I measure my life in small increments—the kind you only notice if you’re looking closely. At 5:43 p.m., I step through the door, a minute ahead of schedule, which feels wrong; being early is almost as bad as being late. I linger in the foyer, keys still in my hand, and wait for the world to line up properly.

I slot the deadbolt, the metal-on-metal sound acting as a reset button so the tension in my throat clears. Shoes off, I place them heels-to-toe on the mat. I check the mail slot, then the peephole. The hallway is empty except for the distant hum of someone else’s television.

I flick the light switch and step into the apartment proper.

Everything is just where I left it. Running my finger along the table by the door, I find no dust—sometimes I check, just to be sure. The thermostat still reads 67, which is the only correct temperature for breathing and thinking. Allowing myself a tight smile, I set my briefcase in its place by the coat rack, unfasten my tie, and roll up my sleeves—my signal that the day is officially over.

Dinner is leftovers. The Tupperware with the blue lid. Three minutes on high, then a minute to cool.

While the microwave rotates and cooks the food, I check my phone. No new messages—which is good, since messages are unpredictable and I don’t like unpredictability.

Skimming headlines, I avoid the full articles because the world outside is always in motion, always shifting; I don’t see the point in knowing more than I have to. If there’s an emergency, someone will knock.

I eat in front of the TV. The show is one I’ve watched before, every episode at least twice. That’s the point. I know when the laugh track is coming and when the canned audience will gasp. I don’t care about sitcoms, but they fill the silence.

There’s a contentedness in the predictability.

Safety.

I’m halfway through the first bite when the picture hesitates. Not static. Not distortion. Just a brief hitch. The laugh track cuts out mid-note. For a moment, the screen holds on an in-between frame—colors flattened, faces unfinished.

The pause lasts just long enough to feel intentional.

Then the set changes.

A desk under bright studio lights. A man in a suit sits behind it, hands folded, posture relaxed. He looks into the camera the way someone does when they’ve been staring at something that slightly disgusts them.

“So normal and boring,” he says.

The image snaps back before I can decide if I heard him correctly. The joke resumes. The audience laughs on cue. My food is still warm. I sit there a moment longer than necessary, then take another bite and keep eating.

I tell myself it’s a channel hiccup. A glitch. No big deal. The show continues without incident, and by the time the credits roll, the moment has faded into something easily ignored.

The next few days pass as expected: work stays work, the commute is tolerable. My schedule remains tight. I arrive home within the same narrow window, and the apartment receives me identically each evening. Nothing carries over from one day to the next.

On Thursday, there’s a magazine in my mail slot when I get home.

I pause before picking it up. I don’t subscribe to magazines. I never have. They arrive monthly, demand attention, and accumulate. I’ve always considered that inefficient.

The address label has my name printed cleanly and correctly. No typos. No forwarding marks.

Inside my apartment, I set it on the coffee table and flip it over without sitting down.

The cover headline is short and declarative: A Man With No Wants.

Beneath it is a photograph.

The man on the cover is dressed plainly—neutral shirt, neutral jacket. His posture is stiff, hands folded in his lap. He isn’t smiling. He isn’t frowning. His expression is dry, uninterested, like someone waiting for instructions that never come.

He looks familiar in a way that’s uncomfortable, like seeing myself described by someone who doesn’t know me.

I don’t read past the headline. I slide the magazine back into its sleeve and carry it straight to the trash. It lands on top of coffee grounds and unopened envelopes. I press it down until I can’t see the cover anymore.

I wash my hands after. Longer than necessary.

At work, near the end of the day, Carol from accounting stops by my desk as I’m packing up.

“Do you ever do anything after work?” she asks, casual, like it just occurred to her.

“No,” I say. “I have plans.”

She nods like that’s reasonable. Like it’s normal. She walks away, and the day closes behind her.

The next afternoon, she stops again. Same place. Same angle of her shoulders, hands resting on the edge of the cubicle wall.

“A few of us are grabbing a drink tonight,” she says. “You’re welcome to come.”

“I don’t really go out on weeknights,” I say.

Her smile doesn’t move, but her eyes do—just slightly, like she’s looking for a crack that isn’t there. An ache settles at the edge of my chest. Then she thanks me for my time in the way people do when you haven’t given them anything.

The exchange feels mechanical, like completing a transaction.

On Thursday again—because the week has begun to feel like a stack of identical pages—she tries a different angle.

