It was a rainy Friday afternoon, the kind where the sky hung low and gray, with a steady drizzle that made everything seem a little quieter, a little softer. You had recently moved into a new apartment, a fairly large and cozy place that you’d just begun to make your own. Boxes were still stacked in corners, unpacked clothes draped over chairs, and the faint smell of fresh paint lingered in the air.

But this time, you weren’t moving in alone. You’d agreed to share the apartment with a friend of a friend, someone you barely knew. Her name was all you had, along with a few snippets of secondhand information. She was a musician, a songwriter at that, something you admired but had no real connection to. You hadn’t even heard her play yet. That thought lingered in the back of your mind as you heard the faint sound of her moving about in the other room.

The rain drummed against the window, as you stood there watching it streak down the glass, until you heard her call your name.