On the twenty-second day, the vacuum broke.

A sharp knock rattled the door. It wasn’t military brass bringing the worst news imaginable — it was a private courier in a cheap gray suit. He handed me a sleek, cream leather folder, got my signature on his digital pad, and vanished down the hall without a word.

The air went cold. I carried the folder to the kitchen table and flipped it open.

Inside was a stack of heavily watermarked legal documents. Divorce papers. At the bottom of the final page, stark against the white, was Caleb’s signature.

Unmistakable — the sharp, aggressive C with a long, impatient slash through the H, the exact loop he used signing restaurant receipts and hasty field reports.

Attached to the front was a sticky note in Celeste’s elegant cursive: