The noise is a physical migraine. It is the sound of lives Elle never asked for, screaming for space in a brain that is already at capacity.
Marielle Morgan, known to her friends as 'Elle' doesn't just live in New York; she lives in the leaks of it. While others worry about their rent or their coffee orders, Elle is busy watching a neighbor she's never spoken to press a mistress against a brick wall, inside her head. Or worse, she's stuck in the humid, metallic heat of a desert half a world away, watching a soldier bleed out under a violet sky she can't find on a map.
"Borrowed eyes," her grandmother used to whisper, smelling of sage and secrets. "It's a gift, my firefly. You see the truth."
"It's a curse," she would snap back. If this is a gift, she'd like to speak to the manager and return it for a full refund.
For fifteen years, her parents treated her visions like a particularly stubborn "goth phase," but Elle knows better. You don't just "grow out" of seeing the world in jagged, unstoppable film reels.
She survives on a steady diet of caffeine and a "don't-touch-me" aura that works wonders on the subway. She moves through Manhattan like she's navigating a minefield. Eyes down, and shoulders up. One accidental brush of a stranger's hand could send her spiraling into their childhood trauma or their grocery list.
Only her best friend, Camila, bless her patient, saintly soul, knows why Elle would suddenly freeze mid-laugh, her eyes turning into glass. Camila never asks questions. She just reaches out, grabs her hand, and anchors her to the sidewalk until the fire stops playing behind Elle's eyelids.
Tonight, however, is supposed to be her safe place.
"Just me, you, and the dramatic inaccuracies of The Crowned Heart," Elle tells her reflection. No ghosts, no strangers' secrets. Just the blissful comfort of microwave popcorn and a night where the only drama belongs to people getting paid to act.
But fate has a twisted sense of humor, and it is currently laughing in her face.
*****
Across the city, Damian Blackwell is busy trying to prove that his soul hasn't completely eroded. It isn't going well.
He's a man built on the architecture of control. But control is a lie when your board of directors holds a metaphorical gun to your head. Blackwell Enterprises is bleeding out from a year of scandals, and the only known cure is a staged romance. A PR-perfect marriage.
"A wife, Damian," his uncle had hissed earlier, adjusting Damian's cufflinks as if they were shackles. "A nice, quiet, photogenic wife. Fix the image, or they fix the leadership."
The gala is a sea of expensive teeth and predatory smiles. The air tasted of vintage champagne and desperation. Damian stands in the center of the madness, his pulse a hollow, rhythmic thud. He has the ring in his pocket, and the speech memorized. He just needs to find the woman his team scouted; a socialite with a clean record and zero personality.
Then, he sees her tangled with his uncle.
She isn't the socialite. She's a glitch in the system. A woman in a black dress, clutching a notebook as if it were a weapon. She looks like she's vibrating at a different frequency than the rest of the room.
Their eyes meet, and for the first time in thirty years, the internal roar of Blackwell Enterprises goes dead silent.
He's supposed to turn left. He's supposed to propose to the woman who will save his stock prices. Instead, his legs suddenly operating with a mind of their own, carry him toward the woman with the notebook.
Every step feels like walking off a cliff. He can see his publicist's face turn a ghostly shade of white, and feel the heat of a thousand cameras turning toward him. But for the first time in his life, Damian Blackwell doesn't care about the headline.
He reaches for her, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. The noise in his head finally stops. He can actually hear himself breathe.
"Yes," she whispers, after he begs her to.
Elle's head is spinning. She can't tell him that as he approached, everything else vanished. She can't tell him that she's just seen a vision of them; not now, not here, but somewhere older. Somewhere with a storm and a promise.
The cameras explode into a frenzy of white light. The deal is struck in the dark. They have no idea that "yes" is just the beginning of the cost.