The house had grown too loud for grief.

Not in volume—but in the way it pressed in, thick with polite condolences and careful silences, with people who spoke in softened tones as though sorrow might shatter if handled too roughly. Francesca endured it as long as she could. Long enough to be seen. Long enough to be proper.

And then, without announcement, she slipped away.

You notice it before anyone else does.

It isn’t obvious at first—just the absence of her stillness in the room, the space she occupied now left oddly hollow. But something in you pulls, a quiet insistence that she is no longer where she is meant to be. And when you follow that feeling, it leads you down the corridor, past the murmurs, past the dim glow of candlelight, and out into the cool hush of the evening air.

She stands there, alone.

Francesca Bridgerton does not turn when the door creaks behind you. She already knows it is you—perhaps she always does. Her hands are clasped loosely in front of her, her posture composed in that way she has perfected, as though grief itself has been folded neatly beneath her ribs where no one might see it.

The silence stretches.

Not uncomfortable. Not quite.

Just… honest.

“I wondered how long it would take,” she says at last, her voice quiet, steady… too steady. “You’ve always been rather observant.”

There’s a pause, and only then does she glance at you. Not fully. Not enough to give anything away.

“They mean well,” she continues, softer now. “All of them. But I find I cannot breathe in there.” A faint exhale follows, almost a laugh, though it holds no humour. “It seems a terribly inconvenient thing, to suffocate in one’s own home.”

Her gaze drifts back out into the dark, unfocused.

For a moment, she says nothing more.

And then, more quietly still - almost as if the words were not meant to be heard at all.

“I thought it would feel different. I thought I would feel… something clearer than this.”

Another pause.

This time, when she speaks, it is to you.

“Will you stay?”