I should not be trusted with this manuscript.
That is the first thought that comes to me as I hunch over the pages, pen hovering above the margin like it might betray me if I let it touch paper. My instincts are loud and clumsy. Underline everything. Circle what feels wrong. Scribble until the page looks like a confession of ignorance.
I resist.
Instead, I reread the paragraph slowly. The problem is not the idea. It is the rhythm. The sentences rush each other, tripping over their own urgency.
I make a small note beside the paragraph. Careful. Almost apologetic.
Consider breaking this into two sentences. Lets the tension breathe.
I set the pen down and fold my hands in my lap, as if stillness might undo the audacity of having an opinion at all.
The editor overseeing the stack stops behind me. She is tall, always perfectly straight, her glasses perched so low they make her look over them rather than through them. She flips the page, pauses, tilts her head. Her finger traces the margin once, slowly.
My lungs forget how to work.
She does not look at me. She does not comment. She moves on.
Minutes pass. I tell myself it means nothing. That silence is just silence. That I should not expect acknowledgment for doing the bare minimum.
When the manuscript returns to my desk, the paragraph is different. Not rewritten. Not dressed up. Just spaced. Calmer. Exactly what I suggested.
I blink.
Something inside my chest loosens. Not pride. Not relief. Just a quiet settling, like finding solid ground where I expected to fall through.
I lean back and look around the open office. Pens clicking. Keyboards tapping. Low voices discussing plot holes and deadlines. Fluorescent lights hum overhead, indifferent and constant. The world moves fast here, efficient and unceremonious.
And somewhere in the middle of it, a tiny note I made has mattered.
Not enough to earn a name. Not enough to be praised. Just enough to move the story forward.
That is enough.
I pick up the next manuscript. My hands are steadier now. The doubt is still there, but it no longer shouts. It waits its turn.
This is not glory. It is footing.
⟡ ✧ ⟡
A month in, I have learned the rhythm of this place.
The printers groan like they are tired of existing. Someone laughs near the window over a truly impressive misuse of a metaphor. The hum of work settles into my bones, no longer overwhelming. Just present. Just constant.
Survival has a sound. This is it.
Josh sits at the desk across from me, earbuds in, head nodding to a beat only he can hear. His fingers move confidently now, flipping pages, making notes without hesitation. When we first arrived, he second-guessed every mark. Now he edits like he belongs here.
I watch him for a moment longer than necessary.
He does not look lost anymore.
I turn back to my manuscript. There is a sentence weighed down by an unnecessary adverb, trying too hard to explain itself.
I write another small note in the margin.
Consider cutting the adverb. Action already shows this.
I place the pages onto the finished pile and lean back, realizing my hands are not shaking. My confidence does not announce itself. It hums quietly, steady and contained.
The editor passes by again. Same sharp posture. Same unreadable expression. She pauses at my desk, scans the note, and moves on without a word.
A few minutes later, the page returns. The sentence is leaner. Cleaner. Stronger.
I exhale, slow and silent.
This is what competence feels like. Not being seen. Not being celebrated. Just being right, and knowing it without needing permission.
Josh glances up, one earbud slipping out. He smirks.
"Your microscopic correction just became office law," he says. "Congratulations, assistant editor."
I roll my eyes. "Try not to sound impressed."
"Impossible," he replies, already turning back to his screen.
The moment passes easily. No weight. No ceremony.
I flip to the next manuscript, a faint thrill threading through my ribs. Brooklyn no longer feels like a place I am borrowing time from. It feels earned. Built page by page, note by note.
Lena's absence still exists. It always will. But it does not own this room. It does not touch the margins where I work, where I decide, where I leave something better than I found it.
For the first time in months, I am not reaching for healing. I am not waiting to be whole.
I am anchored.
Not by love. Not by memory. By presence.
And for now, that is enough.
⟡ ✧ ⟡
Cups of instant noodles and old papers are scattered around the apartment. This sight isn't unpleasant, just familiar.
Josh is pacing.
Not nervous pacing. Charged pacing. Like his thoughts have outgrown his body and need movement to survive.
"I figured it out," he says, for what is probably the fourth time in ten minutes. "The middle was wrong. Not bad. Just dishonest."
I sit on the couch with my laptop open but untouched, the screen dimmed to a soft glow. My notebook rests on my knee. Blank. It has been blank all evening.
"Dishonest how?" I ask, because that is my role right now. Anchor. Audience. Witness.
Josh stops long enough to point at me, eyes bright. Too bright for midnight.
"It was trying to be clever," he says. "Instead of being true. You know when a story pretends it understands something before it actually does?"
I nod. I do know.
He drops into the armchair across from me, then immediately leans forward again, elbows on his knees, hands moving like the air itself needs convincing.
"So I tore it apart. The structure, I mean. I pushed the inciting incident later. Way later. Let the voice breathe first. Let the reader fall in love before I break their heart."
A faint smile finds me.
Josh talks about writing the way some people talk about faith. Absolute. Unembarrassed. No distance at all.
"And the voice," he continues, barely stopping to inhale. "I finally quit trying to sound smart. I let him be messy. Insecure. A little unbearable. Which is the point."
I glance at the clock on the wall.
12:47 a.m.
"Josh," I say gently, "have you eaten anything today besides noodles?"
He flicks the question away without looking at me.
"Food is optional," he says. "This is a breakthrough."
Of course it is.
I lean back into the couch, letting his words wash over me. Plot. Structure. Voice. He circles them again and again, returning with fresh urgency each time, like he is discovering them for the first time.
I should be exhausted. I am exhausted. But there is something magnetic about watching someone love their work without apology.
Josh finally stops. Breathless. He looks at me, really looks.
"You're not listening," he says. Not angry. Just observant.
"I am," I reply. "I'm just slower."
He grins, then tilts his head, studying me the way he does when he thinks he has caught something important.
"You spend all day fixing other people's sentences," he says. "Then you come home and sit on your own words like they might hurt you."
I do not answer.
He leans back, arms crossed. "You know that's kind of messed up, right?"
"Editing doesn't ask me to bleed," I say, before I can stop myself.
Something in his expression shifts. Softens.
"That's exactly why you should be writing," he says.
My gaze drops to the notebook. The empty page waits. Patient. Unforgiving.
Josh writes outward. He throws himself onto the page and lets the world crash into him, then documents the wreckage without flinching.
I write inward. Or I would, if I allowed it. But inward writing demands silence. Honesty. A willingness to see what is still alive and what is not.
Avoidance is quieter.
Josh sighs dramatically and stands again, stretching like someone who refuses to call the race finished.
"One day," he says, "you're going to stop hiding behind other people's drafts."
I meet his eyes. "And one day you're going to learn that not every sentence needs to shout."
He laughs. Loud. Unbothered.
"See?" he says. "That's a note. You can't help yourself."
Maybe he is right.
Josh resumes pacing, already halfway back inside his story. I stay on the couch, notebook still empty, listening as his obsession fills the room.
Somewhere between his certainty and my silence, something waits.
Unwritten.
Unresolved.
Not ready yet.