Thoughts darted back and forth.

  I lay down and got up again several times, turned from side to side, pulled the blanket over myself, then threw it off. The night would not take me in. The storm would not let go.

  The thunder was no longer somewhere far away — it passed through the house, through the walls, through my body. With every strike I flinched, as if from a touch. Sleep was torn and shallow, closer to a kind of oblivion.

  And then — sirens.

  At first very quiet.

  As if the dream had decided to play a trick.

  Then louder. Closer.

  Insistent.

  I sat up in bed. My heart began to pound immediately — without reason, in advance. The room was not dark. That was strange. The light was uneven, pulsating, not the kind that belonged indoors.

  "What..." I said out loud and stood up.

  I went to the window.

  Something outside was glowing.

  Not streetlights. Not windows.

  Fire.

  I did not understand at once what I was seeing. The bush by my fence was engulfed in flames. And the fence itself — tongues of fire ran along it, clung to it, climbed upward. It all looked unreal — as if the garden had suddenly turned into a stage set.

  "I have..." I breathed out. "I have a fire!"

  I grabbed the first thing I could find, shoved my feet into my shoes without fastening them, and ran outside.

  The cold hit sharply. The wind was strong, biting, wet. The rain had almost stopped, but the air was still heavy with water and smoke.

  The firefighters were already there.

  They worked quickly, in sync. Hoses, commands, headlights. Water struck the fire with a hiss. The bush crackled, the fence darkened and sagged. The flames resisted, but were already losing their shape.

  Neighbors watched from their windows.

  Some came outside — in robes, jackets, holding umbrellas, phones in their hands. Their faces were sleepy, alarmed, curious. Someone else's misfortune always wakes people a little.

  I stood there, hugging myself.

  "Lightning," one of the firefighters said as he passed by. "Happens often in storms like this. It struck right here."

  He pointed at the blackened bush.

  The wind tugged at the wet branches, pushed smoke down the street. It was very cold. I suddenly realized I was trembling not only from fear.

  "Everything's under control," another said. "But you should dress warmer."

  I nodded.

  My feet were icy. My fingers would not obey.

  I ran back into the house — fast, almost running, leaving behind the noise of water, voices, the flashing lights. Inside it was dark and quiet, but it was a different kind of quiet — protective.

  I closed the door, leaned my back against it, and for a few seconds simply breathed.

  I dressed and went back outside.

  The fire was already dying down. The firefighters methodically added water, checked whether anything was still smoldering. The bush had turned into a black, steaming mass; the fence was partly burned, charred and wet. The smell of burning mixed with the cold, damp air — heavy, sticky.

  One of the firefighters nodded at me.

  "That's it. No more danger."

  The trucks slowly packed up and left. Neighbors came closer, said a few routine phrases — "Good thing you noticed," "At least the house is intact," "You were lucky." Someone sighed too sympathetically, someone was already yawning. Then everyone dispersed as quickly as they had appeared.

  The street became empty again.

  I stood by the fence a little longer, looking at the blackened branches, the wet ground, the trails of water glistening in the streetlights. Then I went back inside.

  Sleep would not come.

  I lay there, listening to the house cooling down after the night's alarm. The wind still moved through the garden, but the storm was gone. My thoughts tangled; my body felt heavy, but genuinely tired.

  At some point, sleep finally began to creep in.

  And then the phone rang.

  Sharp. Right in my ear.

  I jolted, groped for it on the nightstand, and looked at the screen.

  Phil.

  I glanced at the clock.

  5:23 a.m.

  "Please..." he said.

  His voice was hoarse, broken, as if he had been running for a long time or was gasping for air. "Come. Urgently. Something happened. Something very bad."

  I did not ask questions.

  I dressed almost blindly — jacket, boots, scarf. My hands were shaking, but my head was strangely clear.

  I went outside.

  The cold struck my face again — sharp, damp, morning-cold. The sky was no longer black, but a dirty gray, the kind that comes before dawn, when night is giving up but the day has not yet decided to arrive.

  Ahead, near the houses where the lightning had struck, everything was black.

  The bush by the fence — the very one where I had hung the glove — had burned completely. Not charred, not scorched, but burned through: brittle, ashen branches, leaves gone as if they had never existed. The fence beside it was blackened; the wood had swollen and burned away in places. The ground beneath was dark and wet, smelling of smoke and rain.

  Nothing remained of the beautiful winter glove.