“You mentioned liking trivia shows once,” she says. “There’s a place downtown that does that.”

I don’t remember mentioning trivia. I don’t remember talking about myself at all.

“I already have plans,” I tell her.

Carol hesitates. For a moment, it looks like she’s going to say something else, something that might require a real answer. Then she smiles, nods, and walks away like she has completed a task.

No awkwardness. No offense taken. Just another attempt filed and closed.

It’s over as soon as she walks away.

By Friday, she doesn’t ask me anything. She only says, “Have a good weekend,” in a tone that feels final.

That night, back at home, I eat dinner in front of the TV and wait for the familiar rhythm to settle my mind.

The screen flickers again. Same hitch. Same flattening of color.

The desk returns under the studio lights. The man is there.

Before he speaks, something slips into my mind sideways.

Not a voice.

A list.

Fear: uncertainty.

Aversion: spontaneity.

Low tolerance for disruption.

Observations, rather than feelings.

The thoughts arrive fully formed, clinical. I don’t recognize them as mine, but they sit in my head anyway, arranged neatly, like a questionnaire with the answers already filled in.

Another line follows.

Interests: routine. Familiar media. Predictable outcomes.

My chest tightens. I try to think of something else—anything. The words hold their place.

They don’t move. They don’t change. They just exist.

The man looks into the camera, thoughtful now, like he’s turning something over that hasn’t fit anywhere else yet.

“Fear,” he says, like the word explains everything.

The picture corrects itself instantly. The sitcom snaps back mid-sentence. The laugh track swells too loud, right on time, smoothing everything over.

I take another bite. Dryness coats my mouth. I chew slowly, focusing on the motion until the noise in my head dulls to something manageable.

---

Sunday night, the interruption returns.

The man looks finished. Like someone who has tried every polite version and has run out.

“Nothing ever changes,” he says.

The sitcom snaps back mid-joke. The audience laughs. I realize my fingers are digging into the arm of the chair hard enough to hurt.

I turn the television off.

The world outside can spin itself into knots.

I don’t participate.

The silence is immediate. My heart thumps in the darkness; I sit there, nerves electric, telling myself this is over. Normalcy has asserted itself.

I go to bed on time.

In the morning, after a night’s sleep, the apartment feels slightly off—not wrong exactly, comfortable but unfamiliar, like I woke up in a hotel room.

I cross from the bedroom to the kitchen, and the space between them feels slightly off. The hallway seems longer than it should be. I blink, and it settles back into place.

I stand in the bathroom and look at my face. It looks back like it always does.

Calm.

Composed.

Acceptable.

“I don’t know what to do with you,” I say, and the sound of my own voice surprises me. It comes out rehearsed. The kind of tone that has always worked.

My reflection moves.

I don’t.

“This is what always happens with this guy,” the reflection says. “I don’t know what to do with you.”

“I was trying to be careful,” I say to my reflection. “I didn’t want to waste my life.”

A pause.

Consideration.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I can change,” I blurt out. The words rush. “I see it now. I was wrong. I’ll do something. Anything.”

The reflection hesitates.

“I think that maybe—”

Another pause. Longer this time.

I wait.

“I’m just not feeling it.”

Something fundamental lets go.

The bathroom blinks.

My reflection disappears.

My name flickers in and out of memory.

I try to speak.

I try to move.

I try to hold on to anything that feels solid.

There is a soft, final sound.

Not loud.

Not dramatic.

Like a key being pressed.

---

He stared at the screen, the words blurring. “I’m just not feeling it,” he said, voice low, as if the room might overhear.

He leaned back and rubbed at his eyes. This one had been with him longer than he cared to admit.

Edwin Miller. The name sat at the top of the page.

He scrolled through the notes again. Same dead end. Edwin never caught fire. Careful men never do. No matter where he put him, the story stalled.

He’d changed the weather, the stakes, the shape of the trouble. Forced choices that should have mattered.

Nothing held.

Not for long.

The world around him worked fine. The scenes fit. The structure held.

But Edwin never did.

Flat.

Careful.

Hollow.

Nothing to build from.

Nothing to pull forward.

He hovered over the trackpad, waiting for some last angle to show itself.

Nothing did.

He closed the file.

Didn’t bother to save.

A blank page blinked back at him.

He sat there a moment.

Then started over.

T.C. 1.5.26