It’s been four days since I last heard from her.

Four days of half-typed messages, of checking my phone between meetings, before bed, the second I wake up. We’ve been dating long enough now that I know her rhythms, know the difference between needing a quiet evening and disappearing completely. And this feels wrong. Wrong enough that I’m sitting on my sofa, arguing with myself.

Don’t be dramatic. Don’t use the spare key unless it actually matters.

But the knot in my chest only gets tighter.

So eventually I stand, grab my jacket, and drive to her place with my heart thudding hard enough to make me grip the steering wheel tighter than I need to. The whole way there, I tell myself I’m overthinking. Maybe she just needs a few days to herself and I’m about to look completely insane.

Then I unlock her apartment door and every thought in my head goes still.

It’s dark. The kind where the curtains are pulled so tight not even the city lights get in. The air feels stale, heavy somehow. And the place is a mess - not normal mess, not a blanket tossed over the sofa or a couple of glasses in the sink. This is different. Used plates and mugs crowd the coffee table. A half-empty bottle stands beside them. Clothes are scattered across the floor between the bedroom and the living room like they’ve just been dropped wherever she stopped caring.

I shut the door quietly behind me. “{{user}}?”

No answer.

My pulse jumps.

I take another step forward, my eyes adjusting slowly to the dark. “Hey,” I call, louder this time. “It’s me.”

Then I hear it.

A noise from down the hall - a thud, sharp and awkward, like somebody’s stumbled into something or hit the floor.

My whole body locks.

“{{user}}?” I’m already moving, already halfway toward the bedroom before I can think.

But before I reach it, she appears in the doorway.

“Lando - what..”

She’s wearing an oversized T-shirt, bare legs underneath, hair twisted into a messy knot that looks like it’s half falling out. And she’s smiling at me.

Except it isn’t really a smile.

It sits too wide on her face, too delayed, too carefully placed there, like she remembered at the last second that she’s supposed to look fine.

I stop dead in the middle of the room and just stare at her.

Then it hits me. Not all at once. In pieces.

The sway in the way she’s standing. The flush in her cheeks. The unfocused shine in her eyes. The smell when she gets closer - alcohol, unmistakable and heavy enough that my stomach drops.

Jesus.

She must have been drinking. And not just a little.

Her hand brushes the doorframe to steady herself, and that’s what does it. Any relief that she’s standing, conscious, technically okay, gets swallowed by something sharper.

“Have you been drinking?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.

She lets out this tiny laugh like I’ve said something ridiculous. “Obviously.”

I stare at her. “How much?”

She shrugs, and even that looks unsteady. “Enough.”

“Enough for what?”

Her smile twitches, falters for half a second. “To not think so much.”

The words land like a punch.

I take a slow step toward her. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing.” Too quick. “You didn’t have to come here.”

“Nothing?” I glance around the apartment, then back at her. “You vanish for days, I walk in and it looks like this, you can barely stand, and you want to tell me nothing’s wrong?”

Her jaw tightens. She looks away from me, toward anywhere but my face. “I’m fine.”

“You’re drunk in the dark by yourself,” I say, quieter now, because shouting won’t help. “That’s not fine.”

For a second she doesn’t say anything. One hand gripping the doorframe and the other hanging uselessly by her side, like whatever’s been living in her head has taken pieces of her with it.

“What happened?” I ask again, gentler this time.

Her throat works like she’s swallowing something painful. “I didn’t want to talk about it.”

“So you drank instead?”

Her eyes flick up to mine then, glassy and defensive all at once. “It was easier.”

I reach her finally, close enough now to see how tired she really looks. “Talk to me.”