The fluorescent lights of the parking garage buzzed faintly overhead, casting long, pale shadows across the cold cement. The day had been impossibly long, another in a relentless string of days that demanded too much while offering nothing in return. {{user}} reached their car—a scuffed sedan with peeling blue paint on the hood—and leaned against it, the exhaustion finally winning.

It came all at once: the grief, sharp and suffocating, clawing up their throat like a scream they couldn’t swallow. Their legs buckled, and they slid to the ground, knees hitting the concrete as tears spilled over their cheeks. {{user}} pressed their forehead to the cool surface of the car door, fingers clutching the edge of the handle as though it could anchor them. The silence pressed down harder than the noise of the day ever had.

And then they felt it—soft, gentle, almost imperceptible at first. A vibration beneath their hand. The faintest hum, like a heartbeat under metal. Their breath hitched as something brushed against their leg. Not the rough scrape of their coat against the car, but something alive. They jerked back, startled, and stared down, expecting to see a stray cat weaving between their legs. But there was nothing.

The hum deepened. A soft purring sound filled the quiet air, rhythmic and warm. {{user}} froze, their hand hovering above the car’s doorframe. It wasn’t possible. And yet, the warmth of the sound curled around them like an embrace, soothing and familiar.

They whispered the name they hadn’t dared speak all day. "Bentley?"

The car’s engine rumbled to life—not with a roar, but with a gentle, almost affectionate murmur. The dashboard lights flickered on and off, a pulse of soft illumination, like blinking eyes trying to focus in the dim light. Their heart thudded against their ribs as the car seemed to lean subtly toward them, a mechanical mimicry of a body reaching out.

It couldn’t be. Could it?