The night deepened.
The city pulsed below, a living thing that never slept.
Adrian stood on the balcony, barefoot, glass of whiskey in hand.
The cold air brushed against his face, but he barely felt it.
Far below, traffic crawled — tiny rivers of light winding through the streets.
People laughed somewhere, too far away to hear clearly.
It was the sound of life continuing without him.
He took a long sip, the liquid burning down to his stomach.
The glass trembled slightly in his hand.
The city's wind carried faint music from another building — someone practicing piano, a simple waltz, uneven but alive.
It made his chest ache.
He looked down.
Twenty stories below, the streetlights blurred in the haze.
A single step forward, he thought.
No pain.
No interviews.
No pretending.
The thought came not as temptation but as logic, smooth and cold.
He wasn't running from life anymore; he was simply walking toward silence.
Inside, the piano key he had struck still hummed faintly, a single echo refusing to fade.