The rain hadn't broken since it started the night before, and if anything, it had only grown heavier overnight — a steady, punishing roar against the windows that made the whole apartment feel smaller, closer, everyone pressed together by necessity rather than choice.
It was Kai who noticed first.
"Guys." He'd pulled the blackout curtain back further than usual, squinting toward the gray wash of sky visible between the downpour and the clouds. "The sun's not red anymore."
Everyone gathered at the window in the next few seconds — Aunt Mary shifting Aurora onto her hip so she could see too, though the baby seemed entirely uninterested in the sky, more fixated on chewing her own fist.
Penelope pushed the curtain aside another few inches, studying the pale, ordinary gray light filtering weakly through the storm clouds. Not crimson. Not that unnatural, bruised color that had painted the world for the last five days.
