White bulbs buzz overhead like the last neurons of a dying sun, throwing long shadows over neatly shelved boots and clothes so black they drink the light. A space carved from access, though never named as such: walls lined with pressed coats, carefully folded sweaters, and bags for every persona.
Amy leans toward the mirror, close enough to see the small crack running through the glass, an old scar she never fixed, a quiet rebellion against perfection. Pale foundation smooths over young skin, turning warmth into a deliberate, ghostly canvas. Cheekbones sharpened with powder, eyes rimmed in black so thick it could pass for conviction. A faint wash of blue brushed around the lids, as if stage light itself had left its fingerprint.
On the counter: a scatter of receipts, half-empty bottles of fragrances, and a political pamphlet peeking out from under a lipstick tube, red as a fresh manifesto.
A small buzz. Phone screen alive with a single costume selfie from Trisha: Darna, midriff bare and gold gleaming, a quiet war cry in spandex. Her fingers react almost on instinct, emoji with hearts for eyes. Not irony, not quite sincerity either.
She rises. The dress pools around her feet, trailing behind like forgotten promises. In the tall mirror secured against the far wall of the closet, surrounded by scuffed suitcases and unopened donation boxes, she sees a figure both living and a little bit dead. Lips like the final punctuation mark of a sharp retort.
She frames the shot: Morticia in exile, in a private mausoleum of cardigans and coats. A quiet moment before the performance.
-can’t wait to see the gang ?????
sent
She pads across the polished wood floors, dress whispering secrets against her ankles. The hallway glows with low, warm light: recessed fixtures set into a ceiling of pale, lacquered oak. Walls painted in discreet shades of bone and ash, interrupted by black-and-white portraits framed in quiet, expensive understatement. The faint scent of sandalwood hangs in the air, layered over something sharper, freshly polished wood, and the cold breath of an invisible aircon.
At the end of the hall, her parents’ bedroom door: matte maplewood, brushed steel handle, opening into a space where money and taste had struck a rare truce. Her knock sounds small against the solid door.
Inside, they’re already moving, finishing touches before their own masquerade: her mother draping on earrings that catch the recessed lights, her father checking his watch with the distracted precision of someone who has been busy long enough to hate being late.
Her mother’s eyes lift first, brightening. “Exquisite ‘nak,” she declares, voice soft but proud, hand fluttering toward the jewelry box on the vanity. “Do you want to borrow a pendant? For the Carolyn Jones look.”
Amy shakes her head lightly. “I’m going for Anjelica Huston, no necklace needed.” The reply slides out smooth, practiced, like the line from a favorite film.
Her father chuckles softly, almost absentminded. His cufflinks flash once under the light. “Remember, Ate Rene is still in the province. Lock the doors before you leave.”
“I know, Dad,” she says, tone gently affectionate, almost teasing.
They move past her in the quiet choreography of practiced departure. Perfume drifts behind them, her mother’s, floral and cool, mixing with the older scent of books and wax from her father’s study.
She watches them descend the sleek staircase, glass balustrade catching the low amber light. Waves them off from the second floor landing, hand lifted like an actress finishing a scene. The door closes below with a soft finality, leaving only the house: stone, wood, and stillness, waiting for night to begin.
Her phone vibrated. Small, urgent.
The screen lights up: Anton Mercado. Mentor, guide, occasional devil perched on her shoulder. A shared folder blinking open like a trap or a treasure chest.
She types back: “will handle tomorrow,” then pauses, thumb hovering. The party’s still a ghost on the horizon. The night, half-born. Curiosity, old and familiar, scratches at her ribs.
In her bedroom, low warm light pools across an unmade bed and walls the color of cigarette ash. A framed protest photo leans against a shelf, beside an abandoned practice pad and a single broken drumstick. She opens her work-issued laptop, corporate gray, humming faintly like an insect.
The laptop hums to life with a weary familiarity, aluminum still faintly warm from the last time it ran. The UP sticker on its cover is half-peeled, a silent rebellion against formality. The folder Anton sent opens with an unceremonious click, spilling its contents like a drawer forced open too quickly.
