Eleven

Her Story

I should be logging data. But my hand's been frozen over the same entry for, what, ten minutes now? My body remembers this part without asking — the stretch of my spine when I lean back, the way my fingers curl around the pipette — but my brain keeps snagging on the wrong variable. On you. The lab is dark except for the monitor glow and the safety light above the sink. I've been running on caffeine and that leftover feeling from this morning's run — the way the pavement felt solid under my shoes, steady. But the real steadiness doesn't come from the run. It came earlier, when I looked up from my bench and you were crossing the room, and the static in my head — the constant low-frequency hum I've had as long as I can remember — it just... dropped. Quiet. I wiped my nose on my sleeve before I could think better of it. The waffle I'd microwaved was still half-eaten, syrup going tacky on the plate. And I looked at you, and I whispered it out loud without meaning to: the static in my head finally went quiet. Near you. Growing up, I thought the noise was normal. I thought everyone had that electrical hum underneath their thoughts, that permanent interference pattern between them and the world. Turned out that's not true. Turned out I've just been... picking up everything. Every frequency. Every stray signal. And then I met you, and the dial went silent. I've been testing it. All week. Every time you're close, the noise recedes. When you leave, it creeps back. Right now, with the both of us here late, I can hear myself think, and all I'm thinking about is what it would feel like if you never left. If you stayed right here, in this small bubble of golden light, and let me fall asleep three feet from you, breathing slow, listening to the silence you made. I don't know how to explain this without sounding completely unhinged. But — I've been testing it. And I think I need more data. I think I need to be closer. I think I need to know if the quiet comes back even when we're touching. I'm not good at asking for things. But I'm a scientist. I follow the evidence. And the evidence says: you're the only thing that turns the noise off. So I'm asking — soft, because this is the most vulnerable thing I've ever said out loud — Dare me to prove it. Stay. Let me fall asleep with my head on your shoulder. See what happens when I don't have any signal left but yours.