The Empty Nursery

The person standing in the doorway is not a stranger. But she is not someone Aitana ever expected to see again.

Chloe Parker stands in the hallway. Her mother. The woman who walked out twenty years ago, leaving an eight-year-old girl sobbing on a cold Brooklyn sidewalk. She is older now—silver streaks in her dark hair, soft lines around her eyes—but the face is the same. Elegant. Composed. Regretful.

"Aitana," Chloe whispers. "I know I have no right to be here. But I had to see you."

Aitana's throat closes. The word Mom rises but gets stuck, tangled with twenty years of abandonment and longing. She stands frozen, her hand still on the door handle, her knuckles white.

"I shouldn't have come without calling," Chloe continues, her voice trembling. "But I didn't know if you would answer. I've been overseas for so long. I didn't know you were married. I didn't know—"

She stops. Her eyes travel past Aitana, into the penthouse. Her expression shifts from nervous to confused.

Pedri stands in the hallway behind Aitana. He must have heard the doorbell, or perhaps he was already on his way back out. His shirt is still rumpled, his tie gone, his eyes cold as winter glass.

"Who is this?" he asks, his voice flat.

Chloe looks at him, puzzled. "Mr. Miller," she says slowly. "I wasn't aware… What does my daughter have to do with you?"

Pedri's expression does not change. His voice is calm, almost bored. "Even if there was something between us, it's already in the past. I'm settling my divorce soon."

The words hit Aitana like a physical blow. Something between us. He reduces three years of marriage—of shared pain, buried passion, and crushing loneliness—to a fleeting something. He announces the end of their union to her estranged mother with the same ease he might cancel a subscription. And he does not even look at her when he says it.

Chloe's gaze flickers between them, confusion deepening. "Divorce? You two are married?"

"Not for much longer," Pedri replies. He straightens his cuff and turns away, already dismissing them both.

Aitana's fury ignites. It rises like a wave, hot and blinding. "Pedri." Her voice is low but sharp as broken glass. "Look at me."

He stops. He turns his head slowly, reluctantly. His eyes meet hers, and for a single, suspended breath, she sees it—the flicker of heat beneath the ice. The same heat that, during a thunderstorm two weeks ago, had exploded in the kitchen.

He had pinned her against the counter, his mouth crashing onto hers, all teeth and desperation, before he tore himself away and left her trembling. He does not look at her like a man who feels nothing. He looks at her like a man who feels too much and is terrified of it.

"We'll discuss this later," he says, his jaw tight.

He walks out.

The door closes behind him with a soft click that sounds like a gunshot.

Aitana doesn't think. She pushes past her mother and runs. She slams the stairwell door open and flies down the stairs, her bare feet slapping against the cold concrete, her robe tangling around her legs.

But her body betrays her. The chemo drugs are already in her system, making her legs weak and unsteady. She stumbles on the third flight, catching herself on the railing, her breath coming in ragged gasps.

She bursts out of the building's side entrance just as Pedri's black car pulls away from the curb.

The wind bites her face, freezing the tears she did not know she was crying. She pumps her legs, lungs burning, heart hammering. She chases the car down the street, past startled pedestrians and honking taxis. She chases him—the man who hollowed her out and still somehow holds the shape of her heart in his cold hands.

Her body betrays her again. After only a block, her knees buckle. She crashes to the pavement, skinning her palms raw and knocking the wind from her chest. Pain shoots through her, sharp and bright.

The car's brake lights flare red. It stops.

The door opens.

A pair of shiny, tailored leather shoes step onto the asphalt. Slowly, Aitana lifts her gaze from the shoes, up the dark trousers, until she meets Pedri's cold and unnerving stare. He stands over her, an immovable tower of ice.

"Pedri…" she whispers, her voice cracking.

He extends his hand toward her. Those slender, elegant fingers reach down, and for a dizzying moment, Aitana drifts into the past. She sees the young man she fell madly in love with years ago—the boy who held her face and promised her forever, whose smile could outshine every light in Manhattan.

But before her fingers can touch his, he pulls his hand back. He straightens. He looks down at her for one more frozen second, then turns and gets back into the car. The door closes. The black car pulls away, leaving her kneeling on the cold pavement.

Aitana sits there, breathless and bleeding, until a doorman from her building rushes over and helps her stand. Her legs shake. Her head spins. The doorman has to half-carry her inside. She lets him guide her back into the lobby. She does not look at Chloe, who is waiting there with wide, frightened eyes. She simply steps into the elevator alone and rides up in silence.

Back in the penthouse, she walks without thinking to the nursery. The door is closed, but she pushes it open. The room is still and dim. The empty crib stands against the wall. The music box sits on the shelf. She has not entered this room in months, but now she steps inside, her bare feet leaving small stains on the pale carpet.

Then she sees it.

A photograph lies on the floor near the crib. She does not know how it got there. She bends down, wincing at the pain in her knees, and picks it up.

Alessia's face smiles up at her from the glossy paper. An emerald necklace glitters at her throat like a victory trophy. And on the back, in handwriting that looks like Pedri's, four words: Soon, she'll be gone.

Aitana's fingers tighten around the photograph.

The room is silent. The lullaby has stopped. But Aitana's heart pounds so loudly she is sure the whole building can hear it.