  No fur.

  No fabric.

  Not even a hint.

  Only a dirty mark on the branch — like a memory that something had once hung there.

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  I walked slowly along the fence. The neighboring plots looked untouched. Their bushes stood whole, wet, heavy with rain. The boundary was too sharp — as if the fire had known exactly where to stop.

  I walked fast now, almost running. Phil's house was fully lit, all at once — as if he hadn't bothered choosing which lights to turn on.

  The door was open.

  "I'm here," I said from the threshold.

  He stood deep inside the house, in the greenhouse.

  I felt it immediately — by the smell. Not smoke. Not burning. Glass. Water. Something sweet-metallic, alien.

  The floor was covered with shards.

  The vessel was gone.

  Where it had stood on its wheeled base, there was now a puddle — thick, cloudy, spreading. Glass crunched under my feet as I stepped closer. I stopped, not daring to step into it.

  "Toward morning," Phil said. "I heard a sound. Not an explosion. More like... something couldn't hold anymore. I ran in — and it was already like this."

  He spoke quickly, unevenly, but without hysteria. His face was gray, his eyes too open.

  "She..." I stopped.

  "She's gone," he said. "No form. No movement. Nothing. As if she became this liquid. Or left."

  I looked at the floor.

  No black tadpoles.

  No movement.

  No life — in the usual sense.

  In the corner, on the shelf by the waterfall, lay the fragments of the device. The flower was gone. Only damp traces and debris remained.

  "I did everything right," Phil said. "Temperature. Light. Composition. I was preparing to feed her. Everything was ready."

  He fell silent and drew a heavy breath.

  "I don't understand," he added more quietly.

  The waterfall kept murmuring. Even. Calm. Ordinary. The sound was irritating — as if the space refused to acknowledge what had happened.

  Outside the windows the garden was dark green, still, alive.

  I suddenly realized clearly that I felt no panic. Only fatigue. Deep, dense fatigue, like after a long road at the end of which you are met not by rest, but by another task.

  "Alright," I said at last.

  My voice sounded steady. "First we'll clean up the glass. Then we'll think."

  Phil looked at me. Nodded.

  Outside, it was beginning to get light.

  We cleaned for a long time.

  At first — in silence.

  Then — with concentration.

  Phil brought gloves, bags, a bucket, rags. I stood there not knowing where to start until he said:

  "Let's go in order. Glass first."

  There was a lot of it. Too much for a single vessel. Shards were everywhere — large, small, almost dust. We gathered them carefully, slowly, as if afraid that if we hurried, something else might crack or crumble. Glass crunched underfoot all the time, even where it seemed we had already cleaned everything.

  The liquid on the floor was sticky, cloudy. It did not smell sharp, but left a strange sensation — like after touching something living that had already stopped being alive. We blotted it with rags, changed the water, blotted again. Then Phil turned on a vacuum cleaner — a special, industrial one he kept for the greenhouse. The hum filled the room, drowning out the sound of the waterfall.

  Time stretched unnoticed.

  The light outside became even.

  The garden no longer looked nocturnal.

  Phil kept sighing.

  "I'm sorry..."

  "I'm so sorry..."

  "I should have... I don't know... foreseen something..."

  He said it quietly, not insistently, but again and again. There was no panic in these words — only guilt. The kind that arises not because you are guilty, but because something happened in your presence.

  "It's not your fault," I said at last. "You did everything you could."

  He nodded, but I could see the words didn't reach him.

  When the glass was finished, we washed the floor. Then again. Then again. Phil moved heavily, slowly, but stubbornly. His legs were still swollen, but he did not complain. Only sometimes stopped to catch his breath.

  By the time everything was clean, it was already close to noon.

  He moved the flower to another room.

  It was drier there, quieter. He placed it on a tall table by the window, under soft, diffused light. The flower looked just as strange — wilted, but not rotting. As if it, too, was waiting, though for what was unclear.

  "It hasn't spoiled," Phil said, almost surprised. "See?"

  I nodded.

  The greenhouse began to look like itself again. The waterfall murmured, the plants stood calmly, the window glass was clean. Only the empty space where the vessel had once stood gave away that something had happened here.

  We sat in the kitchen.

  Phil looked emptied out. He stared into his mug without lifting his eyes.

  "I don't understand," he said quietly. "They just... disappeared. Didn't die. Didn't fall apart. As if they were torn from the inside and immediately dissolved. And that's it. No trace. Not a single one."

