Terms and Conditions

Shadows and Relics

It started with a song. A few piano notes drifting from the far end of Alison's office corridor—low, languid, almost melancholic. Emily paused, her footsteps slowing instinctively as she turned her head toward the sound. Music wasn't uncommon in this building, but something about this melody felt personal. Familiar, even. Like it belonged to a different life.

The sound led her to the media lounge, a minimalist room outfitted with soundproof walls and a baby grand piano no one seemed to use.

Except someone was using it now.

The woman at the keys had long honey-brown curls pulled into a loose bun. Her back was straight, her movements fluid and exact. Emily recognized her posture before she recognized her face.

Then she turned her head slightly and Emily's breath collapsed inside her chest.

Maya.

It was impossible, and yet it wasn't because of course Maya Lightburn was here. Of course she was in the same building, in the same orbit. Emily should've seen it coming the moment she read Alison's last name.

Cousin. That had been the word in the outline. It felt too small now, like trying to describe a storm as "some wind."

Maya hadn't changed much. Same glint in her eyes, same infuriating calm. But there was something sharper in her now too, something more composed, more expensive. She wore a white blazer and matching slacks with effortless cool, and when she saw Emily, her smile was a slow, intimate weapon.

"Well," Maya said, rising from the bench. "If it isn't the one that got away."

Emily froze in the doorway.

"Maya."

"Still got that same voice. Like Sunday morning," Maya said. Her tone was teasing, but the edge was real. "I heard you signed with Alison. That's brave."

Emily swallowed. "I didn't know you worked here."

"I don't," Maya said. "Not officially. But I consult. And family's family. Especially when it's her family."

Emily took a slow breath. "How long have you known?"

"That you'd be here?" Maya walked closer. Her heels made no sound on the carpet. "Alison told me last week. She seemed... intrigued by you. Didn't take much to figure out who she meant."

Emily hated the flush that rose to her throat. "She didn't know about us."

"Maybe not," Maya said. "But she knows now."

Later that night, Emily sat in her apartment with the lights off and the TV playing a show she wasn't watching. Her father was asleep in the back bedroom, and her mother was out for her weekly prayer circle. It was quiet.

Too quiet.

Maya's voice lingered in her head, rewinding pieces of their past. She hadn't thought about the breakup in months — really thought about it — but now it played like film on a loop.

The last night they were together. The fight in the rain. Maya yelling that she needed space, needed freedom. Emily begging her to stay. The way Maya had kissed her afterward, soft and slow, like goodbye wasn't the end but something worse, an undoing.

They had tried. For months. But ambition pulled Maya west, and grief held Emily back like an anchor.

And now, like some cruel twist of fate, here they were again. Older. Sharper. With more to lose.

Emily picked up her phone, then put it down again. Then picked it up once more.

She texted Hanna.