A fresh house, a fresh victim. Valle Verde, sterile streets lined with palms trimmed to regulation shape, guards in faded barongs manning gates that kept out everything but real trouble. Anton’s notes read half like a police report, half like gossip filtered through a journalist’s curiosity: HOA officials denying everything, so hard it almost sounded like fear. Someone at Truthspan who lived in the neighborhood slipped them this fragment of truth.
Amy scans line by line. Target: upper income class, no small kids to wake and cry, no elderly to shuffle around at night, no dogs to bark warnings. Items missing read like the inventory of a well-appointed but not ostentatious vanity: a few pieces of jewelry, designer watches, four handbags, one still with its tag on. A laptop, unopened, ribbon still tied, bought for a birthday that now won’t come the same way.
She pauses. The refrigerator. Anton’s note points it out in italics, almost like an afterthought: thieves took a large slab of wagyu beef and foie gras from the freezer. The detail feels almost absurd, opulence stolen to be devoured, a crime half-petty and half-feast. Amy imagines the robbers in a dimly-lit kitchen somewhere, laughing around a stolen table.
She flips to the next page. Cash untouched, heirlooms left alone, portraits of dead grandparents still smiling from gilded frames. No mess, no violence. Surfaces wiped clean, doors re-locked. The houses left behind look, at first glance, as though nothing had happened, until someone notices the absent shine of gold on a dresser, the missing weight of a box meant for celebration.
She pulls her notes closer. Fingers hover over the trackpad, hesitating, then begin to type:
- No forced entry visible
- Selective theft: resale-friendly, not sentimental
- Food taken = practicality? Or strange trophy?
- Homes left oddly intact, nearly respectful
- HOA stonewalling media access
She drags photo thumbnails into her document. Living rooms caught in the phone’s wide-angle lens: symmetrical furniture, pale floors polished like corporate smiles. She zooms in on a detail, a speck of mud near a French window latch, or maybe just a flaw in the tile. Her eyes burn from the backlit glare; the costume makeup feels heavy, theatrical, as if Morticia herself is peering through the screen.
Patterns begin to emerge, half-seen, half-suspected: this isn’t mindless looting. It feels deliberate. Curated. Even considerate in a twisted way.
A small thought presses at her temples, gentle but insistent: What kind of thief wipes down after themselves?
She starts another line of notes, labeling it possible motive, but the words stall in her throat. Time drips away unnoticed, as the cursor blinks in quiet anticipation.
Only when her phone vibrates again, reminding her of the hour, does she break the trance.
Shit. Time.
The laptop snaps shut with a dull finality, the cursor’s last blink swallowed by gray aluminum. She draws a slow breath, costume heavy on her shoulders, thoughts still half-tethered to crime scenes and neatly relocked windows.
Eyes drift across the bedroom. The clutch waits by the vanity, beside it, car keys. She slips the clutch under one arm, keys cold against her palm.
A thought rises, unbidden: lock the doors before you leave. Her father’s voice, mild but insistent. But tonight it feels sharper, edged by the files still fresh in her mind, the list of houses left open, then closed by someone else’s hand.
She turns back. Fingers brush over the smooth, painted wood of her bedroom door. She twists the lock, feeling the mechanism settle into place.
Down the hall, the quiet hush of the house deepens. Her parents’ bedroom door looms. She tries the handle gently. Locked. Good.
Steps tap down the polished stairs, the scent of old wood and faint sandalwood thickening with each step. At the foot of the stairs, the main door: heavy, contemporary, metal, painted a dignified dark grey. She draws the bolt, turns the key until it bites.
The garage door next: a darker passage, air cooler and carrying the dry smell of concrete and rubber. The door to the garage is old narra, faintly scuffed near the bottom where shoes have tapped over the years. She steps through, pulls it shut behind her, then locks it, metal sliding home with a soft, decisive click.