  I didn't know what to say.

  I told him about the fire. About the lightning. About the fence. He listened attentively, frowning, as if trying to connect it with what had happened to him. I didn't mention the glove — I truly forgot. It seemed unimportant.

  Phil was very surprised and said he had slept so deeply that he heard nothing.

  Then he suddenly stood up and went into another room. He came back with an envelope.

  "Take it," he said, placing it on the table.

  I immediately knew what was inside.

  "Phil," I began.

  "No," he interrupted gently, but firmly. "It's yours. I have no right to keep this money. I promised to help — and I didn't. I'm sorry."

  I wanted to object, but he had already slid the envelope toward me.

  He looked deeply upset. Lost. Like someone who had let something important slip through their hands — not a thing, but a meaning.

  "If you ever need cleaning," I said, just to fill the pause somehow, "I now have contacts for a good agency. They work very carefully. I can give them to you."

  He nodded, not immediately.

  "Thank you," he said. "I'll think about it."

  We sat in silence.

  Outside, it was daytime.

  Ordinary, gray, November.

  The doorbell rang.

  Phil flinched and immediately went to open it — as if he had been expecting it.

  A woman in a medical coat stood on the threshold. In her hands — a small case. She looked very pale: almost translucent skin, light hair, eyebrows and eyelashes so fair that her face seemed carved from a single tone. Her blue eyes were slightly protruding, deep and calm. Her gaze was direct, composed.

  "Hello," she said.

  Phil nodded.

  "Hello, Dr. Albright."

  She came in, looked around briefly, professionally.

  "I came to examine you," she said. "We need to take tests."

  "I wasn't informed," Phil said.

  "The laboratory should have notified you," she replied evenly. "There may have been a mistake."

  She set the case on the table and looked at me.

  "We will need privacy."

  Phil turned to me.

  "Do you mind?" he asked. "Please stay here."

  "Of course," I said.

  She and Phil went into the back room.

  I remained in the kitchen.

  The house was filled with the smells of plants, damp earth, cleaning products. Everything had already been cleaned, yet a sense of disorder still lingered — not in the things, but in the air.

  I could hear their voices — quiet, even, without raised tones. Occasionally something clinked. Then silence again.

  About twenty minutes later she came back into the kitchen.

  "He will be a little drowsy now," the doctor said calmly. "That's normal."

  She set the case on the edge of the table, as if marking a pause.

  "He needs to sleep. Today it's better not to disturb him or overload him with conversation."

  I nodded.

  "These are the consequences of overexertion," she continued. "Prolonged. Accumulated."

  She looked at me more closely.

  "And you... who are you to him?"

  "I'm his neighbor," I said. "And a friend."

  She nodded, as if that fit her framework.

  "He is undergoing treatment. Overall, everything is going well," she said. "But he needs rest. No stress, no overexertion. Nutrition, fresh air, safety are important."

  The last word sounded especially clear.

  "Just keep an eye on him from time to time," she added. "Nothing complicated."

  "Alright," I said.

  She closed the case, nodded goodbye, and left.

  The door closed softly behind her.

  I remained alone in the kitchen and suddenly felt guilt clearly. Not sharp, not acute — heavy, viscous. About the vessel. About him taking it to his house. About all this tension, this anxiety, about allowing it to happen so close to him.

  I stood for a moment, then went deeper into the house.

  Phil's bedroom was simple.

  Rough wooden furniture, a massive bed, as if built to last centuries. The boards were dark, worn, unvarnished. Everything looked solid, heavy, stable. As if nothing here could suddenly collapse.

  Along the walls — plants.

  Many plants.

  They stood on the floor, on stands, on low shelves. Leaves reached toward the light, intertwined, touched the bed. The air was humid, warm, alive.

  Phil lay on the bed.

  He was relaxed, slack, like someone who had finally allowed himself not to hold on. His eyes were half-closed. His breathing was even. On his face — a faint, almost childlike smile.

  He looked calm.

  "Are you okay?" I asked quietly.

  Phil opened his eyes and looked at me calmly, without tension.

  "Yes," he said. "After these tests I always get very sleepy. Very."

  He sighed and added more softly:

  "Sorry."

  "There's nothing to apologize for," I said.

  I held out my hand.

  He smiled slightly and gave me a light high-five, as if we had agreed on something simple and understood.

