I wake up already exhausted.
Not physically — the kind of tired that settles deeper, somewhere thought-shaped and bone-heavy. Yesterday clings to me like a film I can't wash off. I lie there for a minute, staring at the ceiling, wondering if it's worth pretending I can function today.
Maybe I should call in sick.
The idea feels warm, tempting. One phone call, a shaky voice, a simple excuse. A day without people, without questions, without the office waiting to swallow me whole.
But then another thought crawls in:
Calling in sick will draw attention.
Just like leaving early did. Just like standing up too quickly.
Just like every small deviation these days.
I imagine HR noting my absence, someone asking Ryan if he's heard from me. I imagine my name being mentioned in a room I'm not in. That thought alone is enough to kill the idea.
The warmth vanishe.
I get up.
I move slower than normal — not out of laziness, but because every movement feels delayed, like my body is buffering. By the time I'm ready to leave, I realize I took too long. Too many minutes wasted deciding how to exist.
I step outside, walk to the bus stop, and watch the bus's taillights vanish before I even reach it.
A quiet panic.
Then the familiar resignation.
I call a cab and try not to think about the money. I watch the city through the window, passing in soft, indifferent motion. I feel like I'm being carried into a day that already started without me.
When I reach the office, I know something's wrong.
People are gathered around Jimmy's desk — the same desk left in disarray since Monday. Papers everywhere. Drawer half-open. Mug stained at the bottom. But today they're not just staring. Today they're whispering.
"It's been four days since anyone saw him," someone says.
Four days.
I didn't know the number. Hearing it out loud makes something inside me drop.
Ryan notices me the second I enter, like he'd been waiting.
"John," he says quickly, pulling me aside. "We need to go."
"Go where?"
"To Jimmy's place. Management wants someone who worked with him to check in. Make it official."
My stomach twists.
"I barely worked with him," I say.
"You worked with him more than anyone else who's here today."
I want to argue. I want to say no. But I see the faces around us, half-curious, half-anxious. If I refuse, that becomes a story too.
So I nod, and somehow that single movement seals my involvement.
Ryan drives.
The car ride is suffocating. He keeps trying to talk — about project deadlines, about how "Jimmy seemed off," about how he hopes everything's just a misunderstanding — but his voice trembles around the edges.
I give short answers.
I'm not hiding anything. I just don't have anything to give.
We pull up to Jimmy's building and everything inside me goes still.
Two police cars.
Tape across the entrance.
Officers moving in and out with the heavy silence of people who know more than they're allowed to say.
Ryan inhales sharply.
"We're too late," he whispers.
We walk closer, hoping for someone to stop us, hoping for instructions, hoping for something to anchor the moment. A cop steps forward.
"You live here?" he asks.
"No," Ryan says. "We're coworkers. We're just checking on him."
The cop's expression closes. "Can't comment on an ongoing investigation. If you're from the company, someone will contact you."
It's final.
We leave without answers.
Only questions that feel heavier than before.
I feel something building in my chest — not panic, not sadness, something duller and heavier than both. A kind of helplessness that sinks.
When we return to the office, everyone gathers around us immediately.
"What did you see?"
"Is he okay?"
"Was he home?"
Ryan gives them the clean version.
"Police were already there. They wouldn't say anything."
I stay at the back of the group.
I don't want to answer.
I don't want them looking at me the way they did yesterday — like I'm part of this.
But today I am part of it.
Whether I chose to be or not.
A meeting is called in the afternoon.
Anyone who worked with Jimmy is required to attend.
I sit in a room full of people I barely talk to, all pulled into Jimmy's gravity now that he's gone. The atmosphere is tight, brittle. Everyone looks tense, like we're all waiting for someone else to speak first
Management starts listing Jimmy's open projects, talking about deadlines, continuity plans, reallocating responsibilities. They speak like this is an inconvenience, a scheduling disruption.
But no one says the word missing.
No one acknowledges the fear under the surface.
When my name is called next to Ryan's, I already know what's coming.