Now only the car, waiting under the dim recessed lamps. Keys slip into ignition, engine stirring awake like an old animal. The house behind her sealed, silent, secure, at least until she returns.
She backs out into the night, doors locked, keys firm in hand. The weight of vigilance trailing her into the dark.
The drive to San Juan unspooled in headlights and low CarPlay tunes. Houses gave way to small shops, then rose again into quiet enclaves, tiled roofs glowing faintly under scattered streetlights. Amy’s eyes traced familiar shortcuts almost without thinking, left at the pharmacy, past the dim karaoke bar, up a road that curved like a lazy question mark.
Sandro called, his voice warm and impatient. Where are you?
“Traffic,” she lied, though the roads had been as empty and compliant as an old dog.
Ahead, the street began to slope upward. Over the rooftops, flat, weathered concrete, water tanks squatting like silent sentries, rose Sandro’s place: twelve stories of glass and pale stone. A mix of office showroom below and private residences above, his family’s own castle. The windows near the top glowed fully alive, like a lantern hoisted over the neighborhood. The multi-function room, probably. She pictured the crowd already gathered inside: masks, capes, laughter spilling against glass.
She pulled into the small parking garage across the street, the smooth pavement belonging to a grand community center whose lights buzzed defiantly against the night.
Out of the car, across the street, heels tapping a steady beat. The lobby was familiar in a way that felt almost intimate, once it had been her second home too, or at least something close. Elevator doors, brushed steel scarred by years of use and drunk elbows.
She stepped inside, pressed the floor number. The slow, shuddering rise matched by the catch and release of old memories: the times she came here half-excited, half-nervous; the times she left here silent, fighting down words.
The doors slid open and the music tumbled in, someone in a fitted black vest and white shirt, clearly part of the wait staff Sandro must have hired, stepped forward almost wordlessly and pressed a small folded piece of paper into her palm. “There’s a game later,” he murmured, leaning closer so only she could hear above the pulse of bass and laughter. “Keep this, and don’t tell anyone else what it says.” She unfolded it just enough to glimpse a single word scrawled in dark ink: Dracula.
The multi-function room was packed, the air warm with sweat, perfume, and laughter.
Costumes loud as neon signs: devils with glittering horns, a Cleopatra with gold painted on her collarbones, someone in a crumpled Pikachu kigurumi sipping gin from a plastic cup. Food crowded the long side table, spring rolls, pasta trays sweating under the lights, fried chicken whose smell cut cleanly through the perfume haze.
This year, Sandro hadn’t settled for a few cobweb decals and a plastic pumpkin. Fabric draped the walls in theatrical folds of red and black; a tall candelabra burned real candles, their wax dripping onto a marble-topped console. Up near the ceiling, a projector played silent black-and-white horror films, looping Nosferatu behind swirling artificial smoke.
Amy stepped out fully, the door hushing shut behind her. The room pulled her in, music thrumming through the soles of her feet, costume fabric shifting around her like a second skin remembering old dances.
He spots her almost at once, Sandro, grinning wide beneath carefully styled hair, the Flash costume clinging to him like speed itself. No foam muscles needed; the suit follows every line of his torso, arms cut from months at the campus gym, legs lean from half a lifetime of pick-up basketball.
He hops over, bounding past Cleopatra and almost colliding with a zombie nurse, and pulls her into a hug. Warm, practiced, not too long, not too short. Friendly, cordial. A hug that says: we were something, but now we’re something else.
Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.
She hugs back automatically, the fabric of her Morticia dress whispering against his synthetic red. Pulls away just enough to see his face up close: still the same Sandro, bright-eyed, quick to smile, painfully easy to love. Once.
She can’t quite believe it’s only been months since she’d been head over heels, planning weekends together, imagining what her parents might say if it got truly serious. Then the slow unraveling, the questions, the late replies. Then the truth, blunt and sudden: a boy, not a girl. Her pride had hissed. But the wound had surprised her by healing fast, as though her heart had known before her head had.
