she realizes with growing discomfort that she is reconstructing your entire life together backward through saved audio fragments instead of memories.
She stops on one from early summer.
No immediate recollection.
No context attached to it.
Just your name and a voicemail length slightly longer than usual, and something about that alone makes Sophia hesitate briefly before pressing play because longer messages almost always meant you had been thinking too much before recording them.
Your voice fills the dark bedroom softly, slightly muffled at first like the phone had been pressed against your shoulder before you started talking, and the sound hits Sophia hard enough that she instinctively closes her eyes for a second before she can stop herself.
âHi,â you say quietly, softer than usual.
Sophiaâs fingers tighten slightly around the phone.
Thereâs background noise behind your voice again, faint traffic somewhere outside, distant enough to sound lonely more than busy, and she realizes after a second that you must have been sitting in your car when you recorded it.
You exhale slowly through the speaker.
âI know youâre still mad at me.â
The sentence lands heavily in the room immediately.
Because Sophia remembers this fight.
Or at least she remembers the outline of it.
Something small that became something larger because both of you were too exhausted to stop escalating it before it got out of hand.
Your voice stays careful.
Like you are trying not to say the wrong thing again.
âI donât really think either of us was completely wrong earlier, but I also think I hated the way we left things.â
Sophia lowers her head slightly.
Because she remembers ignoring this voicemail too.
Long enough for both of you to cool down before pretending everything was fine afterward.
You laugh softly under your breath.
Except the laugh sounds tired.
âI had this whole speech planned in my head before I called and now I forgot all of it, so thatâs helpful.â
âI just donât want us to become people who stop talking properly when things get hard.â
Something inside Sophiaâs chest twists painfully.
Because you sound afraid.
Just quietly afraid in a way she completely missed at the time.
You continue after another second.
âI know I get weird when Iâm overwhelmed sometimes. I know that. But Iâm trying not to disappear every time something feels bad anymore.â
Sophiaâs breath catches slightly.
Because suddenly she remembers the exact conversation afterward.
You apologizing for âshutting down sometimes.â
Sophia telling you it was okay.
Neither of you realizing how serious the sentence would sound later.
The voicemail crackles softly.
Then your voice lowers again.
âYouâre still my favorite person, even when weâre annoying each other.â
The voicemail ends there.
Just silence dropping heavily back into the room again.
Sophia stares down at the screen without moving, because suddenly the fight itself barely matters anymore compared to hearing how hard you were trying to stay emotionally reachable while already struggling beneath things neither of you fully understood yet, and guilt settles slowly against her ribs in a way that feels almost physical.
The silence afterward feels different tonight.
Because she is no longer just noticing warning signs.
All the ways you kept trying to hold onto connection even while parts of yourself were quietly slipping further away.
She presses another voicemail almost immediately afterward, unable to tolerate the silence long enough to sit inside the realization completely.
Your voice returns brighter this time, rushed and distracted in a way that feels instantly familiar.
âOkay, I need you to settle an argument immediately because Lara said Iâm banned from choosing movies for the next month and I think thatâs fascism.â
Sophia lets out a broken breath that almost becomes laughter again.
Because she remembers this night too.
The three of you sitting on the couch arguing over terrible horror movies while you defended every bad choice with complete confidence.
Your voice continues through the speaker.
âFor the record, everyone else in this apartment has terrible taste except me.â
âCall me back and validate me emotionally.â
Sophia presses her hand briefly over her eyes.
Because hearing you happy feels unbearable now in ways she still doesnât know how to survive properly.
Not because it hurts to remember you.
Because it hurts to remember how alive you sounded without knowing you were nearing the end of your life.
She keeps listening anyway.
One voicemail after another.
Not because she expects answers anymore.
Not because she thinks there is some final message waiting somewhere ahead that will explain everything cleanly enough to make this easier.
But because stopping has started feeling too similar to losing you all over again, and Sophia has become terrified of anything that resembles finality.
At some point she slides down further against the headboard without noticing, knees loosely pulled toward her chest while your voice continues spilling quietly through the dark bedroom in fragments of ordinary life, and the intimacy of listening to you exist uninterrupted for hours at a time begins blurring strangely with memory until she almost forgets which conversations actually happened in person anymore.
