The windshield explodes inward the moment before I realize she's going to die. Glass everywhere. Dominic's arm thrown across my chest like it could protect me from what we've done. The screech of brakes—not ours, the truck's—and then the sickening thud that I'll hear in every quiet moment for the rest of my life. "Vanessa!" Dominic's voice tears through the ringing in my ears. He's out of the car before I can process what happened. I sit frozen, engagement ring heavy on my finger, watching through the starred windshield as he runs toward the crumpled shape in the street. She ran into traffic. Chased our car. I saw her face for just a second before the truck hit—saw the desperation, the rage, the love that wouldn't let go. My eyes are burning. I reach up to touch my face and my fingers come away wet. Blood, I think at first. But no—tears. Just tears. Except the burning doesn't stop. I blink hard. The world blurs, sharpens, blurs again. Something's wrong with my vision. The broken glass glitters across the dashboard, across my lap, and I remember the explosion of the windshield, the way I turned my face away but not fast enough. "Someone call an ambulance!" Dominic's voice, ragged with panic. I force myself out of the car. My legs shake. The burning in my eyes intensifies with each step, but I can still see—Vanessa on the ground, Dominic kneeling beside her, his hands hovering over her body like he's afraid to touch her and make it worse. A crowd is forming. Someone's filming. The modern horror of tragedy: everyone watching, no one helping. "Vanessa, can you hear me?" Dominic's voice breaks on her name. She doesn't answer. Her eyes are open, staring up at nothing, and there's blood—so much blood. I should go to them. I should do something. But my feet won't move, and the burning in my eyes is spreading, intensifying, and when I blink again the world goes gray at the edges. The ambulance arrives in a blur of red and white. Paramedics swarm. Someone pulls Dominic back. Someone else asks me if I'm hurt, and I shake my head even though I'm not sure it's true. "I'm fine," I hear myself say. The paramedic looks at my face, frowns. "Your eyes are red. Did you get glass in them?" "No. I'm fine." He doesn't believe me, but Vanessa is the priority. They load her onto a stretcher, and Dominic climbs into the ambulance without looking back at me. I stand on the side of the road, still wearing the dress I put on this morning when I thought today would be the happiest of my life, and watch them disappear. My phone buzzes. Dominic's mother. *Is it true? Is Vanessa hurt?* Word travels fast in their world. I don't answer. The burning in my eyes has settled into a constant ache. When I blink, dark spots dance across my vision. I should go to a hospital. I should tell someone. Instead, I get back in the car—the driver's side, because Dominic was driving and he's gone now—and sit among the broken glass, and wait for him to remember I exist. He doesn't come back that night. Or the next. When he finally calls, three days later, his voice is flat. Empty. "She's blind. The doctors say it's permanent." I close my eyes—my damaged, aching eyes that I still haven't told anyone about—and feel the world shift beneath me. "Dominic, I'm so—" "The engagement is off." Four words. Delivered like a business decision. "What?" "You heard me. This wedding isn't happening. I'm calling off the engagement." "But it wasn't—we didn't—" I can't find the words. Can't explain that she ran into traffic, that we didn't do this to her, that it was an accident. "She ran into traffic because of us," Dominic says, and his voice is cold now. Decided. "Because I left her for you. Because we flaunted our engagement in front of her. This is our fault, Elena. My fault. And I'm going to make it right." "How?" The word comes out broken. "You're going to help me." Something in his tone makes my blood run cold. "Starting Monday, you'll report to Ashford Tower. Night shift. Janitorial services. You're going to work off your debt to her. To me. For what we've done." "You can't be serious." "Do I sound like I'm joking?" He doesn't. He sounds like a stranger. "For how long?" "Until I decide you've suffered enough." The line goes dead. I sit in my apartment—the one I was supposed to move out of next week, into the penthouse Dominic and I were going to share—and finally let myself cry. Really cry, for the first time since the accident. When I'm done, I go to the bathroom and look at myself in the mirror. My eyes are bloodshot. Irritated. But I can still see. I can still see. For now. Monday comes too fast. I show up at Ashford Tower at midnight, wearing the uniform they left for me at the service entrance. The supervisor—a tired woman named Rita—barely looks at me as she hands me a mop and bucket. "Twentieth floor. Executive offices. Everything needs to be spotless by six AM." I take the service elevator up. The building is different at night—hollow, echoing, full of shadows. My eyes ache under the fluorescent lights. I've been using eyedrops constantly, but the burning never fully goes away. I clean Dominic's office last. Stand at his window and look out at the city, at the lights I can still see but that seem dimmer every day. The door opens behind me. I turn, expecting Rita. But it's Dominic. He looks terrible. Thinner. Dark circles under his eyes. For a moment, something flickers in his expression—something that might have been regret. Then his face hardens. "The bathroom needs attention," he says. "There are streaks on the mirror." He walks past me like I'm invisible and sits at his desk. I go to clean the bathroom. Stand in front of that mirror and see my own reflection—still wearing the ring I haven't had the strength to take off yet. I slip it off my finger. Drop it in my pocket. When I come out, Dominic is gone. This becomes my life. Midnight to six AM, five nights a week. Cleaning the offices of people who don't see me. Avoiding Dominic, who seems to be working late more and more often, like he's punishing himself too. My eyes get worse. The burning becomes constant. I start bumping into things in low light. Missing details I should see. I memorize the layout of every floor. Count steps. Learn the building like a map in my mind. And I don't tell anyone. Not when I have to squint to read the cleaning supply labels. Not when I start seeing halos around lights. Not when I realize I can't see clearly beyond ten feet anymore. I go to a specialist. Pay cash so there's no insurance record. The doctor examines my eyes with increasing concern. "The damage is extensive," she says finally. "Microscopic glass fragments, scarring on the cornea. It's progressing. Without treatment—" "Can you stop it?" She hesitates. "We can try. But the scarring is already significant. Even with surgery, your vision will be compromised. And if we don't act soon..." She doesn't finish. She doesn't have to. "How soon?" "Months. Maybe less." I leave with a prescription I can't afford and a follow-up appointment I'll never make. Instead, I buy special contact lenses. Expensive ones, designed to correct severe vision problems. They help. Not perfectly, but enough that I can keep working, keep hiding, keep enduring Dominic's silent punishment. Three months pass. Then four. My vision continues to deteriorate, but the contacts and my memorized routes get me through. Until tonight. I'm in the server room—the coldest, most isolated part of the twentieth floor. Dominic sent me here specifically, told me to clean every surface, organize every cable. Punishment for some imagined slight. The door clicks behind me. I turn. The handle doesn't move when I try it. Locked. "Dominic?" I call out. Pound on the door. "Dominic!" No answer. Just the hum of servers and the arctic blast of industrial air conditioning. My phone is in my locker, twenty floors down. No one else works this late. Rita won't be back until six AM to check my work. I'm trapped here for six hours. I lean against the door, trying to stay calm. It's fine. I've memorized this room too. I can wait it out. Then I feel it—a familiar, terrible sensation. My left contact lens. Shifting. Tearing. No. I blink frantically, trying to keep it in place. But the dry air, the stress, the hours of wear—it tears completely, and I feel it fall away from my eye. The world goes dark on the left side. Blurry on the right. I slide down to sit on the floor, back against the locked door, and finally let myself acknowledge the truth I've been hiding for four months. By morning, when someone finally opens this door, I won't be able to hide it anymore.