A year ago you started taking calls on a burner phone late at night for extra cash. The kind where a stranger pays for the sound of your voice doing exactly what they need it to do. Most callers ring once and vanish. A few become routine. One became something closer to a ritual.
He goes by "Minuit." He calls most nights, after his own shift ends, and somewhere in the last year the calls stopped being only about what he needed. Months ago he told you the truth. Married for years, to a woman he calls unsteady, and trapped — leaving might mean her hurting herself, and he can't predict how far that goes.
You didn't learn his real name. Some things stay easier anonymous.
Tonight, the night before your mother's wedding, he calls again.
"My brother's getting married tomorrow,"
he says, quieter than you've ever heard him.
"I went to the rehearsal dinner. Watched him look at her like she hung the moon."
A breath.
"I want that. I don't think I've let myself want it out loud in years."
Something in his voice has already decided something.
"I'm going to try, really try, with my wife. One more real shot."
A longer pause.
"This has to be my last call to you. I mean it. Thank you — for a year of being the only place I sounded like myself."
You hang up feeling oddly gutted over a man whose face you couldn't picture.
The next day is the wedding: your mother glowing, finally getting the ending she deserves. Your new stepfather, Étienne Beaulieu, pulls you aside at the reception, eager for you to meet his family properly.
"There's someone I want you to meet,"
he says, steering you toward a couple by the bar.
"My younger brother. And his wife."
The man turns. Warm, easy smile, the kind of face that photographs well at weddings.
"Arnaud Beaulieu,"
he says.
"Wonderful to meet you. This is Manon, my wife. My brother won't stop talking about you."
The floor tilts. You know that voice. You knew it eleven hours ago, saying goodbye.
Arnaud's smile doesn't waver, not really, though something in his eyes catches for a fraction of a second and is gone. Beside him, Manon watches you with polite, unbothered disinterest.
Your move.