Alaric leaned back in his chair, his eyes tracing the sprawl of the city beyond the vast glass wall of his office. The world moved out there—restless, humming, alive—and he drank it in with a quiet, aching attention. Every tiny shift below, every flicker of movement on the streets, he caught it. Held it. Let it go.

Things changed. Everything changed, every damn day—and there he sat, stuck. The thought burned under his skin like a slow fever.

Six years since the accident. Six years, and still his bones hadn't learned to settle into this new silence. He used to despise noise—the grating, unwanted kind. Now he longed for it. Now he would have sold his soul for it. For the thrum of a club's terrible music—the kind his ex used to drag him to. For the sharp, stupid bark of the neighbor's dog—the same mutt he'd once threatened to put down to silence for good.

Now the quiet he had once prayed for had swallowed him whole. And he hated it. Hated it with the kind of fury that had no outlet, no end.

He hadn't just lost his hearing that night. He had lost his whole world—right alongside his father.

By all accounts, Alaric should have been grateful to be alive. He wasn't.

Months to learn how to speak again—not too loud, not too soft. Two years to find someone patient enough to teach him sign language, to bridge the gap between him and the rest of the world. John. Bless that man's weary, loyal heart. John put up with more than any salary could repay. Alaric reminded himself to give him a raise. And a gift for his son's birthday next month.

And still.

Here he was. Perched above a city that didn't need him, watching a life he could no longer fully touch. Sometimes he wished for it to end—the endless everything and nothing. Just a finish line. Just something kind enough to put him out of his misery.

A light tap on his shoulder pulled him back.

Alaric turned his chair. He saw her. A woman standing before his desk. He hadn't heard her come in. Of course not. How could he?

But he recognized her. She had started working here last month. Which department? He hadn't bothered to remember. He'd seen her in hallways, elevators, the soft edges of peripheral vision.

And now she was talking. Her lips moved, and Alaric's gaze fixed there—calm, unreadable, patient. Six years of watching mouths shape words had made him fluent in silence. He caught the fragments—new project, what she'd come up with, John, find, a shake of her head.

She had wanted to talk about the project. Couldn't find John. So she had helped herself.

Right on cue, John rushed in, flustered and breathless. Sorry, sir. I didn't see her come in, he signed.

Alaric watched the woman's face drain of color as she realized. Watched her eyes go wide, her throat tighten, her gaze fall to the floor like something fragile had just cracked open.

The faint blush that crept up her neck almost made him smile. Almost.

"You can go, John," Alaric said evenly—though he could no longer hear his own voice, he had learned to trust it. "I'll deal with this myself."

John hesitated. Then left.

Alaric rose, smoothing the front of his suit with slow, deliberate hands. He gestured toward the couch in front of his desk. She hesitated. He nodded again, gently this time. She sat.

Six years of deafness hadn't killed him. A short meeting wouldn't, either.

He looked at her—properly, for the first time—and asked, "How may I help you?"