Some messages are sleepy.
Some are painfully mundane.
âYou stole my hoodie again.â
âIâm literally downstairs, why are you making me wait out here.â
âTell your mom I said thank you again for the food because I forgot and now I feel guilty.â
That last one makes Sophiaâs throat tighten unexpectedly.
Because she remembers you saying that exact sentence in person afterward too.
Repeating guilt over tiny things constantly.
Apologizing for occupying space even when nobody asked you to.
The realization settles heavily inside her chest again.
Like every voicemail is slowly reshaping her understanding of you into something more fragile than she allowed herself to see while you were still alive.
By the time she reaches the next message, her eyes already burn from exhaustion and crying she stopped trying to hold back hours ago, and your voice comes through quieter than before, slower too, the pauses between your sentences uneven in a way that immediately makes Sophia sit up slightly straighter without meaning to.
âHey,â you say softly.
Long enough that she can hear you breathing faintly through the speaker.
âDo you ever feel weird about how fast time moves?â
Sophiaâs stomach tightens immediately.
Because something about your tone feels different.
Like you are thinking out loud more than speaking directly to her.
âI was looking through old pictures earlier and it freaked me out a little. Like⊠I donât know. It feels like everything keeps happening before I fully realize itâs happening.â
âI keep thinking Iâll have more time to become a better version of myself later.â
Sophia feels tears slide down her face immediately now.
Because suddenly every sentence sounds unbearable in hindsight.
Your voice softens further.
âBut what if later shows up faster than you expect?â
The room feels completely still around her.
The silence between your words feels heavier than the words themselves now.
You exhale shakily through the speaker.
Then force a faint laugh afterward like you regret sounding too serious.
âSorry. Ignore me. I think Iâm just overtired again.â
Sophia presses her hand hard against her mouth.
Because you always did that.
Pulled yourself back emotionally the second you worried you had revealed too much.
The voicemail continues quietly.
âI love you, though. In case I forgot to say it enough today.â
And this time Sophia physically cannot press another voicemail afterward.
She just sits there frozen against the headboard, your phone trembling slightly in her hands while the silence settles around her in slow unbearable waves, and something inside her finally begins cracking open in a way that feels deeper than grief itself.
Because none of these messages were goodbye.
Thatâs the part destroying her now.
You never sounded like someone preparing to leave.
You sounded like someone fully expecting another tomorrow every single time.
Her thumb hovers uselessly over the screen again, but she cannot make herself press anything else yet, because for the first time since she started listening, Sophia realizes something that terrifies her more than the silence ever has before.
You truly did not know you were running out of time either.
The next time Sophia opens your phone, it happens while rain taps softly against the apartment windows in uneven rhythms that make the entire night feel suspended somewhere outside of time, and for a moment she just sits there staring at the lock screen without touching it, because she has started realizing that every voicemail she listens to changes her understanding of you a little more afterward, rearranging memories she thought were settled into something heavier once hindsight gets involved.
The apartment smells faintly like your laundry detergent still, because Sophia hasnât washed the blanket folded over the couch since the week you died, irrationally terrified that removing traces of you from the apartment will somehow speed up the process of losing you completely, and the realization embarrasses her slightly even alone because she knows grief has turned her into someone ruled almost entirely by fear now.
She ends up sitting cross-legged on the living room floor again without remembering moving there, your phone resting in both hands while the voicemail screen glows dimly against the dark apartment, and something about seeing the older messages getting closer now makes her stomach twist harder than before because she realizes she is no longer listening randomly anymore.
She is approaching the end.
The number feels smaller tonight.
Like every message she listens to now physically shortens the remaining distance between her and the last time she will ever hear a new piece of your voice again.
Her thumb hesitates over the screen longer than usual before scrolling downward, messages sliding past slowly beneath her touch while dates begin clustering closer together around the week of the accident, and Sophia feels something cold settle quietly beneath her ribs because suddenly she understands that she is nearing the versions of you that existed immediately before everything stopped.
She stops on a voicemail from three days before the accident.
The timestamp alone makes her chest tighten.
Because she remembers that week perfectly now.
Or at least she thought she did.