"You two will sort through Jimmy's computer," our supervisor says. "Extract the folders and materials we need."
I feel my pulse climb.
"I— isn't this something IT should handle?"
"They don't know which documents are relevant," she says.
"You do."
I want to refuse.
I know I can't.
So I nod again.
And again, that single gesture feels like surrender.
IT unlocks the computer and leaves us with the screen glowing in front of us.
Jimmy's wallpaper is a plain blue gradient — painfully ordinary. His folders are neatly arranged despite the chaos of his desk. Everything looks normal at first.
Too normal.
Ryan starts dragging files onto a shared drive.
I sit beside him, opening folders one by one, checking for project names.
We work quietly until I see it.
A file buried where it shouldn't be.
Name: "Departure."
Not a project.
Not a work term.
Nothing he should've labeled anything with.
"Ryan," I say, my voice thinner than I expect. "Look at this."
We open it.
Inside:
Lines of encrypted text.
Symbols.
Broken strings that look like half-finished codes.
And at the bottom:
post office 612
A single phrase.
Clear.
Intentional.
I feel my breath tighten.
Ryan mutters something sharp under his breath.
"I'm… pretty sure we shouldn't be looking at this," I say.
"We already are," he replies. "And if Jimmy hid it here, someone had to find it."
From behind us, I sense movement.
I turn.
Elena.
She's passing through the aisle, but when her eyes flick to the screen, something in her stops. Just for a second. Barely visible. But I see it — the tightening around her mouth, the stillness in her posture, the way her attention hooks onto the file like it means something to her.
Then she walks away.
Calm. Controlled.
But changed.
I don't know what it means.
And I'm too tired to care right now.
"I'm giving this to the police," I say. "This isn't our job. It's not— it's not my problem."
Ryan shakes his head.
"If Jimmy wanted the police to have this, he wouldn't have hidden it."
"That doesn't matter. We shouldn't—"
"We should at least see what this '612' is," he interrupts. "If it's nothing, we hand it all over. If it's something, we do the right thing."
I hate that his logic makes sense.
I hate even more that I don't have the energy to fight.
So we go.
The post office is nearly empty when we arrive.
Harsh lighting.
Faded posters.
A hum from overhead vents.
Locker 612 sits at the far end of the room.
Ryan unlocks it with the key IT found in Jimmy's desk drawer.
Metal clicks.
The door swings open.
Inside:
Not letters.
Not explanations.
Not evidence.
Just fragments.
A folded map with no labels, only a red mark near the industrial district.
A small USB drive with no markings.
A torn piece of a notebook page with numbers circled in Jimmy's handwriting.
A scrap of paper that reads:
"Tomorrow."
That's it.
Nothing to make sense of.
Nothing to hand to the police that would mean anything.
Just breadcrumbs.
Ryan stares at it all, silent for a long moment.
"He left this for someone who knew how he thought," he says quietly.
"You mean us?" I ask.
"Who else?"
I feel sick.
He's right.
I hate that he's right.
We stand there, staring at pieces of someone else's unfinished plan, and I realize there's no way to solve this tonight. Not when my brain feels like it's shutting down.
"Tomorrow," Ryan says. "We'll figure it out tomorrow."
I nod.
I don't trust my voice.
Outside, the sky is dark the air feels like it's holding something I can't name.
Ryan turns to me, hands in his pockets, looking older than he did this morning.
"You… want to grab a drink or something? Just to take the edge off?" he asks.
I answer before he finishes.
"I just want to go home."
He nods.
Doesn't push.
Doesn't ask another question.
We go our separate ways.
I walk down the street carrying nothing but exhaustion and pieces of someone else's unraveling plan — and all the broken parts of my own life tangled in them.
The day loosens its hold on me at last, leaving me with nothing but pieces—of Jimmy's trail, of my routine, of myself.
If restoring even one of them means pushing deeper into this, then I guess I have to keep going.
I just wish I knew whether any of it leads back to the life I lost.