Outside, the city exhaled. Somewhere a man with a broken watch was already forgetting your name. And you — you were already practicing your next confession, the one you’d never have to make.
Then you smiled.
You’d learned lying young — a useful muscle, like curling your tongue. You told your mother you loved her casseroles. Told your boss the report was almost done. Told yourself you’d call back. Small deceptions, soft as moths. You became fluent in the grammar of omission. Bad Liar
The fluorescent light buzzed like a trapped fly.
Marlow leaned forward. His cologne was cheap, aggressive. “Here’s what I think. I think you’re a very good liar. But good liars leave no trail. You left a perfect one. Which means either you’re innocent — or you wanted me to find exactly this.” Outside, the city exhaled
You waited until the door clicked shut. Until his footsteps faded down the linoleum hall.
Your pulse didn’t change. That was the trick: lying isn’t about invention. It’s about subtraction. You remove the tremor from your voice. You sand away the interesting details. You make the truth so boring that no one wants to dig. Then you smiled
You shrugged. “I’m never there.”