The Last Vitamin

The cable snapped at 3:47 AM. I watched the fiber line swing loose from the utility pole, frayed end whipping in the wind like a death sentence. No internet. No connection. Just me and the bottle of vitamins on the counter.

Marcus had sent them—expensive shit he swore saved his marriage. 'Take two daily,' he'd texted, 'they're what kept me from killing Sarah during the divorce.' I'd laughed then. Now I stared at the orange label, wondering if B12 could fix the way my hands still shook.

Three weeks ago, I'd taken the fall for the bull. McLaren—the nickname fit his style of management: charging straight through problems, goring anyone in his path. When the quarterly reports came back cooked, I signed the confession. Not for loyalty. For the payoff that would let me disappear.

My phone battery died that night. I didn't charge it.

A week later, Sarah found me on the padel court. She'd been Marcus's wife once, before the vitamins and the careful distance we'd all learned to keep from each other. We played in silence, the rubber ball cracking against the glass walls, echoing like gunshots in the enclosed space.

'You know what he did to me,' she said afterward, sweat-dark hair plastered to her neck. 'Marcus. The vitamins didn't save him. They just made him numb enough to stay.'

I looked at her hands. No ring.

'The severance comes through tomorrow,' I said.

She kissed me then—hard, desperate, tasting like salt and exhaustion. Not forgiveness. Just recognition.

The cable company sent someone at noon. A kid with nervous hands who looked at the empty vitamin bottles on my counter and didn't ask questions.

'You know,' he said, splicing the line, 'some people pay extra to have this disconnected.'

I watched the fibers knit together, bright as fresh wounds. 'I know.'

He left. The router blinked green. I called Sarah. She answered on the first ring.