The silence in her apartment stretched, not as a peaceful absence of sound, but taut and vibrating, like a high-tension wire strung precariously between the fragile walls of her living space and the even more fragile walls of her chest, threatening to snap at any moment.
Outside, dawn had crept in with a hesitant grace, quietly unravelling the inky blackness of the night into a bruised, melancholic lavender, the fragile promise of a new day already tainted by the bitter residue of a broken yesterday.
But inside, Seo-yeon remained utterly still, her body frozen in a state of suspended animation, as though any sudden movement, any involuntary twitch, might fracture her already precarious grip on what little remained of her certainty, sending the shattered pieces spiraling into an abyss of disbelief and fear.
