Undone
Copyright© 2026 by VerbalAbuse
Chapter 1
Many thanks to neuroparenthetical, who edited this story.
The man paced back and forth across the length of his office. It was a large room with two glass walls that sat high in a very tall office building overlooking industrial areas. The floors were polished stone — smooth and pale gray. The interior walls were also glass, giving him an almost unbroken view across the floor. Like many modern workspaces, it consisted of a central open area with desks where people worked, and offices and other rooms lining the sides. The space was nicely appointed — fitting for a thriving corporation — and its small size hinted at the building’s needle-like profile.
He checked the wall clock. It was late in the afternoon. Time to call the day and leave. But where would he go?
He stopped by the window and looked out. The day was cloudy and wet, and by the looks of it, windy. Below, warehouses, loading docks, and low industrial buildings stretched in rigid lines. Beyond them, the river ran sluggishly, greenish and wide, dotted with barges. On the far side lay more of the same industrial landscape, slowly giving way to hilly farmland.
The other side of the building faced the town, a view more engaging. He could have had his office there if he had wanted, but he preferred the more isolated corner. He was not very active in the day-to-day work of the department. His position in the company was justified not by any great engineering skill or business acumen, but by the large share of company stock his family owned.
He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. Then he walked to the large desk and sat in the leather chair. He looked to his left, where photographs of his wife and two children — sixteen and thirteen — sat on the desktop. He loved them and had never doubted that — nor that they loved him in return — but that day, the sight of their pictures did not make him smile.
He pulled a small laptop from one of the lower drawers and placed it on the desk. He raised the lid and, once it was online, opened an album of photographs. They showed him at a younger age, before his marriage, in the company of a blonde woman. She was pretty, joyous, and lively.
He then ran a name search and scanned the results, clicking and reading.
It was a sequence of actions he had repeated many times over the past ten years, and in the last few years ever more frequently.
He drove slowly along the narrow, winding streets, rising and falling with the terrain. The wide tires of his ultra-low, glossy red muscle car — available only by invitation — took the curves in near silence on asphalt so pristine it could have been painted. Tall trees pressed close to the road, crowding the lane and easing drivers’ feet off the gas. Their wide, overhanging canopies released pleasant fragrances and reset the mood to serene.
Behind them, tall masonry and wrought-iron walls ran uninterrupted. Decorative plants overflowed from every opening and spilled over their tops.
The gardens behind the walls were lush and overgrown with magnolia and jacaranda trees, and wisteria crept across stone and iron alike. Large villas rose through the thicket, built in the decorative styles of past eras: stone and stucco structures with arched windows, colonnaded terraces, and tiled roofs.
He slowed to a crawl in front of a wrought-iron gate. It rolled open at the press of his remote. He drove carefully along the gravel alley. The tires crunched and scraped against the stone. A dense tree canopy hung low over the drive, its branches brushing the car as it passed beneath them.
He leaned forward over the steering wheel and looked up through the windshield. The villa stood ahead of him — white marble, three stories tall. Some of the large, floor-to-ceiling windows were lit.
The uninvited thought of his former lover’s current home entered his mind. He had no way of knowing where or how she lived, but he imagined a small apartment in a large, hive-like building — flickering lights in the stairwell; noise from neighbors on all sides; a single window; perhaps a small balcony if she was lucky, opening onto another massive building so close she could step across.
He parked the car in front of the villa and shut off the engine.