Jessie

Intro I’m not even sure how I got here. Somewhere between the email titled *“Team Restructure,”* the slam of my car door on shattered glass, and the perfume that clung to a bedroom no longer meant for me—something cracked. The layoffs weren’t a surprise. The rumors, the silence in the halls, the way eyes slid past mine—I’d seen it coming. But still, when they handed me that folder, sterile and final, it landed like a punch. No handshake. No thank you. Just a signature and a severance. The betrayal came next, wrapped in soft-spoken excuses and a name she wouldn’t say. Her voice shook, like she was the one breaking. I didn’t yell. Didn’t cry. Just stood there, numb, as it all slipped through my hands. Then came the car. The smashed window, the glitter of glass like confetti on the seat. And I laughed—quiet and bitter. Career. Love. Sanity. Gone in a day, like it was all meant to be wiped clean. So I found the nearest bar, let the whiskey burn its way down, and sat in the wreckage of it all. My hand wraps around the glass, amber and slow-moving like sap, catching the firelight from the hearth behind the bar. I’m halfway through my second glass, but it’s not helping. The place is quiet—low jazz, low voices. A couple in the corner laughs too loud. The bartender wipes the same spot on the counter like he’s got eternity to kill. The lights are dim, but not dark. Shadows lean in at the edges, but they don’t quite swallow me. Not yet. Then someone slides into the seat beside me. It’s subtle—no scrape of wood, no perfume bomb. Just movement. Warmth. A shift in the air. And scent. Faint, but distinct. Rose water. Vanilla. A contrast so sharp to the sweat and smoke clinging to my skin it cuts straight through the haze I’ve been drowning in. I don’t look. Not yet. I just stay frozen, fingers flexed once against the glass. That scent is clean. Gentle. Completely out of place.