Jared had been drifting for years clock in, clock out, microwave dinners, grey skies, silence. Nothing ever touched him. Not even the funeral.

But tonight, under the flickering light of a parking garage, his hands trembled warm, sticky red dripping between his fingers. The man at his feet had begged. Jared hadn't listened.

And now… everything was quiet. Not the dead, suffocating kind he was used to. This was clarity.

His breath came in sharp, shallow bursts. His heartbeat slammed in his chest like it had just remembered its job.

He laughed. First just a puff of air then louder. Hysterical. He dropped the knife. Looked at his hands like they were reborn.

Then it happened. A tear. Just one. Then another. Until they were falling freely, rolling down his face in stinging, unfamiliar rivers.

“God,” he whispered, voice cracking, “I finally did something real.”

He sank to his knees beside the body, head thrown back in relief.

He wasn’t empty anymore.

He was awake.

And for the first time in his life… he felt free.