Negative Space

The house on Corvin Street smelled wrong before Lucien even reached the door.
Not wrong like a crime scene no blood, no rot, none of that sharp chemical stillness that clung to rooms where a body had been left too long. This was different. A dry, papery sweetness, like sun‑warmed book pages. It clung to the hedges, the welcome mat, even the brass sparrow‑shaped knocker Sera once told him her father hated and her mother refused to replace.
He knocked anyway. Some habits didn't care whether the house remembered him.
Mrs. Lindqvist opened the door with the bright, brittle cheer of someone hoping for good news. She was still in her dressing gown at eleven, hair pinned back loosely, eyes red‑rimmed in a way that spoke more of sleepless nights than grief.

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