George always avoided the memories that hurt the most. But tonight, they refused silence.

He was twelve. His mother’s laugh still lived in the wallpaper. Dishes drying on a rack. A soft hum from her favorite old radio whenever she cooked spaghetti — the cheap kind she called a “celebration meal.” There was warmth in every corner of that small apartment.

Until the night someone cold stepped inside.

George remembered coming home from a school event. He dropped his backpack and called out for her. No answer. The radio still played. That was wrong. She always turned it off.

He stepped into the kitchen and saw her feet first. Bare. Still.

He didn’t scream. His throat locked. Everything inside him curled tight like a spider folding into itself when frightened. There was blood, too sharp and red to understand. And on the fridge…

A message scrawled in black marker:

THE WORLD STAYS THE SAME.