The black Mercedes moved through empty streets with the quiet hum of expensive engineering, its tinted windows reflecting neon signs and streetlights that painted brief, colorful streaks across the glass. I pressed my back against the leather seat, trying to disappear into its warmth while my skin burned with exposure. Naked. Still completely naked in the back of a stranger's car, with only the darkness and her studied in...

The gym is quiet. Late enough that most people have gone, early enough that the cleaners haven’t started their rounds. I like it this way: space to move without bumping elbows, space to breathe without someone watching. Outside, the last stretch of sun hangs stubbornly over the city, a thin orange blade cutting through gray. The cold still lingers from the past few days, but in here, on the treadmill, warmth builds. My sh...

Three weeks since that night in the basement, and I could still feel the buzz of that room beneath my skin. Three weeks of ordinary shifts at The Foundry, wiping tables, dodging wandering hands, and watching the familiar rhythms of Klaus's operation unfold above ground. The Crows still held their corner booth. The regulars still nursed their beers. The music still pounded industrial heartbeats through concrete and steel....

Klaus’s text had arrived three days ago, blunt and unyielding: Black. Short. Tight. Clean. No bra. Leather or latex preferred. Heels. Makeup done. I’d spent the afternoon hunting through Neukölln’s back-street thrift stores: narrow, cluttered caves wedged between döner shops and auto garages. Fluorescents buzzed overhead, racks sagged under the weight of strangers’ wardrobes. Everything smelled faintly of dust, smoke, and...

The Foundry squatted between a shuttered auto repair shop and a warehouse whose windows were crosshatched with plywood, the dark brick blackened with the kind of soot Berlin never bothered to wash away. No neon, no name above the door. Just a rusted plaque etched with a warped gear, more graffiti tag than sign. The entrance sat recessed in shadow, guarded by a bouncer with a neck thick as rebar, scanning the street like h...

Seattle doesn’t change, not really. Cold. Wet. The mist was thick enough to blur the skyline into smudges of gray. Streets slick with rain, the air always heavy, like it’s pressing you down into the concrete. Everyone walks fast here, heads low, collars up. Pretending they don’t see the things piling up in the news. The bodies show up steadily, like clockwork. Every week or two. A homeless man slumped against a wall, skin...

The November cold bit through my jacket as I leaned against the concrete wall, watching the warehouse across the street. Four weeks in Neukölln had taught me that winter crept in fast here, slipping between the industrial buildings like smoke. The streetlights cast uneven pools of yellow on the cracked asphalt, and the air carried the smell of diesel and Turkish coffee from the all-night café two blocks over. I pulled my...

Two days. Gone. I stared at the girl in the mirror, my mind clawing for any fragment of memory from the void between then and now. What had I done? Where had I been? The harder I searched, the more complete the emptiness became. Think, Alan... Think. Nothing. Just this yawning gap where forty-eight hours should have been. No dreams, no flashes, no half-remembered conversations or glimpses of sunlight through windows. Just...

The hammering inside my head dragged me back to consciousness like a rusty anchor scraping against concrete. I cracked one eye open and immediately regretted it. The pale morning light filtering through Martin's thin blue curtains felt like needles jabbing straight into my brain. Christ. What did I drink last night? I tried to roll over on the couch, but something felt... off. My limbs moved with this strange, weightless...

It’s been a long winter in Seattle. The kind where the rain never really stops, just changes in volume. Days smear into nights until you forget when one ends and the other begins. Classes. Part-time work. Grocery runs between downpours. Reality is nothing like the glossy college life they show in movies: no endless sunny quads, no picture-perfect friend groups. Just damp hair, sore feet, and laundry that never seems to dr...

I was supposed to be studying. I had the books open, the highlighters uncapped, but my phone was face-up and glowing. One little red dot. Instagram. The message was from someone I didn’t follow. A guy. Profile picture looked like it had been taken with a cigarette between his fingers. ~Michael Hey… your look is really natural. We’re casting for an existing series, kind of first-time video vibe. Nothing crazy. If you’re cu...

I don’t remember who booked the hotel. Not me. Or Mads. Probably one of the other girls, after too many cocktails and not enough supervision. It wasn’t the Bellagio or anything fancy, but we had two connecting rooms, a working ice machine, and the kind of floral bedspreads that looked like they’d seen some things and wouldn’t judge if we added to the list. Vegas for Summer Break-slash-birthday-slash-we-survived-our-freshm...

I stepped onto the campus, backpack slung over one shoulder, and felt the pulse of it: the distant hum of air conditioners, the scrape of sneakers across concrete. My chest tightened. Today was the start of college. ASU, my first class. Freshman orientation had been a blur of names and pamphlets, but now it was the real thing. The classroom doors opened, and I stepped in, scanning for a familiar face, or maybe just the on...

Seattle breathes in shades of gray. Rain streaks down my window in crooked lines, blurring the buildings outside into shapes I don’t try to name. The sidewalks below shine like wet stone, slick and dark, reflecting the occasional flash of headlights. Somewhere, a bus sighs to a stop. I don’t look. It’s been raining since morning. Probably will continue all night too. That kind of cold that seeps in through the walls, no m...

By the time I finally see the roof of the cabin through the trees, my legs are shaking and my socks are wet with that cold, squishy kind of regret. They say it’s a four-hour hike… sure, if you’re a damn forest elf. For me, it takes almost seven, with the last hour spent second-guessing every turn and trying not to think about how fast the light is fading. The air has that brittle, late-October bite, and the trail is litte...