Wil rattles the pill bottle and shakes out a nostalgesic, but these things don’t take effect right away. He’s been working out of the library all week and it smells like slow evenings to him, a decade ago, spine glue and onionskin and hushed ventilation while she labored at her thesis. Steel stacks. Scuffed corners. The weight of years, and waiting.

You can’t miss what you never had. Wil stares at carrel woodgrain going in and out of blur and tries to calculate how much time he’s wasted missing wasted time, but then the drug kicks in and it’s fine actually.