Page 63 of Peak Cruelty

It’s not about safety.It’s about sequence.

You do it all or you don’t sleep.You follow the order.You don’t skip steps.

Otherwise, you wake up at 3:17.Or 4:04.

And you won’t know what’s wrong—just that it is.

I pause in front of the laundry room.She left her shoes there—sandals, not even practical ones.Gold strap broken on the left one.She wears them anyway.I think about asking her why.Then I think about what kind of man cares about a broken sandal.

I move past it.End up outside her room again.

Her light’s still on.

I don’t check directly—just rest a hand on the doorframe.

Wood warm beneath my palm as if it’s been waiting.

She’s not asleep.I’d know.

There’s a kind of silence that’s earned, and a kind that’s faked.

This is the latter.

I don’t knock.Don’t walk in.I just stand there.One shoulder to the wall.Head down.Breathing in air that tastes like her and something older.

Like maybe this isn’t new.

Like maybe it never was.

She shifts.A creak in the mattress.Deliberate.

Letting me know she knows.

And I do nothing.

Because crossing the threshold would make it real.

Instead I count to five.

Then again.

And again.

Until the air changes.

Until her light flickers off.

And even in the dark, I stay.

Not because I want to.

Because I can’t break the pattern.

32

Marlowe

He eats like it means nothing.

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