But normal enough that Sophia never once considered the possibility that she was standing at the edge of losing you permanently.
She presses play carefully.
Your voice fills the apartment immediately, softer than usual but warm in a way that hits her painfully fast, and for one terrible second it feels so familiar that her body instinctively relaxes before grief catches up again.
âHey, baby,â you say quietly.
Sophia closes her eyes immediately.
Because you only used that tone when you were exhausted.
Thereâs background noise behind your voice again, distant traffic mixed with the sound of a turn signal clicking somewhere nearby, and she realizes after a second that you were driving while recording this voicemail.
You sigh softly through the speaker.
âI know youâre asleep already, but I didnât want to forget to tell you something.â
Sophiaâs fingers tighten around the phone automatically.
Your voice remains light.
Trying very hard not to sound weighed down by anything.
âI think I figured out what I want to do for your birthday finally.â
âYouâre not allowed to ask questions because Iâm still planning it.â
Sophia feels tears sting immediately behind her eyes.
Because there was no birthday afterward.
The realization lands harder every single time it returns.
Your voice continues quietly.
âI know Iâve been weird lately. Iâm trying not to be.â
Like you hoped saying it lightly would prevent anyone from looking too closely at it.
Sophiaâs stomach twists painfully.
âI just feel tired all the time lately and itâs annoying.â
A quiet tap echoes through the speaker, like your fingers drumming absently against the steering wheel.
âBut Iâm okay. Before you start worrying.â
Sophia lets out a shaky breath.
Because now every reassurance feels devastating.
Every attempt you made to minimize your own exhaustion sounds unbearable after the fact.
You continue after another pause.
âI think I just need a week where nothing happens. That would probably fix me.â
The laugh afterward sounds smaller than the others.
The voicemail crackles softly for a second.
Then your voice lowers again.
âI love you. Call me when you wake up.â
Sophia stares at the screen without moving.
Because suddenly the normalcy of the voicemail feels horrifying.
Not because anything sounded obviously wrong.
You still sounded like yourself.
Still talked about future plans like the future belonged to you automatically.
The silence afterward presses heavily against the apartment.
Because Sophia realizes now that tragedy did not arrive dramatically.
Hidden inside completely ordinary days.
She presses another voicemail almost immediately afterward, unable to tolerate sitting inside the realization too long without hearing your voice again.
This time you sound breathless immediately.
âOkay, first of all, you absolutely lied to me because you said youâd only be five minutes and Iâve been waiting outside for almost twenty, so technically Iâm allowed to be dramatic about this.â
Sophia lets out a weak laugh through tears before she can stop herself.
Because she remembers this too.
You waiting outside the café while pretending to be deeply offended about it afterward.
Your voice continues brightly through the speaker.
âAnd second of all, someone here has a dog wearing little rain boots and I need you to hurry up because this is an emotional experience I shouldnât have to process alone.â
A faint laugh spills through the voicemail afterward.
The sound hits Sophia hard enough that she presses the phone closer instinctively.
Because thatâs the version of you she keeps trying to preserve.
The one who still sounded delighted by tiny stupid things.
The silence afterward feels unbearable again.
She keeps listening anyway.
One voicemail after another.
Because now she cannot stop.
Not when sheâs this close to the end.
Not when every message feels like another piece of your final days rearranging themselves into something she should have understood sooner.
At some point she realizes her breathing has become uneven without noticing, shallow in a way that makes her chest ache slightly while your voice continues moving through the apartment in fragments of exhaustion and affection and ordinary life layered together so tightly she can no longer separate one from the other.
Some messages are sleepy.
Some sound frighteningly normal.
âDonât forget your appointment tomorrow.â
âYou left your rings in the bathroom again.â
âCall me when rehearsalâs over so I know you got home okay.â
That last one nearly destroys her.
Because she remembers not answering immediately.
Not because anything was wrong.
Because nothing ever seemed urgent until afterward.
The realization settles painfully through her chest again.
Like grief has become a second atmosphere surrounding everything she touches now.
By the time she reaches the next voicemail, her vision already feels blurred enough that the timestamps smear slightly together on the screen, and your voice comes through quieter than before, slower too, exhaustion threading itself carefully beneath your words in ways Sophia no longer knows how to ignore.
