Alex did not read the notebook all at once.
He sat at the table, the four cups still arranged by the stove, and turned the pages slowly, as if moving too fast might cause the house to remember it was supposed to be empty.
The handwriting was small and careful.
It was thin.
The pages near the back had been chewed at the edges.
Not by insects.
By someone who had learned that paper dissolved slower than hunger.
The writing inside was careful at first. Then uneven. Then small.
Alex sat on the floor outside the closet and read.
— — —
My name is Lira.
Dad says I should write things down so I don't forget them.
I am twelve.
I think I am still twelve.
The city is quiet today.
—
We used to live near the long water room.
Dad said it was safe because the city liked water.
It fixed the pipes by itself.
Sometimes the walls moved but only a little.
—
Mom stopped coming back first.
Dad said she went to the center.
Everyone says the center is sealed.
The air hurts there.
But people still go.
—
I get hungry.
Not like before.
Before was loud.
Now it is everywhere.
—
The handwriting tightened here, lines pressing closer together.
—
Dad says hunger is a test.
He says the city watches how long things last.
He says the ones that last get to stay.
—
Sometimes I dream I have wings.
Not like birds.
Like the city.
Like I can hold myself up without trying.
—
The page after that was stained.
Salt.
Water.
Something darker.
—
Dad came back wrong.
—
He didn't talk anymore.
He moved slow like the floors do when they are thinking.
He smelled like the water room.
—
I hid.
—
He followed.
—
The words here were pressed so hard the paper had nearly torn.
—
He touched me like he was checking if I was real.
I think he wanted me to change too.
I think he wanted me to keep going.
—
I hit him.
—
He stopped moving.
—
The city didn't do anything.
—
I waited.
—
Several pages were blank after that.
Then the writing returned, smaller, steadier.
—
I locked myself in the closet because things that stop moving get taken.
The shell-walkers don't come here.
They stay near the big streets.
—
Sometimes I hear them anyway.
Their feet sound like the floor deciding.
—
I eat what I find.
Sometimes grain.
Sometimes paper.
Sometimes nothing.
—
Hunger doesn't yell anymore.
It talks quiet now.
It says it can wait.
—
I don't think I am supposed to die yet.
—
The last entries were dated only by repetition.
—
I dreamed again.
This time I didn't wake up hungry right away.
—
I dreamed I was hollow and it felt good.
Like there was room to keep going.
—
The city hasn't pushed me out.
I think it forgot I was here.
—
Or maybe it is watching.
—
Alex closed the notebook slowly.
Only then did he place his hand against the closet door.
Inside, something shifted.
Not fear.
Not flight.
Endurance.
Breathing—slow, economical—continued on the other side of the wood.
No system message appeared.
No designation formed.
Whatever Lira had become, she had not crossed the threshold that made the city name things.
Alex did not open the door.
Not yet.
Outside, far across the Floating City, something vast pressed against the sealed center, patient as hunger itself.
And inside a space meant for cleaning supplies and coats, a child who had outlasted gods waited for the world to decide what she was allowed to be.
— — —