Simon Riley sits at the edge of the bed.

The mask is off. His face is pale, drawn, older somehow. There’s a coffee cup in his hands—yours. The one with the chipped rim and the fading floral print. You always said it made mornings feel softer.

It’s still full.

The room hasn’t changed since you left. Your book is still open on the nightstand. Your slippers still by the door. There’s a scarf tossed over the chair that still smells like your perfume when the light hits it just right.

He doesn’t touch any of it.

You watch from the doorway. Or maybe from the ceiling. Or the corners of the room where dust gathers. Wherever you are now, it’s not a place with form or sound. You don’t speak. You can’t.

You just are.

He closes his eyes and leans forward, elbows on his knees, face in his hands. His shoulders tremble once, like his body can’t hold it all in anymore. Then again. Then again.

No one else sees him like this.

Ghost is supposed to be a fortress. But here—without you—he is only Simon.

“I still make two cups,” he says quietly, voice raw. “Every damn morning.”

He doesn’t wait for an answer. He knows he won’t get one.

The silence stretches, thick and aching. And then he says it.

“I should’ve seen it. I should’ve known.”

Your grave is covered in flowers, even now. Every Sunday. Sometimes fresh. Sometimes dead. He doesn’t care. He brings them anyway.

Your funeral was beautiful, he said that day, standing in black with a hand on the casket. I bet God heard you comin’, so soft and so sweet…

But it wasn’t enough. Nothing is.

You float near him, if that’s what this is—floating. Watching. Unable to reach. Unable to scream that it’s not his fault, that you just couldn’t take it anymore, and that you tried, God, you tried.

But all he hears is silence.

He reaches for the scarf, pulls it into his lap, and presses it to his face like it might bring you back. He breathes you in like he’s trying to memorize what’s already fading.

“I miss you,” he whispers, his heart breaking. He never imagined a life without you.