The Dead Things We Carry

Mara stood on the balcony of the corporate retreat center, her iPhone clenched in her palm until the metal bit into her skin. Three missed calls from David. Two unread emails from HR. One text from her mother asking if she'd found someone nice yet. The screen glowed with the relentless demand of a world that refused to let her sleep.

Inside, the others were drinking wine and playing board games. She'd escaped to the balcony, where a withered spinach plant drooped over its ceramic pot—a forgotten attempt at someone's corporate wellness initiative. Its leaves were yellowing, curling inward like secrets. Mara touched one, feeling the dry papery texture, and thought about how she'd been eating nothing but takeout for three weeks.

"You look like I feel," said a voice behind her.

She turned to find Elias, the senior architect from the Toronto office. They'd met once, in a conference room where he'd fallen asleep during her presentation. Now he looked exhausted in a way that went beyond tired—a deep, cellular weariness that made him appear somehow translucent.

"The zombie shift," she said, surprising herself. "That's what they call us in my department. The ones who stay past midnight."

He laughed, but his eyes remained flat. "I've been a zombie for six years, Mara. The trick is learning to move convincingly."

They stood together in the cooling desert air, watching the distant mountains redden with sunset. A real fox appeared at the edge of the property—sleek, improbable, vivid as a burst of laughter. It paused, regarded them with golden insolence, then slipped away into the shadows.

"Wild things," Elias said quietly. "They still know what they're supposed to be doing."

Mara thought about David waiting in their apartment, probably angry that she'd chosen this retreat. Thought about the promotion she might get if she played her cards right, the one that was supposed to fix everything. Thought about the spinach plant, dying slowly in its too-small pot, and the way she'd been dying too, in increments so small she barely noticed them anymore.

She unlocked her iPhone again. The messages waited, patient and terrible.

"I don't want to go back inside," she said.

Elias nodded, understanding everything. "Nobody does."