Band practice had helped: shared sweat in a cramped studio, loud drums under harsh lights that burned regret out of her chest. Performances especially, when the adrenaline rose higher than nostalgia. And shortly after that, the Jiro Lim Uy case, something real, something messy, something that forced her thoughts outward.
She catches herself studying his face a moment too long, then lets it go. Water under the bridge, smoothed by time, music, and other obsessions.
“You made it!” Sandro’s voice cuts through the noise, still bright as ever.
“Of course,” she says, lips twisting into a small, real smile. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
At first, the room is just noise and motion, cheap wigs, spandex, fake blood, glitter catching the flicker of silent Nosferatu on the wall. But then she spots the familiar flash of red and gold.
Trisha. Darna. The iconic winged headpiece gleaming, midriff bare, that heroic posture only half-played because Trisha almost stands that way in real life. For a half-second Amy nearly calls out, before realizing she was about to wave at the wrong person: a girl nearby in a Wonder Woman costume, bracelets glinting under the projector flicker.
Then, yes, that’s Trisha, laughing with a hand on her hip, chatting with Anna.
Beside her, Anna’s gone all-in as Lady Gaga’s Harley Quinn: white face paint so perfect it almost looks printed on, dark and pointed eye makeup that still somehow manage to look amused. The wig teased into something architectural, as if gravity was a polite suggestion.
Then Rain, unmissable even in this mess of color and movement: drag done to near-perfection, wig in vintage curls, smoky eyes sharp enough to cut. He radiates nervous pride as he pulls someone into Amy’s view when he notices her arrival.
“Amy you’re here!” Rain says, eyes glittering, “I’d like you to finally meet my boyfriend Benj”
Amy blinks, taking in the costume before the person. Crisp white shirt, black cape thrown dramatically over one shoulder, and the iconic half-mask of the Phantom of the Opera. The effect is somewhere between theatrical and strangely vulnerable: the mask hiding and revealing in the same breath.
Benj offers a shy, crooked smile, teeth catching a sliver of light, and Amy sees the softness in the shoulders, the half step closer to Rain that says more than words.
Trisha spins toward her, bracelets chiming. “You made it! Want a drink?” She brandishes a plastic cup, something dark sloshing under the shifting colored lights.
Amy shakes her head lightly, Morticia hair swaying. “Nah, I’m driving tonight.”
“Oh! Sorry, I didn’t know,” Trisha says, hand dipping back, expression flickering into apology before the easy grin returns.
“It’s fine,” Amy says, and it is.
The air smells of sweat, warm alcohol, cheap synthetic fabric; the music’s low-end thrumming in her ribs, old love half-forgotten, case notes half-remembered. The gang’s all here, in costumes absurd and perfect, larger than life for a night.
The mic lets out a soft thump, then a crackle, drawing a momentary hush from the chatter and laughter. Amy glances up to see someone she knows all too well, Ram, their band’s vocalist, in half-costume himself: a loose, Victorian poet’s shirt and an old velvet vest that somehow works. His voice, warm and teasing, rolls out over the crowd.
“Welcome, everyone! Glad to see so many monsters, demons, and questionable life choices here tonight,” Ram grins, the room giving back laughter and a few scattered whoops. He lets his eyes roam the crowd, calling out compliments and playful jabs: praises Trisha’s “badass Darna,” teases Rain’s “too-perfect hair,” points at Sandro’s Flash suit and quips something about “speeding hearts.” He even spots Anna’s towering Harlequin boots and raises an eyebrow as if to say: brave.
Then, with a subtle shift, Ram’s posture changes, voice slipping into something richer, more theatrical, a Victorian master of ceremonies. “Now, my dear creatures of the night,” he intones, drawing out the syllables like they’re half smoke, “we begin our game.”
He explains, one hand gesturing like a stage conjurer: “When you entered, you each received a slip of paper, your curse, your riddle, your identity. Each bears the name of a famous monster, ghost, or horror icon… but you hold only half of a doomed pair.” A beat. “Frankenstein searches for his Bride. Dracula stalks the night, seeking Van Helsing. You get the idea.”
