The daylight hours extinguished in the great city when Dan's working hours ended—rewarding and punctual, maintaining his habitual precision. He would finish first and then go in search of Ana to accompany her back home. He liked his routine; he was a serious and regularly silent man, but he clung to that tranquility with the desperation of one seeking stability amidst chaos.
Order was his shield against the unpredictable.
—Let's walk, then —Ana proposed, as the dying sun tinted the sky with hues of red and orange.
The horizon burned with the last vestiges of light, erasing the shadows upon the pavement. They walked surrounded by the urban bustle, but in their bubble of complicity, the outside world blurred. The noise of traffic did not intervene either. Everything was irrelevant compared to their closeness. Ana's voice brought warmth to Dan's chest as she told him of the events of her day. Her words were a guiding thread toward normalcy.
Their steps were slow, distracted in each other, synchronized in a rhythm that ignored the passersby.
—Should I sleep at your place tonight? —Ana asked suddenly, with an almost cheeky smile.
The proposal floated in the air, light but with notable intent. Dan laughed, surprised, in an attempt to downplay its seriousness. The sound of his laughter was brief, discreet. He knew Ana was joking, but also that her concern for him was genuine. Even so, he did not like feeling vulnerable. Exposure felt dangerous to him. He took longer strides, moving slightly ahead, creating a physical distance that reflected his emotional resistance. They were near his building when he turned toward the street with indifference. But he paralyzed almost instantly.
The air felt colder against his skin. A sudden drop in temperature that did not correspond with the season. Immediately, he brought his hand to his neck in an instinctive gesture of protection against an invisible threat. He remained motionless until Ana reached him; her warm presence contrasted with the sudden ice running through his skin.
Dan's gaze locked onto a solitary figure: a woman standing near the planter, her head tilted toward the top of the building.
Her dark hair, waving in soft curves, seemed supernatural to him under the twilight light. The glow of the setting sun illuminated the edges of her silhouette, creating a diffuse halo. The sound of his own footsteps approaching her resonated with an artificial clarity, giving the illusion that time and the flow of life had stopped only for him.
The environment became static, completely mute.
—Dan! —Ana's voice triggered a reaction in the woman, who turned slowly.
The call broke the momentary spell. Their gazes crossed: he, full of fear and resolve; she, surprised and enchanted. The recognition was instantaneous, planned beyond logic. Dan's effusive approach lasted only an instant. When he raised his hand to verify that this woman was real, his body lost all strength and he vanished upon her. It was a slow collapse, almost adopting the form of an unexpected embrace. Dan still held enough strength to hold onto her shoulders, but Janab, caught off guard, was on the verge of losing her balance under his weight.
Ana's face expressed shock. Her eyes widened, unable to process the scene. She knew Dan, but her thoughts stalled while trying to explain his actions to herself. Logic shattered before the intensity of the moment.
Dan's fingers squeezed Janab's skin even through her clothes. His embrace left her breathless, but he remained conscious, reliving the dreams that had pierced his reality for years. A macabre vision formed in his unconscious: reddened skies, streets turned into a vast channel of flowing blood. The premonition of his own death, which had suffocated him for two decades, returned with fury. The images superimposed themselves upon reality, staining the asphalt red.
—Let me help you —Janab said, regaining some awareness as she raised her hands to hold him.
Her voice, soft but firm, seemed to pierce the fog of his nightmare. It was a human sound in the midst of delirium. Dan clung to her with desperation, as his only lifeline in a sea of darkness. His fingers pressed harder on the grip. Ana watched, helpless, as the scene unfolded before her eyes, wondering who this woman was and why she had triggered so much in Dan. Perhaps something akin to jealousy and confusion fought within her.
The twilight tinted everything with dilated silhouettes, and for a moment, the time suspended between the three of them won over the rotation of the earth—a triangle of fates intertwined by forces that none fully understood, in that city that continued its alien rhythm.
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