[Serena’s POV]
The grocery bags slip from my hands before my brain fully processes what I'm seeing.
The door to our apartment hangs open. Not just unlocked—open. A six-inch gap that screams wrongness into the dimly lit hallway.
"Mommy?" Aria's hand tightens in mine. "Why is our door—"
"Stay here." My voice comes out steadier than the panic clawing up my throat. "Right here. Don't move."
I push the door wider with my foot, every nerve ending screaming at me to grab Aria and run. But I need to know. Need to see if someone's still inside, if we're coming home to violence or just its aftermath.
The living room is carnage.
Couch cushions gutted, stuffing scattered like snow. My bookshelf—the cheap IKEA one I assembled myself—toppled, books splayed across the floor with broken spines. The TV I saved for six months to buy is gone, leaving a rectangle of clean wall where it used to hang.
But it's the small things that make my chest constrict. Aria's art scattered and trampled. The photo of my mother—the only one I have—frame shattered, glass everywhere. My laptop bag emptied, contents strewn like they were looking for something specific and destroyed everything else out of spite.
"Mommy, I'm scared." Aria's voice, small and shaking, pulls me back.
I turn. She's in the doorway despite my instruction to stay in the hall, her eyes huge and terrified as she takes in the destruction of our home. Our safe space. The place I've spent six years making her feel protected.
"It's okay, baby." I crouch down, pull her against me. Feel her small body trembling. "It's okay. They're gone. We're safe."
But we're not safe. That's the truth vibrating in my bones. We've never been safe. Not really. Not in this building with its broken security cameras and a landlord who cashes checks but doesn't fix anything. Not in this neighborhood where I can afford rent but not peace of mind.
Someone was in our home. Touched our things. Violated the only sanctuary I could provide.
"Ms. Vale?" My neighbor, Mrs. Halse, appears in the doorway. Her apartment is three doors down, and her face is pale. "They got you too? They hit five units. Kicked in the doors while everyone was out."
Five units. I should feel better knowing it wasn't personal. Wasn't targeted. But it doesn't help. Doesn't make my hands stop shaking as I survey the wreckage.
"I called the police," Mrs. Halse continues. "They said they'd send someone, but..." She trails off. We both know what that means. Overworked cops in an understaffed precinct. A break-in with no injuries will be low priority. We'll get a report number for insurance we barely afforded and sympathy that doesn't fix anything.
"Thank you," I manage.
She disappears back to her own ransacked home, and I'm left staring at the ruins of our life.
* * *
The landlord is worse than useless.
"New locks take time," he says over the phone, his voice bored. "I got five units need 'em now. You're looking at two, maybe three weeks."
"Three weeks?" My voice cracks. "Someone broke into my home. I have a six-year-old daughter—"
"Best I can do is board up the door frame where they kicked it in. That'll be tomorrow afternoon."
Tomorrow afternoon. Twelve hours from now. Twelve hours of a broken door and shattered safety.
"What are we supposed to do tonight?"
"Stay with family? Friends?" He says it like it's simple. Like everyone has a safety net. "Or get a hotel. Not my problem, lady."
The line goes dead.
I stand in the middle of our destroyed living room, Aria clinging to my leg, and feel the full weight of my aloneness. Maya is in Chicago until Friday. My sister Lily is away at college with her own struggles. My mother is years in the ground.
There is no safety net. There's just me. And I'm not enough.
* * *
By eleven PM, I've done what I can.
Swept up the glass. Righted the bookshelf. Taped cardboard over the broken door frame because the landlord's "tomorrow afternoon" feels like a lifetime away. Made Aria's room look as normal as possible, even though her mattress is slashed and half her toys are destroyed.
She's on the couch beside me now, curled into my side, her breathing finally evening out after two hours of crying. I stroke her hair with mechanical precision, my body going through motions while my mind calculates.
A hotel room. Even a cheap one. $120 a night minimum. Times three weeks until the landlord fixes the locks. That's $2,520 I don't have. Can't have. Not without dipping into the emergency fund that's already dangerously low.
But staying here? In this apartment that smells like violation? With Aria flinching at every sound, asking every five minutes if the bad people are coming back?
The choice sits in my chest like broken glass.
My phone buzzes. Unknown number. I almost ignore it, but something—instinct, desperation, exhaustion—makes me answer.
"Serena." Caspian's voice, tight with something I can't identify. "I just saw the news. Channel 7. Your building. Are you—are you okay? Is Aria—"
The concern in his voice does something terrible to my composure. Makes the walls I've been holding up all evening start to crumble.
"We're fine." The lie tastes like ash. "Just some property damage."
"Property damage." He's quiet for a moment. "They showed the kicked-in doors. The police tape. That's not 'just' anything."
I close my eyes. Feel Aria's weight against me, small and warm and trusting me to keep her safe when I can't even keep our home safe.
"What do you want, Caspian?"
"Pack a bag." His voice shifts, becomes something I remember from boardrooms. Commanding. Absolute. "You're staying at my place."
The presumption of it—the sheer audacity—ignites something through my exhaustion. "Excuse me?"
"My penthouse. It has security. Multiple bedrooms. Space for both of you." He pauses. "It's not a discussion, Serena. Pack a bag."
"You don't get to order me around—"
"I'm not ordering. I'm offering the only logical solution to an unsafe situation."
"The only solution?" My voice rises. Aria stirs against me, and I force myself quieter. "I'm not some damsel you get to rescue because it makes you feel better about—"
"This isn't about me." His voice cuts through mine. "This is about Aria sleeping in an apartment with a broken door. About you sitting there trying to figure out how to afford a hotel when you shouldn't have to make that choice."
The accuracy of it—the way he's somehow seen through to the exact calculation I've been running—feels like another violation.
"How do you—"
"Because I know you." His voice softens, becomes something dangerous. "Because I know you'd rather bleed than ask for help. Would rather put yourself in danger than accept anything that looks like charity." He pauses.
"But this isn't charity. It's basic human decency. Something I wasn't capable of before but am trying very hard to be capable of now."
Aria shifts against me, murmurs something in her sleep about the bad people. My heart cracks.
"I need to think—"
"Then think at my place. With working locks and security and a door that hasn't been kicked in."
His voice is steel wrapped in something that sounds almost like pleading. "Please, Serena. Let me do this one thing. This one thing that doesn't require you to trust me or forgive me or even like me. Just let me give you and our daughter somewhere safe to sleep tonight."
Our daughter.
The words land differently than they ever have before. Not a threat. Not a claim. Just a fact. A shared responsibility he's finally acknowledging.
I look around our destroyed home. At Aria sleeping fitfully against me. At the cardboard taped over our door frame that won't stop anyone determined to get in.
At the choice that isn't really a choice at all.
I sit on my ruined couch, holding my sleeping daughter, and feel the weight of seven years of doing everything alone pressing down until I can barely breathe.
The phone sits in my hand, against my ear. His breathing in the dynamic.
One word. That's all it would take.
One word to admit I can't do this by myself anymore.