The days keep their shape.
The city moves softly around me, and I move softly through it. Familiar paths. Familiar faces. I don't belong here – not truly – but I fit. Just enough.
Madame Leclerc is outside her florist's shop as always. Her hands are full of green stems and soft pink blooms. She waves when she sees me, her fingers still dusted in yellow pollen. She wears the same neat scarf tied around her neck every morning – blue, today – and her voice carries the warmth of someone who's seen too many seasons to care for small formalities.
"Morning, dear girl," she calls. "Off to the market?"
I nod. "Just a few things."
She smiles like she always does. Kind. Curious, but never prying. "You keep us all in line," she teases. "I swear you're the only one in this town who remembers to say hello to everyone."
I smile back. "Habit, I suppose."
I move on.
The baker, Monsieur Duret, is setting out fresh loaves as I pass. He doesn't say much – he never does – but he gives me a small nod, the same precise tilt of the head every time. I've seen him do it for years. Always the same. There's something steady in it. Something I like.
I hear about his daughter sometimes, though I've never met her. People mention her name over café tables, in half-heard snippets. Studying in the city. Living far away. He never speaks of her himself.
I keep walking.
I pass the square. The bookshop. The cafés with their small iron chairs and soft chattering voices. Everything breathes the way it always does.
But it feels different now.
The faces are the same. The air is the same. But beneath it, the warmth hums softly, tucked under the edges of thought. The weight of fabric against skin. The memory of stillness.
Nothing's changed.
Except me.
The market hums softly when I reach it.
I let myself wander without purpose. The stalls blur together – colors, scents, soft voices. My hands trail lightly over folded fabrics again. A habit now, almost. The sensation of touch lingers longer than it should.
Madame Aubert waves me over. She sells herbs and small jars of dried things I never know the names of. She always wears two thick silver rings on her fingers, always has a smudge of something under her nails. Her eyes are sharp but kind.
"Too quiet this morning," she murmurs. "The city's gone soft on us."
I smile. "I don't mind the quiet."
She offers me a paper-wrapped sachet of lavender – "For your pillows," she says – and I take it. I buy nothing else. She doesn't seem to mind.
The rest drifts by in pieces: the boy from the pastry stall flashes me a grin when he catches me watching; two elderly men play cards on a corner bench; a child chases pigeons near the fountain, his laughter sharp and bright against the muted morning.
It's peaceful.
And yet the warmth is always there now. Not urgent. Not loud. Just steady. Pressed low under breath and movement. The way silk brushes skin. The way my thighs shift when I pause too long.
I don't act on it.
But I feel it deepen.
And when I finally turn back toward home, the weight of it sits with me. Quiet. Breathless.
And full.
Home greets me softly, as always.
The door clicks shut behind me. The weight of the outside world lifts in pieces – coat, shoes, bag set carefully aside. The air inside is still, carrying the faint scent of lavender from the sachet I accepted earlier.
I change without thinking: soft shorts, clean cotton, loose sweater. Every fabric familiar. Every layer chosen without deliberate meaning – and yet each choice feels sharper now. More present.
The pressure returns the moment I sit. The faint pull of fabric. The weight. The hum beneath my skin.
I let it stay.
I don't chase it. I don't move my hands. I just breathe, slowly, and let the quiet hold me. The warmth gathers gently, not sharp, not urgent. Just full. Soft. Contained.
I don't need more than this.
Not yet.
The evening drifts by – tea, soft music, the slow hush of turning pages I barely read. But beneath it all, the warmth lingers. Quietly alive.
And when I finally slip into bed, fingertips brushing the soft edge of fabric, I know without doubt:
I don't want to let it go.
Not tonight.
Not anymore.