Rain and Neon

The city looked the way cities only look at the end of long days — wet, glassy, full of reflections. He walked with one hand in his jacket pocket and the other on his phone, half scrolling and half waiting.

She wrote: u201cYouu2019re walking, arenu2019t you?u201d He smiled at the screen like an idiot, the way you do when nobody is watching. They talked about nothing the whole way home. About the song stuck in his head. About a movie sheu2019d been wanting to watch with him. About the way certain streets felt different at night.

By the time he turned the key in his door, the day had already softened around the edges. He sat down on the couch, pulled a blanket over his legs, and replied one more time before doing anything else.