The following morning unfolded with a clarity so sharp that it felt staged, as though reality itself had decided to mock me with precision. I sat alone at a small café positioned directly across from the townhouse, my body tucked behind a wide newspaper I barely registered reading. The porcelain cup before me released faint spirals of steam that slowly vanished into the air while my coffee cooled untouched, mirroring the strange numbness spreading through my chest. I had not slept. I had replayed every detail from the previous night until exhaustion blurred memory into a looping haze of disbelief.
At precisely 8:12 a.m., the front door opened.
He stepped outside with the ease of a man beginning an ordinary workday.