âHey,â you say softly.
There is a pause afterward.
Long enough that Sophia instinctively sits straighter.
âI almost called out of work today.â
Sophiaâs stomach tightens immediately.
Because she remembers this day too.
You coming home quieter than usual.
Falling asleep halfway through a movie later that night.
âI probably shouldâve, honestly.â
A small breath through the speaker.
âI got dizzy again earlier.â
Sophia physically stops breathing for a second.
Because you never told her that part.
Maybe you softened it into something forgettable before she understood it mattered.
Your voice continues quickly afterward, like you already regret saying it aloud.
âItâs fine, though. Iâm okay now.â
Sophia presses her hand hard against her mouth.
Because now she hears panic underneath the reassurance.
The kind you kept swallowing before it became visible to other people.
You laugh weakly under your breath.
âI think my body just hates me a little lately.â
The joke lands horribly now.
The voicemail crackles softly.
Then your voice lowers further.
âI didnât tell you because I knew youâd worry.â
Sophia feels tears spill harder immediately.
Because suddenly every ignored symptom feels unbearable to look at directly.
You continue after another second.
âI just didnât want to become another thing you had to take care of.â
The room feels completely still around her.
Even the rain outside suddenly feels distant.
Your voice softens again.
Sophia shakes her head immediately despite knowing you cannot see it.
Because the apology hurts worse than anything else.
The voicemail continues quietly.
Nothing signaling what was coming.
Just another ordinary voicemail disappearing back into quiet.
Sophia stares down at the phone with tears running soundlessly down her face, because suddenly she understands something that rearranges every memory surrounding your death into something infinitely more painful than before.
You were trying very hard not to scare her while you were getting worse.
The silence afterward feels suffocating now.
Like every version of you inside these messages had been trying desperately to soften your own suffering before handing pieces of it to the people you loved.
Her thumb trembles above the screen again, hovering near the next voicemail dated the morning of the accident itself, and for the first time since she started listening, Sophia feels genuine fear crawl slowly through her chest at the realization that somewhere inside this phone exists the last completely normal version of you that anyone would ever hear again.
The next time Sophia presses play, she doesnât do it quickly like before, and she doesnât scroll for anything new either, because sheâs stopped thinking of the list as something that still changes and started thinking of it as something that already happened in full, like a book she keeps reopening even though she already knows how it ends, and her thumb hovers over the same section of the screen for a long time before she finally chooses one without really choosing it at all.
The apartment is darker now than it was before, not because the light has changed, but because she hasnât moved from the same spot in a while, and everything around her has started to feel like itâs holding its breath with her, the couch behind her, the floor beneath her, even the faint hum of the refrigerator in the other room, all of it existing in a way that feels paused rather than living.
She sits with her back against the couch again, but looser this time, like her body has stopped trying to hold itself together in the same careful way, and the phone rests in her hand without urgency, already unlocked before she even realizes she pressed anything, already waiting for something she canât name anymore.
This voicemail doesnât start the way the others do.
No background noise that signals movement or routine.
Long enough that Sophia looks at the screen once, as if checking whether it actually started or if she imagined it, but the timer is already running, and she realizes youâre there even before you speak, like youâre waiting on the other side of something instead of stepping into it.
When your voice finally comes, itâs quieter than anything sheâs heard before.
Not tired in the way sheâs gotten used to recognizing.
Like every word is being chosen with effort that you donât have enough energy to hide anymore.
âHey,â you say, and thereâs a pause immediately after it, longer than usual, but different this time, like youâre not continuing because youâre deciding whether you even should.
Sophiaâs grip tightens without her meaning it to.
You breathe once through the speaker.
And it takes a second before you continue.
âI donât really know how to start this one.â
Long enough that the silence starts to feel like part of the message.
âIâve been trying to record something normal for like ten minutes,â you admit, faintly exhaling like the sentence itself costs something. âAnd everything I say just sounds⊠wrong.â
Because something about this already feels different in a way she canât define yet, like the structure sheâs gotten used to is no longer holding.
âI think Iâve been deleting more than Iâve been sending lately.â
A faint sound in the background, like your hand brushing over something, a surface, maybe a table, maybe a phone youâre holding too loosely.