  I left, closing the door quietly.

  At home, I decided to lie down as well.

  I had hardly slept at night, and my body seemed to ask for a pause on its own. I didn't resist. I undressed, lay down, and almost immediately fell asleep.

  I slept for about five hours.

  I woke up in the evening, when it was dark outside and the house was filled with that particular quiet that comes after a long daytime sleep. My head felt heavy but clear. I was hungry — cooking didn't really appeal.

  I took my phone and ordered food through an app.

  I had ordered from them before — it was always very good.

  I chose rolls.

  With chuka and Japanese omelet inside — I especially loved that combination. There was also Philadelphia cheese and avocado, fish and roe. And hot rolls — обязательно. And soup.

  While waiting for the order, I scrolled on my phone, looking for something interesting to read.

  And then I heard a sound.

  Quiet.

  Rustling.

  Somewhere to the side.

  Then — somewhere else.

  As if something small was moving quickly.

  Not constantly. In fragments.

  I froze.

  Listened.

  Again.

  Rustle.

  Pause.

  Again.

  Something inside me tightened unpleasantly.

  A mouse?

  Or... a rat?

  The thought was immediately repulsive.

  My imagination, as always, worked instantly. Before my eyes appeared a red, large, half-bald sewer rat — heavy, wet, with a long tail and shiny eyes. The kind you cannot look away from because it's too disgusting.

  I grimaced.

  Rats had always caused unpleasant sensations for me.

  There had been one incident in childhood.

  I was walking to an evening art class. It was dark, the streetlights barely worked, and even then I already had poor eyesight. I passed by trash bins — and accidentally stepped on something soft.

  It was a rat.

  It squealed so loudly that the sound seemed to pass straight through me. It twitched, tried to escape, but didn't bite. I jumped back, my heart pounding, my hands shaking. Then I stood there for a long time, unable to move.

  Since then — yes.

  Pet rats can be cute.

  But everything else — no.

  The rustling repeated.

  I stood in the middle of the room, tense, listening, and suddenly caught myself thinking that the sound was... not quite ordinary. Not scratching. Not gnawing. Rather — soft movement. As if something was moving carefully, not wanting to be heard.

  I felt uneasy.

  I went to the wall, crouched, pressed my palm to the floor.

  Silence.

  My phone chirped — a notification.

  The courier would arrive in ten minutes.

  I exhaled.

  "Alright," I said out loud, to myself. "I'll deal with it later."

  But the feeling that there was something in the house did not go away.

  It simply retreated.

  As if it had agreed to wait.

  The scooter braked sharply and confidently by the house.

  The courier turned out to be a pleasant Asian man with a wide, dazzlingly white smile. He removed his helmet — on it was a drawing of a cat curled into a roll, with a fish tail sticking out of its mouth, and the words Rolling Cat. He handed me the bag, nodded several times — politely and sincerely. I gave him a tip. He looked at the bill, then at me — and his smile became even wider, almost childlike.

  "Thank you," he said and drove away.

  The food was exactly as I expected.

  Warm. Calming. Right.

  I ate slowly. Soup. Rolls with chuka and Japanese omelet, fish, avocado, roe. The hot rolls were excellent as well. Everything tasted good, familiar, predictable. My body finally stopped being on alert and simply did what it was meant to do — chew, swallow, breathe.

  After eating, I suddenly remembered.

  Frederica.

  I still hadn't written to her.

  About Cuna.

  About the vessel being gone.

  I took my phone and wrote.

  I chose my words for a long time.

  Deleted them.

  Wrote again.

  In the end it came out simply.

  That Cuna was gone.

  That everything had happened at night.

  That the vessel had burst, and its contents had disappeared, as if dissolved.

  That I was very sorry.

  That it was not anyone's mistake — it had simply... happened.

  And that I would return the money.

  I sent the message and stared at the screen for a while, futilely expecting it to vibrate immediately.

  Of course, it remained silent.

  I put the phone away.

  Then I went into my online shop. I put the artwork listings in order, updated descriptions, checked orders, removed unnecessary items. It was mechanical, calm — like putting things back in place after a long absence.

  The house was quiet.

  I listened.

  There was no more rustling.

  Not under the floor.

  Not in the walls.

  Not somewhere to the side.

  The silence was even.

  Real.

  I turned off the light, lay down in bed, and almost immediately closed my eyes.

  This time, sleep came without resistance.