Ram steps closer to the edge of the small stage, voice dropping just enough to make people lean in. “Your goal, before the witching hour strikes at ten, is to find your counterpart. But you mustn’t ask outright. Instead, use cryptic questions: ‘Do you fear the light?’ ‘Have you ever hunted, or been hunted?’ Let your darkness guide you.”
“And when you believe you’ve found your fated other, you approach the Gravekeeper”, Ram gestures to someone at the side of the stage wearing a skeletal half-mask and a cloak, “who shall judge your claim. If correct, you’ll be ‘resurrected,’ rewarded.”
He raises his glass, the grin breaking through the character for a flicker. “Now, my lovelies, may your hunt be thrilling, your drinks be strong, and your costumes never tear at the wrong moment.” The room breaks into applause and laughter as the music swells back in, bass vibrating through the floor.
Trisha and the rest of the gang look instantly animated, eyes glittering with competitive delight. Amy fingers the folded paper in her clutch, feeling the word inside like a quiet pulse: Dracula. Which means, somewhere in this room of devils and phantoms, her other half must be waiting: Van Helsing.
They fall into it almost by reflex, a quick, playful circle of guesses and half-questions, each trying to catch the slip that might betray the answer. Benj, still new to the rhythm, almost blurts out his paper’s name, voice bubbling up in excitement before Anna, sharp-eyed and quicker with a laugh, hushes him mid-syllable. His face flushes under the Phantom mask, the room’s shadows making it look half theatrical, half genuinely embarrassed.
None of them seem to click together, though Amy notices Trisha’s sly little grin when she answers one question about priests and holy water. Definitely an Exorcist, Amy thinks, hiding her own smile.
The group breaks apart like a tide pulled by music and curiosity, each scattering into the shifting maze of costumes and candlelight. Amy drifts toward the buffet, the long table draped in dark cloth and studded with mismatched candelabras. A small tower of macarons catches her eye, neat, pastel, absurdly delicate among fried bar food and shot glasses. She piles a few onto a paper plate, balancing it on one hand.
Then a familiar voice: “Sharing is caring, Morticia.”
Ram appears beside her, half grin, half stage smirk, and pinches a macaron off her plate before she can even glare properly. “Hey!” she objects, though the word comes out lazy, playful, like air escaping a balloon. She scoops another from the stack to replace the lost one, the powdered sugar brushing onto her black sleeve.
They stand together a moment, the party’s hum settling into something almost companionable around them. Ram leans closer, voice slipping just under the music. “So, trainee life, Anton still throwing you into the deep end every weekend?” His grin sharpens a bit, teasing but curious. “And what about that burglary case you mentioned last practice, any bites, or is it all dead ends so far?”
Amy nods, half-laughing, telling him it’s a mix of late nights and half-clues that lead nowhere. Ram chuckles too, low, familiar, a sound that feels warmer than the dry ice haze swirling between them.
“Are you playing the game too?” she asks, flicking crumbs off her fingers.
Amy tilts her head, smile curling with mock curiosity, playing the part but testing the waters. “Do you carry weapons for what hides in the dark?”
Ram chuckles, the sound dry as old paper. “Only when I’m trying to tune the guitars.”
She pushes a bit further, playful but sharp: “Have you ever faced a thing with fangs and lived to tell the tale?”
“Most days before coffee,” Ram shoots back, grin widening.
They volley a few more cryptic questions, Amy trying to catch any hint of hunter’s purpose behind his jokes. But the truth floats up, easy and clear: Ram isn’t Van Helsing hunting in the shadows. He’s something ancient, slow to rouse, bound in bandages of his own making, a Mummy. Far from the adversary she’s meant to find.
He finishes the stolen macaron with theatrical flourish, bows slightly, then drifts away into the crowd, leaving Amy holding a fresh plate and an unclaimed half of an ancient legend, still waiting somewhere in the room.
She’s halfway through biting into another macaron, rose pink, dusted with the softest powder, when a voice cuts through the music and the low murmur of the crowd.
“Really, Morticia? Pastel?”
