Cable Knotted Around Hearts

Maya moved through the office like a zombie at 3 PM—eyes glazed, consciousness elsewhere, her body performing the motions of software engineering while her mind replayed last night's conversation by the apartment pool.

"You play padel?" David had asked, leaning against the wrought-iron fence. The pool's underwater lights cast rippling patterns across his face, making him look both older and more boyish than thirty-two.

"Badly," she'd admitted. "But I enjoy the losing."

He'd laughed, and something in her chest had tightened like a cable pulled too taut. They'd been dancing around each other for months—stolen glances during stand-up meetings, lingering touches when passing documents, the electric tension of unsaid words filling every shared space.

Now, at her desk, her phone lit up. *Dinner? Then padel? I promise to go easy on you.*

Maya stared at the message, her heart hammering. She was exhausted from another week of feeling half-alive, drained by meetings that could have been emails and small talk that felt like performance art. But David made her remember what it was like to feel something real.

Outside, rain streaked the windows. The office felt like a tomb of fluorescent lights and muted conversations. She thought of the pool at night, how the water reflected the stars, how David had looked at her like she was something worth waiting for.

*Yes,* she typed. *But don't go easy. I want the real game.*

The cable around her heart loosened, just a little. Some zombies, she decided, were just waiting for someone to notice they weren't dead at all—just dormant, waiting for the right spark to remember what living felt like.