Dean didn't come home.
At 8:17 p.m., her phone lit up.
Roads are bad because of the rain. I'll just stay here tonight. Don't want to risk driving.
Rosalie stood by the kitchen sink and stared at the message.
Rain?
She turned her head toward the window.
It was barely a drizzle.
A light mist clung to the streetlights outside, dotting the pavement with faint silver specks. Cars passed normally. No flooding. No wind. No storm warnings.
In her past life, she would've sighed and texted back:
Be safe. Love you.
She would have believed him.
Or at least, she would have forced herself to.
Now, reading the excuse with clear eyes, she almost laughed.
The lies were so thin.
So lazy.
And yet… just reasonable enough.
The kind of lie that planted doubt instead of certainty.
Maybe the roads are slick further out.
Maybe there was traffic.
Maybe he was just tired.
And when she'd voiced her discomfort to friends or coworkers—
"He stayed at your parents'? That's not weird."
"It's raining. He was being responsible."
"Rosalie, you overthink everything."
Over time, she had convinced herself she was dramatic.
Insecure.
Too sensitive.
Especially when everyone praised him.
Dean the helpful.
Dean the patient.
Dean the devoted fiancé.
It had been so easy to gaslight herself when the entire world supported his image.
Rosalie placed her phone face down on the counter.
No more doubt.
No more self-blame.
She knew exactly where he was.
And who he was with.
******************************************
The children were asleep by nine.
The apartment was quiet except for the low hum of the refrigerator and the faint patter of drizzle outside.
Rosalie sat at the kitchen table with her laptop open, a notebook beside it.
Columns of numbers filled the screen.
Remaining inheritance.
Bunker payment.
Warehouse lease.
Agricultural orders.
Livestock deposits.
Security upgrades.
She checked off completed tasks one by one.
Bunker construction — initiated.
Seed vault — in progress.
Livestock contracts — scheduled.
Space inventory — expanding daily.
Her movements were methodical.
Calm.
This was what she had always been good at.
Planning.
Enduring.
Building.
For the next few months, she would continue ordering supplies in waves.
Even though her space already held a fully stocked grocery level, she refused to rely on one source.
Redundancy meant survival.
And more importantly—
Blending in meant safety.
Fresh vegetables, fruit, meat, and dairy had spoiled within the first three months of the apocalypse.
Supply chains collapsed almost immediately once the heatwave destabilized transportation.
Refrigeration failed.
Warehouses overheated.
Livestock died en masse.
After that, only non-perishables circulated.
Canned beans.
Canned meats.
Canned vegetables.
Powdered milk.
Instant noodles.
Compression biscuits.
Rice.
Flour.
Salt.
Sugar.
If she were walking around with fresh strawberries six months into collapse, people would notice.
Suspicion was deadly.
She needed visible supplies that matched the timeline.
So she began building a second layer of inventory—items she could carry publicly without raising questions.
Bulk cases of:
Canned tuna
Canned chicken
Spam
Mixed vegetables
Dried lentils
Beans
Pasta
Oats
Freeze-dried fruits
Beef jerky
Powdered eggs
Electrolyte packets
Water was critical.
Even though her space lake shimmered with endless purity, she needed bottled water stacked high in plain sight.
When the riots started, people would look for who had supplies.
She would look like everyone else—just better prepared.
She added another list.
Barter goods.
Cigarettes.
Alcohol.
She didn't smoke.
She barely drank.
But she remembered how valuable those items became.
In the second year, a single pack of cigarettes could trade for a week's worth of dried meat.
Whiskey could buy antibiotics.
Small indulgences became currency when money lost meaning.
And money would lose meaning.
Once the power grids failed and banks shut down, numbers on a screen wouldn't feed anyone.
Gold bars wouldn't stop starvation.
Jewelry couldn't purify water.
She remembered people clinging to heirloom necklaces, insisting they were valuable.
Until they tried trading them for food.
Value shifted.
Water.
Food.
Medicine.
Weapons.
Information.
Those were currencies.
Rosalie added another note:
Medical extras — antibiotics beyond space supply.
Even though she had the hospital floor inside her dimension, she couldn't publicly reveal that capability.
She needed visible first-aid kits.
Common painkillers.
Bandages.
Thermometers.
Normal things.
The kind of supplies a cautious mother might reasonably stock.
She closed her laptop and leaned back in her chair.
The apartment felt too quiet without Dean.
Not because she missed him.
Because she remembered nights like this from her past life.
Nights when she'd waited.
Watched the clock.
Felt guilty for being upset.
Imagined him laughing with Lilith while she stayed home with the children.
Back then, she told herself:
He's just helping her.
She's struggling.
You're lucky he's kind.
Now she understood.
He hadn't been helping.
He had been playing house.
Rosalie stood and walked down the hallway, checking each bedroom.
Evelyn sprawled sideways across her bed.
Liam and Noah were tangled in blankets.
Seth clutched a stuffed dinosaur.
Axel slept curled on his stomach.
The twins stirred faintly in their bassinets.
Seven.
Seven heartbeats.
Her entire world.
She brushed her fingers gently over Evelyn's hair.
In her past life, she had protected nine people.
This time, only seven mattered.
Dean could stay at her parents' house as many nights as he wanted.
Soon, when the heat rose and the world cracked open—
He would finally understand what bad roads really looked like.
And this time—
She wouldn't be the one left waiting.