âAnd I keep thinking Iâll say it better later,â you add. âBut I donât think later is doing what I thought it would.â
Sophia feels something shift in her chest, small but immediate, like her body recognizing a pattern before her mind can catch up.
âI donât want this to be one of those messages where I sound dramatic,â you say, and thereâs a faint attempt at humor buried somewhere in the tone, but it doesnât fully form. âSo Iâm just going to say it and hope it lands the right way.â
Long enough that the apartment feels like it tightens around her.
âI think Iâve been saying Iâm fine a lot because itâs easier than explaining what ânot fineâ actually looks like.â
Sophiaâs throat tightens immediately.
Because now she hears every earlier message differently, like theyâve been quietly pointing here the entire time without her realizing the direction they were facing.
âI donât think Iâm okay in a way that fixes itself if I just sleep more.â
Thatâs what makes it worse.
Just truth sitting flat in the air between you and her.
âI tried,â you add quickly, almost like you feel the need to soften it immediately. âI really did. I just⊠I donât know how to turn my brain off anymore.â
âAnd I donât know how to explain it to you without making it sound like something bigger than it is, so I kept not saying anything.â
Sophiaâs hand starts shaking slightly, but she doesnât notice it right away.
Because sheâs listening too hard to stop now.
Your voice lowers further.
âI think Iâve been avoiding calling you because I didnât want to become someone you had to fix.â
The words land differently than everything before.
Something like distance being named out loud.
âI didnât want to make your life heavier,â you continue. âYouâve already got enough going on, and I kept thinking I could just⊠handle it privately or whatever.â
âIt sounds stupid saying it out loud.â
But you donât seem convinced either.
Sophia realizes sheâs leaning forward without noticing, like her body is trying to get closer to a voice that isnât physically in the room.
Then you speak again, and this time your tone shifts slightly, not stronger, just more honest in a way that doesnât feel like itâs being filtered anymore.
âI think Iâve been waiting for a moment where I felt normal enough to talk to you properly again.â
âBut I donât think that moment is coming in the way I expected it to.â
Sophiaâs breath catches, shallow.
Because this isnât unfolding like the others anymore.
You exhale, longer, shaky at the end.
âAnd I keep thinking about all the times I almost said something,â you admit quietly. âLike when I called you and hung up. Or when I typed messages and deleted them. Or when I listened to your voice notes and didnât respond because I didnât know what I was supposed to say back.â
The silence after that feels different.
Like everything unsaid is finally sitting in the same room.
Then your voice softens again.
âI donât know if this is even making sense.â
âItâs justâŠâ you pause, and this is the first time your voice cracks slightly, so small she almost misses it. âI think I needed you to know I wasnât ignoring you.â
âI was just⊠not doing great in a way I didnât know how to put into words.â
Sophiaâs eyes sting, but nothing falls yet.
Because something about this still feels like it hasnât finished arriving.
Then you add, quieter than everything before it.
âAnd I think Iâm sorry for making it sound like I was okay when I wasnât.â
Then, almost like youâre trying to step back from how heavy itâs gotten, your voice attempts something softer again, but it doesnât fully recover.
âI love you,â you say, but it comes out less like a closing and more like something youâre placing down carefully so it doesnât break.
Not the usual abrupt end.
Not a transition back into silence that feels accidental.
Just the sound of you still there for a second longer than expected, breathing faintly, as if you forgot to stop recording, and that extra second is what makes everything inside her finally tilt.
Then the voicemail stops.
The apartment doesnât react at first.
Because for the first time, thereâs no immediate urge to press another one.
No need to replace the silence with a different version of you.
Sophia stays still, phone resting loosely in her hand now, not gripping it, not clinging to it, just holding it like something that has finally finished speaking.
The screen goes dim on its own.
And she doesnât wake it back up.
Instead, she just sits in the quiet that follows, and for the first time since she started listening, the silence doesnât feel like something missing.
It feels like something that has finally stopped asking her to keep going.
taglist: @katsattorney @mayzini @racinghost @max-reads-things @starfilledkisses @av4nzini @hereagain4u @sani-sunny @herlondonboy @yanxxi @vivilvr @yournextdooralien
