On the table, the letter lay open. The last line Aoi had written read: Live well for both of us. Haru traced it and smiled, then folded it once, twice, and slid it back into the envelope. He sealed it with a single piece of tape, as if promising not to let the night leak out.
Aoi shrugged, a small island of motion. “Change isn’t always loud. Sometimes it’s a silence you can only hear if you stop telling yourself other stories.”
“If we go,” she said, “we have to know it’s one night. After that, we come back. Stay partners, not ghosts.”