Amy almost chokes, the sweetness turning sharp in her throat. She coughs, a laugh sneaking out between breaths, mascaraed eyes narrowing in mock offense. The irony only now dawning on her: dressed as the very Morticia who once curled a lip at the word pastel, and here she is, balancing a plate of delicate, candy-colored macarons like some half-forgotten bridesmaid.
He stands a few steps away, cocked at an angle too deliberate to be anything but practiced. Lestat, but not the Tom Cruise adaptation: this is the sharp, silk-shirted Lestat from the TV remake, brocade vest slightly undone, hair curled at the nape, eyes bright, unbothered, and fully aware of the effect. Chinito eyes, jawline like a question mark, Sandro’s build but tempered by a smirk that says: Yes, I know, and you’re welcome.
“Don’t start,” she manages, voice still catching on sugar and amusement. “Even witches get cravings.”
He laughs, low and quick. “I’m just saying, rose pink, darling? I was expecting… I don’t know, black sesame?”
She points at him with the bitten macaron. “Careful, Lestat. I bite back.”
The reply earns a slow, impressed nod, eyes crinkling at the edges. He offers his hand, the cuff of his shirt soft and slightly wrinkled from dancing or maybe deliberate styling. “Miguel Tan,” he says, voice dropping into something half-mocking, half-charming.
“Amy,” she says, sliding her palm into his. Warm, steady, no rush to let go. For a beat too long, neither of them does.
He tilts his head, studying her from under lowered lashes. “Amy. Morticia by night, pastry thief by choice.”
“Macaron hoarder, thank you,” she corrects, dry as a crypt. “There’s a difference.”
“And do you always dress like grief personified,” he asks, “or is this just for us tonight?”
“Only on days ending with Y,” she fires back, words finding their shape without thinking, self-aware enough to know the exchange is ridiculous, deliciously so.
“How do you know Sandro?” she asks, pivoting before they tumble too far down the flirtation rabbit hole.
“High school,” Miguel says, thumb brushing over his bottom lip as he talks, casual, but she catches it. “Chiang Kai Shek. He was less… tight-suit Flash back then.”
She laughs, low and genuine. “UP classmates ,” she offers. “And yeah, it’s an evolution.”
They slip into the game without naming it, like musicians falling into an old rhythm. His voice dips slightly, playful. “So… do you stalk what you fear?”
She meets his gaze, head tilted. “Only if it stalks me first.”
“Do you fear the sunrise?”
“Not as much as mirrors,” she shoots back, a grin ghosting at the corner of her lips.
His turn again, eyebrow lifting slightly: “Have you ever had a stake near your heart?”
“Have you ever buried someone twice?” she counters, words smooth but eyes searching.
“Do you wake when the church bells toll?”
“Only to check if they toll for me,” she says, a spark of amusement flashing in her eyes.
“Do you drink what others would spill?”
“Only if they taste like secrets,” she answers, voice softer now, playful but testing.
A breath of silence, then his last question, quiet and sure: “And do you hunt in darkness… or are you what the darkness fears?”
She lets the words hang between them, her smile curling slowly into something that says we both know.
Miguel offers his arm with a small, theatrical flourish, half mockery, half sincerity, and she slips her hand through, fingers brushing the warm fabric of his brocade sleeve. Together, they step forward, a slow, deliberate walk that parts the thrumming sea of devils, witches, and glitter-smeared masks.
For a breath, Amy can’t help but see it from the outside: Morticia and Lestat gliding across the flickering candlelit room, black velvet and white silk moving like spilled ink and cream. It’s absurd, perfectly absurd, and something about it makes her grin despite herself.
They stop before the Gravedigger, who is leaning heavily into the part tonight: hood drawn low, face hidden under theatrical skull paint cracked just enough to show the faintest smirk. “Ah, the hunter and the hunted,” he intones, voice graveled like dry earth. “Have you found each other before the hour tolls?”
Miguel nods once, the motion small, but certain.
