Chapter 1. Tomorrow Begins Yesterday
Time dragged on relentlessly, like the rain that had started during the night and now tapped softly against the windowpanes. The morning was as cold as the evening before, when Mark Davis, a private detective, awoke with the unsettling sense that his life had slipped back into its monotonous rhythm — yet again, for what felt like the hundredth time that year.
He lay in bed, unhurried, tugging at the sleeves of his worn flannel shirt. His gaze rested on the gray clouds crowding the skyline outside his window, a view that only deepened the invisible void within him. That familiar, gnawing emptiness had been his constant companion — unyielding, inescapable. Each morning was the same: the weight of everything around him pressing down, the staring faces of old photographs hung on the walls, their subjects long gone.
Mark’s apartment on the twenty-fifth floor of a suburban New York complex was exactly as he had envisioned it when he first moved in — a far cry from cozy. The chairs were stained, their upholstery marked by years of neglect. The frayed rugs held onto the scents of a bygone era, as if they too resisted change. Cracks crept along the walls, peeling paint flaking away like pages from a forgotten book. The urge to scrape it all clean, to claim a fresh start, gnawed at him. In the corner stood an unpacked suitcase, waiting for a departure he had postponed indefinitely.
He lay still for a long while, staring at the ceiling, trying to make sense of the time, the day, and most importantly, the reason to carry on. His mornings had become a mirror of his life — a bleak, unchanging landscape. The faint aroma of coffee wafted in from the kitchen, where the pot had been left on overnight. The bitter smell turned his stomach, yet he brewed it daily, unable to break the habit. In a nearby pot, milk had boiled over and slightly scorched. It bothered him, but he didn’t care enough to fix it.
He shuffled to the window, pulling aside a dusty curtain. The world outside was blurred by rain and mist, the city appearing lifeless, abandoned. Puddles pooled on the asphalt below, untouched by passing cars. Even in the damp, chilling air, there was something vaguely menacing, as though the city itself was as lost as he was.
When his phone vibrated on the table, he sighed. He knew this day would be like any other, but habit compelled him to pick up the call. The number was unfamiliar, and something about it prickled at his senses. This wasn’t going to be just another routine case.
«Hello?» he answered, his voice flat, almost disinterested.
«Is this Mark Davis?» A woman’s voice came through, tense and distant, as though her words existed in some parallel space untouched by emotion.
«Yes.»
