the laugh that just left my throat when someone cracked a joke about the server being down, it felt... real, for a second I almost said what I was really thinking, not about the server, but about how easily that sound just surfaced, how the muscles around my mouth didn’t have to fight to form it, not like they used to, not even a phantom ache these days after I’ve driven away from the office building, the memory of pushing that sound out, that raw, guttural thing into the cheap steering wheel cover is still there, a ghost of a vibration at the back of my skull, but it doesn’t demand to be pushed out anymore, it just… is, a past truth, and the smile that followed, it wasn't a performance, it was just... there, like the summer light on the corporate carpet, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the forced, recycled calm, and it makes me realize that the quiet hum from before, the one that used to vibrate in my bones, it’s not just in the background anymore, it’s in me, a steady rhythm that moves through the spaces where the knot used to be, a loosening, a widening, like the tide receding and leaving behind something solid, something that can hold its own against the rush.