“It’s been ages since we’ve had a storm like this,” she murmured, her gaze hollow, her mind circling the upheavals in her life and the fear that all her imagined tomorrows had been nothing but wishful thinking.

“Yeah… people should ease up on the roads until it all settles,” he replied, though his voice was already somewhere distant, drifting like the slow-falling snow outside.

When a bit of coffee sloshed over the rim, she started to apologize—then stopped. His absence, so complete and quiet, made that unnecessary.