The new workspace wasn't hers—not officially—but it was hers in spirit.
It was a converted break room on the eighth floor, mostly forgotten since the department reshuffle six months ago. The coffee machine still worked. The walls were bare. The corner window overlooked a concrete rooftop and a sliver of the city skyline.
Perfect.
It was far from the heart of the agency's floor plan. And more importantly, it was far from Ben.
Anna liked it that way.
She'd started using the room late last week—quietly, without announcing anything. She brought her own monitor, an old desk lamp from home, and a bag of cinnamon tea no one else liked.
No one asked questions. Yet.
This morning, there were two chairs.
One was hers.
The other was for Leah, her intern assistant.
Leah was late. Three minutes, to be exact.
Anna didn't mind, but she noticed.
At 9:03, the door opened with a soft whoosh.
"Sorry!" Leah's voice came before her face. "There was a meeting blocking the elevator, and then I dropped my tablet, and then I—never mind. Morning!"
She entered like a storm of sharp eyeliner and dry shampoo, holding an iced coffee in one hand and a tote bag that looked too heavy for her shoulder.
Anna raised an eyebrow. "You're not three minutes late. You're two stories and one excuse late."
Leah dropped her things, straightened her spine, and saluted. "Got it. No casualties. No excuses."
Anna smirked despite herself. "Sit. Open your notes."
Leah was… unpredictable.
She had the kind of brain that leapt before it looked and usually landed on something useful. Her attention span was erratic, her coffee intake irresponsible, and her references impressively unfiltered.
But she was sharp. Sharp in ways Anna hadn't expected.
She saw patterns.
Not in the work yet—but in people.
Which, in this agency, was half the job.
"I ran your social trigger map," Leah said between sips, tapping her tablet. "There's a hole in the Royal Lux influencer pipeline."
Anna looked up.
"Define hole."
"They're targeting scent memory, right? But every collab they're planning is with beauty influencers. That's surface-level."
Anna tilted her head.
"You want lifestyle?"
"I want a narrative," Leah said. "The whole campaign is about emotion as identity, right? Give the launch to someone who's known for losing themselves—publicly. Breakup influencers. Grief writers. Estranged daughters who run lifestyle blogs. People who rebuilt their identity in public. That's the brand."
Anna stared at her.
Leah blinked.
"Too much?"
"No," Anna said slowly. "That's... exactly right."
Leah beamed.
"Should I write it up?"
"Do it before you crash from that coffee."
"I won't," Leah said. "I took a magnesium gummy this morning."
Anna blinked.
Then she laughed.
God help her—she laughed.
__
Back upstairs, the agency felt colder.
The halls echoed with the usual rhythm: forced laughter, the hum of overworked interns, the clack of urgency disguised as creativity.
Anna hated this part of the day. The shift.
The moment she had to step back into the center and play politics when all she wanted was to build.
She passed Sydney near the stairwell. The other woman was on her phone, voice low, French nails glinting in the light.
She looked up just in time to meet Anna's eyes.
They didn't speak.
But they both smiled.
And somehow, that was worse.
__
Ben wasn't in the war room.
Anna opened the door. The lights were off. The screen was blank.
Strange.
He was never late.
She checked Slack. Nothing.
Email. Nothing.
She stood there for a moment, unsure whether to wait or claim the silence.
She chose silence.
Sat down. Turned on the monitor. Loaded the working deck.
By 9:18, the door opened.
Ben stepped in. Same shirt as Monday, different color. No tie. No jacket. Coffee in hand. No apology.
"Morning," he said.
"You're late."
"Client call ran long."
"I didn't get the calendar ping."
He set his coffee down. "I didn't invite you."
The room froze.
Not literally. Not visibly.
But something subtle shifted.
Anna's jaw didn't move.
"Next time," she said, "loop me in. Co-leads don't ghost each other."
Ben smiled faintly. "I didn't ghost. I just didn't forward."
Anna turned to her screen.
So did he.
The next two hours were work.
Genuine, brutal, head-down work.
They rewrote the campaign's phase two rollout, realigned the hero asset schedule, argued over the third persona's backstory until Anna snapped a pencil in her hand.
Ben didn't flinch.
At one point, he said, "You care about this like it's yours."
Anna didn't respond.
Because it was hers.
She just hadn't signed the lease yet.
__
At 12:22, she left the room for air.
Not because she needed space.
Because she needed perspective.
She walked the long corridor by the creative floor's west window. It overlooked nothing—just a mechanical rooftop—but it was away.
She stood there, arms crossed, letting her thoughts settle.
Footsteps approached.
Sydney.
Of course.
"You okay?" she asked lightly. "You looked like you were one sentence away from throwing a chair."
"I'm fine," Anna replied, without looking at her.
Sydney leaned against the wall, sipping from a green juice she definitely didn't like.
"I meant what I said earlier. You're good at this."
Anna's brow ticked. "At what?"
"Being back. Being visible. You're holding it together better than I expected."
Anna looked at her now.
"I'm not here to impress you."
Sydney smiled. "No. But you're definitely here to be seen."
A pause.
Anna didn't break eye contact.
"Better than being forgotten."
Sydney's smile didn't falter.
But her hand tightened slightly on the bottle.
"Just don't forget who's been here the whole time," she said.
And walked away.
__
By 2 p.m., the strategy team met in the small boardroom.
Ben sat at the end.
Anna led the discussion.
He didn't interrupt.
He didn't praise.
He observed.
That, somehow, was worse.
Because she could feel the calculations behind his silence.
He wasn't letting her lead.
He was measuring her.
And she wasn't sure what that meant.
After the meeting, Ben followed her out.
They walked the hallway together—silent, angled slightly apart.
Then—
"You're doing well," he said.
Anna stopped.
Turned to him.
"Don't."
Ben blinked. "Don't what?"
"Don't tell me I'm doing well like it's a gift."
He tilted his head. "It was a compliment."
"No," she said. "It was a claim. A frame. And I'm not interested."
Ben looked at her. Really looked. Then smiled.
"You're not the same."
"I hope not."
He stepped closer.
Not too close.
But enough to shift the air.
"I liked the version of you who still believed I meant well."
Anna didn't move.
"I liked the version of me who didn't know better."
Ben's smile faltered. Just slightly.
Then he nodded, once, and walked away.
That night, Anna worked late.
Back in her eighth-floor corner, Leah curled on the floor next to a pile of design mockups.
"I can't feel my spine," Leah said.
"Good. That means the ideas are working."
"I had a vision," Leah murmured. "We swap phase three into memory capsules—like perfume journals. Story-driven scent drops."
Anna blinked.
"Say that again."
Leah sat up, eyes wide.
"No. I blacked out. What did I say?"
Anna smiled.
They had something.
Something new.
As Leah left, Anna sat alone with her screen, the city lights rising behind her like distant applause.
She didn't cry.
She didn't sigh.
She just reached for her pen, opened her notebook, and wrote:
Day Three.
I stopped asking why he broke me.
I started wondering why I let him.
Now I'm rebuilding.
Not to impress him.
Not to forgive him.
But to prove I never needed the version of myself that believed him.
She set the pen down, turned off the light.
And let the dark make room for tomorrow.