The morning sun did little to lift the pall that had settled over the apartment. Neel, usually a slave to his hospital schedule, had taken a rare half-day. The loss of Mrs. Lawrence clung to him, a heavy cloak he couldn't shrug off even in the sanctuary of his own home. The silence was a mutual agreement, a shared space of grief, though for vastly different reasons.

Rooh moved through her chores like an automaton. The vibrant woman who had cooked a celebratory feast just days before was gone, replaced by a ghost of herself. She was in the balcony garden, mechanically watering the plants, her mind a thousand miles away, trapped in the echo of a single, devastating word—"hii."