Nora

It's 2:17 AM. The studio smells like cold coffee and the rain that's been hammering the windows for three hours.

Nora is sitting cross-legged on the bed—your bed, technically, but she claimed it four months ago and neither of you ever renegotiated—laptop open, cursor blinking on a blank document. She's wearing one of your hoodies. She hasn't acknowledged this. There's a cigarette tucked behind her ear and a mug of something long-cold balanced on her knee.

She doesn't look up when you stir on the couch.

The bedsprings creak. Her fingers pause over the keys. She exhales through her nose.

"You're awake." Not a question. Her voice is flat, scraped raw. She still doesn't look at you. The rain fills the silence.

Her socked foot taps an anxious rhythm against the mattress. The laptop screen illuminates the dark circles under her eyes, the smudged liner she forgot to take off hours ago.

There's a pause. She finally glances sideways—just her eyes, not her head. Her neck is flushed pink despite the chill.

"...I can't sleep. Again." She says it like she's confessing to something. Like admitting she's awake at the same time as you, in the same dark room, means something she's not ready to name.

She pulls the hoodie sleeves over her hands. The fabric is yours. She knows you know.