The dead silence on the phone line spoke volumes about how ridiculous Adria’s request was. Without waiting for the banker’s stunned reply, she hung up. The sharp click snapped the last thread tying her to her old, useless self.
She stepped to the window and tugged aside the grimy blinds. Beneath her, Brooklyn’s streets buzzed with a hollow, feverish vitality. Bar and laundromat neon spilled over glistening wet asphalt, while pedestrians hurried past, heads bowed, blind to the coming ruin. To Adria, they were all just ghosts, burning through borrowed time.
She let the blinds fall, drowning the room in shadow. Sitting at her rickety desk, she flipped open her worn laptop. The flickering blue screen lit her face, sharp with unwavering resolve.
Amazon. Survivalist forums. Bulk emergency suppliers.
Her fingers flew across the keyboard in a frantic, purposeful blur. A sprawling, precise spreadsheet took shape: 25-year shelf-life dehydrated rations, military-grade first-aid kits, water purification tablets, high-capacity LifeStraws, mylar thermal blankets, solar chargers, and high-yield survival seeds.
Her shopping cart swelled rapidly, the total surging past sixty thousand dollars. For the fortune she had just unlocked, it was a negligible drop in the bucket.
A violent, insistent pounding suddenly shook the apartment door.
“NYPD! Open up!”
Adria’s fingers froze mid-keystroke. Her jaw tightened. Fear never touched her—only cold, irritable calculation. She slammed the laptop shut, plunging the room back into darkness. Old, brutal lessons blared in her mind: before societal collapse, police were a nuisance; after it, they were merely a better-armed gang.
She slipped a hand under the sofa cushion, closed her fingers around the cool, solid pepper spray canister, and palmed it into her hoodie sleeve before moving toward the door.
The peephole’s distorted fisheye lens revealed two uniformed officers with stern faces. Behind them stood Frank, his wrist crudely bandaged, his features twisted into a grotesque mask of self-pitying victimhood.
Of course he’d come running to the cops.
Adria steadied her breath. She slumped her shoulders, tousled her hair into wild disarray, and dragged the raw, terrified panic of her earlier confrontation back into her eyes. She unlatched the security chain and pulled the door open slowly.
“That’s her! The crazy bitch!” Frank shrieked, jabbing a trembling finger at her. “She attacked me! Tried to kill me and steal my family’s money!”
The burlier, weary-looking officer pressed a hand to Frank’s chest to silence him, then turned to Adria. All he saw was a pale, slender girl in an oversized hoodie, red-rimmed eyes wide, trembling with apparent terror.
“Ma’am, we have a report of a domestic assault. Your father alleges you attacked him.”
Adria flinched sharply, a rehearsed, trembling motion. She clutched her torn hoodie collar tight. Her voice came out as a fragile, shaking whisper.
“He came here for money,” she stammered, nodding at the shattered glass ashtray on the floor. “He got violent when I refused. He smashed the door open.”
The younger officer stepped forward, flashlight cutting through the dim room. His beam swept over the splintered doorframe, scattered glass shards, and overturned table—clear proof of a forced entry, not a defensive attack. Doubt flickered across his face.
Sensing he was losing control of the situation, Frank lurched toward the door. “She’s lying! Check her bag—she stole the cash!”
The big officer moved faster than his build suggested, slamming Frank hard against the hallway wall. A pained grunt tore from Frank’s throat.
“Enough.” The officer’s tone turned sharp and authoritative.
Seizing the opening, Adria lifted her trembling phone. “I—I have footage.”
A week prior, after Frank had drained her rent savings, she’d mounted a cheap nanny cam on her bookshelf, aimed squarely at the front door. The footage was grainy but unarguable. It captured Frank kicking the door down, screaming threats, lunging to grab her, and snatching the ashtray first. It proved her final knee strike was pure self-defense.
She held the phone out. The officers watched, their expressions hardening by the second. When the video ended, the senior officer holstered his flashlight and pulled out handcuffs without a word.
“Frank Puckett, you’re under arrest for assault and breaking and entering.”
The cuffs clicked shut. Frank’s indignation shattered into blind panic. He screamed curses and denials, his shouts echoing down the hall as curious neighbors peeked out of their doors. Police dragged his thrashing, ranting form down the stairs.
The senior officer’s expression softened slightly as he handed her a white card. “File for a restraining order tomorrow at the courthouse. Do you need an ambulance? A hospital check?”
Adria shook her head, hunching into her hoodie. “I just want to be alone. To sleep.”
“Lock your door. Call 911 for anything,” he said. “You’ll also need to come to the station tomorrow for a formal statement to finalize the case.”
Adria’s jaw tightened faintly. Another complication—annoying, but manageable. “Okay.”
The officers left. Adria shut the door and slid every lock and security chain back into place with precise, deliberate movements.
The second the hallway fell silent, her fragile, terrified facade vanished completely. Her shoulders snapped straight, and every trace of fear in her eyes hardened into icy, unyielding resolve.
She returned to her laptop and clicked Complete Purchase without hesitation. A phone notification popped up instantly: a $60,000 charge approved. Her bank balance plummeted.
No regret touched her. Only profound relief. Every dollar spent was another layer of armor, another brick in the safe fortress she was building against the coming collapse.
Grabbing her backpack of trust fund documents, she pulled a plain black windbreaker and sturdy hiking boots from her closet, changing in swift, efficient motions.
She slipped out of the apartment into the cool, damp night, ignoring the homeless man curled in a cardboard box by the entrance. Hailing a yellow taxi, she slid into the backseat.
“Wall Street,” she said, her voice sharp and unyielding. “Step on it.”
The taxi merged into traffic, heading for the Brooklyn Bridge. Adria rested her head against the window, watching Manhattan’s glittering skyline draw near—beautiful, luminous, and doomed. Dawn’s first light spilled over the clouds, gilding the skyscrapers in orange and pink.
The car radio droned a morning financial segment. “Just a minor market correction! Experts say now’s the perfect time to buy the dip!”
Adria’s lips curved into a bitter, cold smile. They had no idea. The dip was a bottomless abyss. The world’s financial tide was already receding.
The taxi stopped before a towering granite Wall Street edifice, a gothic temple built for wealth. Adria paid the driver and stepped onto the financial district’s hallowed ground, striding toward the massive bronze doors. Unseen by her, a dome security camera on the building’s corner swiveled silently, its red blinking light tracking her every move.
