Karl was gone, and a life without him felt impossible.
A doctor later confirmed what the paramedic had suspected. Karl had died of a heart attack.
Four days later, I buried him.
I handled everything because there was no one else to do it.
The only family contact I found in his phone was a cousin named Daniel. He came to the funeral, but no one else from Karl’s family showed up.
He stood off to the side after the service, hands in his coat pockets, looking like someone who wanted to leave but knew it would look wrong.
I walked over to him, grief having burned away any softness in me.
“You’re Karl’s cousin, right?”
He nodded. “Daniel.”
“I thought his parents would come.”
“Yeah…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “They’re complicated people.”
The words made my anger flare. “What does that even mean? Their son is dead.”
He looked at me, then away. “They’re wealthy people. They don’t forgive mistakes like the one Karl made.”
“What mistake?”
Daniel’s phone buzzed. He glanced at it like it had saved him.
“I’m sorry,” he said quickly. “I have to go.”
“Daniel.”
But he was already walking away—fast enough to look like panic.
That was the first crack.
The second came later that night, in the house Karl and I had shared.
Everything looked like he might walk through the door at any moment, and that made it unbearable.
I lay down, closed my eyes, and saw him collapsing again.
And again.
And again.
Before dawn, I got up, packed a backpack, and left.
I didn’t have a plan. I just knew I couldn’t stay in that house another hour. I went to the station and bought a bus ticket to somewhere I had never been, because distance felt like the only thing I could still control.
When the bus pulled away, I leaned my head against the window and watched the city blur into the gray morning. For the first time all week, I could breathe without feeling like I was swallowing glass.
At the next stop, the doors opened. People boarded.
One of them slid into the empty seat beside me, and a familiar scent hit me so strongly it made my stomach twist.
Karl’s cologne.
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