Chapter 165

[ 1,075 words ]

Julian’s POV

She fell asleep at four AM.

I watched it happen from across the server room. One moment she was reading the final sweep report; the next, her head dropped slightly and her breathing changed, and she was gone — the deep, immediate sleep of someone who had been running on nothing for two days and had finally run out of road.

I did not wake her.

I turned back to my screen and kept working and let her sleep and thought about nothing except the architecture in front of me. That was what I told myself.

Her phone was on the desk beside her.

At four seventeen, it rang.

I crossed the room before the second ring. I did not want it to wake her. I looked at the screen.

Daddy’s Girl.

The name I had saved her under after she said it, and I told her to call me that from then on. Private. On my own phone. Telling nobody. I looked at it for half a second, then looked at her asleep form at the desk six feet away, not moving – and felt the confusion land before I answered. Why would Katia call me when she’s right here sleeping? Could it be that Victor bugged her phone?

She was right there. I answered anyway.

“Hello,” I said.

There was silence. Then a small voice. Completely serious. Absolutely certain of itself.

“Hello. Is my mummy there? She left her phone p>

I stopped and looked across the room at Katia asleep at the desk. Her head was tilted slightly to one side. She had not moved.

“She’s asleep,” I said.

Aiden didn’t answer right away. I could hear the processing happening on the other end — a child receiving information and deciding what to do with it. “Oh.” Then: “Okay.” Then, after another brief pause, as if he had just remembered the actual purpose of the call, he said, “Can you tell her something p>

“Of course,” I said.

“Tell her I want waffles tomorrow. The ones with the syrup. Not the wrong syrup she got last time. The right syrup.” He said this with the gravity of someone communicating genuinely important information. “She knows which one p>

“I’ll tell her,” I said. “The right syrup p>

“Yes.” Then he pauses. Then the voice shifted slightly — the purposeful part of the call apparently concluded, now settling into something else. Pure curiosity. “Who are you p>

“My name is Julian,” I said.

“Julian,” he repeated. Testing it. Then, suddenly, with the delight of someone who had just connected two things, he said, “Are you the simulator man? From the party p>

I smiled. I could not help it. “Yes,” I said. “That’s me p>

“I knew it,” he said. Satisfied. Like he had solved something. “I remember you. You showed me the race clip.” He paused. “I’ve been thinking about that clip p>

“I do p>

A short pause. Then, with complete seriousness: “Is she good at her job p>

I looked at Katia across the room. At the woman who had worked for eighteen hours without complaining, who had handed out coffee at two in the morning with her sleeves rolled up, whose team followed her not because they had to but because she had earned every step of it.

“She’s the best I’ve ever seen,” I said.

He received this without surprise. “I know,” he said. “She’s very clever.” He paused again. “I’m going to be clever too when I grow up.” Another pause, shorter. “I’m already a little bit clever now p>

Something moved in my chest. I stood at the window of the server room at four in the morning and felt it and did not try to name it.

“I think you’re probably more than a little bit,” I said.

He paused again, as if trying to process what I said. I could hear him thinking about this — deciding whether to accept it or interrogate it. He apparently decided to accept it. “Okay,” he said. Then, without transition, with the abrupt subject changes that belonged entirely to children: “Do you like waffles p>

“I do,” I said.

“Good.” The word landed with satisfaction—the satisfaction of someone who had just confirmed something important. “Some people don’t. That’s very sad p>

“It is,” I agreed.

“Okay.” The voice shifted again — decisive now, the conversation concluded to his satisfaction. “Don’t forget the right syrup p>

“The right syrup,” I confirmed.

“Bye,” he said.

And hung up.

I stood at the window for a long time after the call ended.

The server room was quiet. Outside, Brooklyn was just beginning to catch the first grey light of early morning. The warehouses across the street were still dark. The city was not awake yet.

I held the phone.

I thought about the voice. The seriousness of it. The way it had moved from purpose to curiosity to warmth with the ease of someone who did not yet know how to be guarded. The way it had said, ’I’m already a little bit clever now’ with the complete certainty of a person who had never been given a reason to doubt themselves.

I thought about the jaw. The hands. The head tilted left.

I thought about a night in Las Vegas six years ago that I remembered in pieces. Warmth. Laughter. Something real.

I looked at Katia asleep at the desk.

I looked at the phone in my hand.

I put it in my pocket and went back to my workstation and sat down and stared at the screen without reading anything on it for a very long time.

She woke at five thirty.

I heard her stir. I gave her a moment. Then I walked to her desk and waited until her eyes were fully open.

“Aiden called my phone,” I said.

She looked up at me. Still half asleep. Then not.

“He was looking for you,” I said. “He wanted me to give you a message p>

She said nothing. Just looked at me.

“He wants waffles tomorrow with the right syrup.” I paused. “He remembered me from the birthday party. Called me the simulator man p>

Her hands were not steady on the desk.

I went back to my workstation. Outside the sun was coming up over Brooklyn, and the server room was quiet, and I thought, She doesn’t know yet. But something in her face had shifted. We were both getting closer to the same truth from different directions.

We both were.

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