Prescribed Light

The vitamin D sat on her tongue like a small white judgment. Three times daily, with meals — the doctor's prescription for what he'd called "situational depression," though Maya preferred the term "winter of the soul." It had been six months since Mark left, taking the better dishes and the cat, a Siamese named Luna who'd always preferred him anyway.

Now, in the fluorescent hum of her office cubicle, Maya's iPhone illuminated with another LinkedIn notification — another former colleague announcing their promotion, their book deal, their goddamn flourishing life. She swiped it away, the gesture as automatic as breathing.

"You look like someone who needs this."

A cat carrier appeared on her desk. Inside, a ginger tabby stared back with ancient, unimpressed eyes. It was Greg from Accounting, his face flushed with the awkward thrill of workplace kindness.

"My sister's landlord. You know how it goes. He's... well, he's yours if you want him."

The cat's name turned out to be Vitamin — a cosmic joke Maya didn't recognize until she'd already signed the adoption papers. Something about how he'd been the "only good thing" in his previous owner's postpartum darkness.

Three weeks later, Maya lay on her floor while Vitamin methodically knocked each pill bottle off her coffee table, one by one. The vitamin D rolled under the couch, joining the dust bunnies and Mark's old earbuds. For the first time in months, she laughed — really laughed, until her ribs ached.

Her iPhone buzzed. A text from Mark: "Luna misses you. I think I do too."

Maya watched Vitamin attack a crumpled receipt with fierce, unearned joy. The phone screen dimmed, went dark. She didn't pick it up.

Some prescriptions you fill. Some you outgrow.

Vitamin abandoned the receipt and padded over, butting his warm forehead against her hand. Purring — that impossibly perfect frequency designed to lower human blood pressure, ease human loneliness. Better than any pill.

"Yeah," Maya whispered, scratching behind his ears. "I get the naming thing now."

She left the text unanswered. The vitamin D stayed under the couch. Some things, she was learning, you didn't need to swallow to feel whole.