The Gravedigger dips his head, and from behind the table lifts a small black gift bag tied with silver ribbon, offering it across to them. “Then you are resurrected,” he intones, tone dropping deeper still. “You may claim your prize now… or take these tags and collect them when you flee this wretched gathering.”
Amy, eyes flicking with theatrical delight, turns to Miguel, chin raised and voice dripping with mock gothic melodrama: “What do you think, dear?”
Miguel almost cracks, a laugh trembling at the corner of his mouth, then recovers, clearing his throat. “We’ll take the tags,” he says, voice slipping back into their shared performance.
The Gravedigger inclines his head solemnly, handing over two heavy black paper tags embossed with silver ink. As they step back, the noise of the party folds around them again: laughter, basslines, and the warm, ridiculous knowledge that, for tonight at least, they’d played the game, and found each other in the masquerade.
They find themselves drifting onto the dance floor, almost without saying anything, just a glance, a tilt of the head, and the soft magnetic pull of shared amusement. The bass hums through the soles of her shoes, lights cut across the dark room, and the ridiculous elegance of their costumes seems to fade into the warmth of movement.
Amy catches sight of Trisha nearby, mid-laugh, spinning in her Darna costume with a boy whose mask she doesn’t quite recognize. She smirks, pleased to see her friend enjoying herself. A little farther off, Rain, still in that flawless drag look, seems to have found his character’s partner too, a girl with a half-face sugar skull mask. The two of them are at the Gravedigger’s table now, claiming their prize with the same giddy seriousness Amy had felt moments earlier.
With Miguel, there’s no real effort: they slip into a rhythm that isn’t quite practiced but feels strangely inevitable. His hand brushes against hers, then settles at her waist; she leans closer, then away, then back again. The movements are equal parts teasing and testing, a slow conversation of bodies rather than words. They don’t bother hiding the attraction, it’s obvious, caught in the half-smiles, the soft brush of fabric, the brief pause when their faces hover just a breath apart.
Eventually, they pull back, breath a little short, and wander to the edge of the room. The music feels softer there, filtered through the party noise and muffled by distance. They stand by the floor-to-ceiling glass wall, the view opening out over Metro Manila’s sprawl: a quilt of sodium lamps, office towers, and blinking radio masts stretching past where the eye can comfortably follow.
She turns, still flushed from dancing, and asks, “So, what school are you in?”
“Ateneo,” he says, and laughs softly at her immediate, knowing “Of course you are.”
They swap socials, phones flickering in the half-dark, his thumb brushing hers by accident or maybe not. Conversation drifts between quick jokes and half-serious questions, words mixing with the press of shared warmth. Their faces draw close, gravity pulling them together in that suspended moment, almost enough for a kiss.
Then her phone buzzes, hard enough to jolt the moment apart. The screen lights her cheek in cold LED blue, and the spell breaks, leaving only the echo of what almost happened and the city still sprawling, indifferent, beyond the glass.
The phone’s vibration hums insistently against her palm, pulling her back from the city lights and the hush of almost. Mom, the screen reads, glowing cold and familiar.
“Sorry,” she murmurs to Miguel, who only nods, hand dropping, the soft flicker of the skyline catching on the edge of his eyes.
She picks up. “Hi, Ma?”
Her mother’s voice is calm, almost casual, but there’s a tightness under the words. “Did you wear my pendant tonight?”
Amy blinks, brow creasing. “No… I told you I didn’t, remember? I went for Anjelica Huston’s Morticia instead.”
A short pause on the line, just long enough for something uneasy to slip through. “Amy… the pendant’s tracker just sent me an alert. It left the house and it’s nowhere near our place.”
For a beat, confusion sits heavy in her chest. Tracker? Her mother had it fitted just recently. Left the house?
Then the shape of it falls into place. The burglaries she’s been digging into. The clean exits. The jewelry stolen, except this time, one is being tracked.
Her pulse kicks, a cold clarity forcing its way past the noise and music.
“Mom,” she says, voice flattening, stripped of hesitation, “call the police. Now. I think we’ve been robbed.”