The air in the house changed after the truth was out. The desperate pretending was over, replaced by a quiet, fierce focus. Asha no longer looked at her blueprints as a job; she looked at them as her fingerprint on a world she was about to leave.
She moved her workspace from the bedroom to the center of the living room, surrounded by the plants and the light. She had a deadline that no project manager could ever understand.
"I need to finish the spire," she said one morning, her voice thin but determined. "The atrium is done, but the spire—the way it catches the dawn—that's the soul of the building. If I don't finish it, the building is just a box."
Rohan and Roy became her unofficial team. Roy handled the atmosphere, playing music that matched the rhythm of her sketching, while Rohan handled the logistics. He brought in high-resolution monitors, 3D modeling hardware, and even hired a private nurse who sat in the shadows, ready with oxygen and pain relief so Asha wouldn't have to go back to the hospital.
"Rohan, look at the angles here," Asha whispered late one night. She was leaning heavily against him as they sat on the floor, the glow of the screen illuminating the hollows of her cheeks. "If we use the reinforced polymer instead of steel for the tip, it won't just reflect the sun. It will glow."
Rohan looked at the screen, then at her. He didn't see an architect; he saw a star that was burning its brightest just before going supernova.
"It'll be the first thing people see when they fly into the city," Rohan said, kissing her temple. "They'll see your light before they even touch the ground."
The work became her medicine. On the days when the pain was so sharp she couldn't stand, she would sit in her chair, her hand shaking as she guided the digital pen. Rohan would sit behind her, his large hands steadying her wrists, his strength flowing into her fingers.
They were building it together.
"Roy," Asha called out one evening. "Come here."
Roy set aside his guitar and knelt by her. She pointed to a section of the atrium's acoustic paneling.
"I've designed the vents to catch the wind," she explained, a small, proud smile on her lips. "When the wind blows from the north, the building will hum. I used the frequencies from The Architect's Theme. Your song will live in the steel, Roy. Even when the music stops, the building will keep singing."
Roy's eyes filled with tears, but he forced them back. He leaned over and kissed her forehead. "Then I'll make sure the world hears it."
But as the spire took shape on the screen, Asha's body began to fail. The "seconds" Rohan had begged for were slipping through his fingers like sand. She was sleeping more, her voice fading to a rasp, her hand losing the strength to hold the pen.
One night, as the city lights twinkled outside, Asha drew the final line. The spire was complete. A perfect, soaring needle of light and wind.
She leaned back into Rohan's chest, her breath coming in slow, shallow hitches. "It's done," she whispered. "I'm... I'm not invisible anymore, Rohan. I'm a part of the sky."
Rohan held her tighter, his tears falling silently into her hair. He looked at the completed blueprint—the masterpiece of a girl who had been too tired to kick down doors.
"You're the brightest thing in the sky, Asha," he choked out.
She didn't answer. She was already drifting, her hand falling away from the keyboard. The final blueprint was finished, but the silence that followed was the loudest thing Rohan had ever heard.