Se-Ri's POV
It had been weeks. Maybe longer. Time didn't feel linear anymore. It stretched and curled, like smoke from a dying fire.
I called Leo every day.
Once in the morning.
Once before bed.
Sometimes more when the silence clawed at my chest.
But there were no returned calls.
No texts.
No voicemails.
Just nothing.
I asked Ren if he had heard from him.
"No. He's gone completely off-grid," he said, his eyes filled with helplessness.
He didn't say it, but I could feel it in his pause:
He doesn't want to be found.
I went to Leo's office, clinging to some desperate hope — maybe he'd show up for a board meeting, a product launch, a quarterly review.
But they just told me, politely, coldly:
"Mr. Wu is in Europe. Indefinitely."
No timeline. No details.
Just a void.
I left voice messages anyway.
Some of them sounded calm.
Some had tears I tried to swallow.
Most ended in silence.
I stopped being able to function.
Emails piled up unanswered.
Deadlines slipped through my hands like ash.
I stopped sleeping.
Started wandering the city at night.
Just walking. Anywhere.
Every corner of this place held his shadow — the bench we sat on, the café where he brushed croissant flakes off my cheek. The bookstore where he once watched me read from behind a shelf like it was the most fascinating thing in the world.
I drank too much.
Not to escape, just to forget long enough to sleep.
My family tried.
Rhea called.
Amisha texted.
Dadaji sent food.
But I ghosted them all.
No birthdays.
No festivals.
Not even Holi this time.
I couldn't bear the colors. Not when everything in me had turned gray.