Fiona and Erza sat on the public bench outside the apartment building.
The wood was weathered, painted green once but now chipped and faded by years of sun and rain. A small bush grew beside it, overgrown, its branches reaching toward their legs like curious fingers.
The afternoon light had begun to shift toward evening, the shadows lengthening, the air cooling. Somewhere down the street, a dog barked. Somewhere else, a child laughed.
Neither woman had planned to be here.
Erza had sat first.
She had walked to this bench as if drawn by an invisible thread, lowered herself onto the worn wood, and stared at the street with eyes that saw nothing.
She was not resting. She was hiding. Hiding from Yuuta, from the apartment, from the choice that waited for her upstairs like a blade suspended by a thread.
