Out of time.

Ch 1 Glass dust

The scent of white orchids and vanilla candles couldn't mask the acrid smell of anxiety that hung around in Kelly Taylor's office. On the crystal and mahogany desk, stacks of contracts for Bel Air's most exclusive weddings were perfectly aligned, but her mind was elsewhere, stuck on a single, ruthless number: ten.
Ten years since graduation from West Beverly High. Ten years since that vortex of drama, beach bonfires, shouted loves, and tears shed over school desks or between the phone booths of the Peach Pit.
Kelly massaged her temples, gazing at the reflection of her agency, Taylor Events. If someone had told her at eighteen that she would be Los Angeles's most sought-after wedding planner and event coordinator, she would have laughed. Her—the girl who never knew which way to turn, constantly torn between a need for approval and an urge for rebellion. She had built herself an armor of professional perfection: an immaculate agency, a solid bank account, a strictly minimalist and controlled love life. A choice, she loved to keep telling herself, not a sentence.
The problem was that this armor was beginning to cave in under its own weight.
She felt her hands tingle. A wave of sudden, leaden exhaustion crept over her shoulders. She needed to switch off, to shut down that incessant buzzing that had been hammering inside her skull for hours.
She looked around cautiously, even though she was alone in her top-floor office. She stood up with quick, circumspect movements, locked up the heavy solid-wood door, and lowered the Venetian blinds, filtering the blinding Los Angeles sun into thin, faint blades of light.
She returned to the desk, opened the lowest and hidden drawer—the one with the false bottom—and pulled out a small black leather pouch. Her fingers trembled slightly, a mix of repulsion and ravenous relief. Inside were a small pocket mirror, a rigid credit card, and a transparent cellophane baggie filled with a very fine white powder.
Kelly took a deep breath, closing her eyes for a second. She knew where that road was leading her, she knew that every line was a mortgage on her sanity that sooner or later she would have to pay back with interest. But right now she didn't care. She just needed to feel in control again. She needed that icy jolt that cleared out her mind of every insecurity, every ghost from high school, of Brandon who had walked out on her with a love that was too rational, and of Dylan who had scorched her soul.
With precise, almost surgical gestures, she poured a small amount of powder onto the mirror. With the credit card, she divided it up into two perfect, thin, geometric lines. She slipped an old silver straw from her bag, bent over the surface, and eagerly breathed in the first half, then the other.
A cold, chemical burn exploded in her nostrils, sliding rapidly down her throat with a bitter aftertaste.
A few seconds passed. Then, the effect.
Kelly's heart suddenly accelerated, a furious and steady beat that flooded her veins with a fictitious, immensely powerful energy. The world around her snapped back into focus. The exhaustion vanished, swept away by a wave of lucid omnipotence; the outlines of things became sharp, the colors more vivid. Her dilated pupils in the mirror reflected a woman who was afraid of nothing, untouchable, perfect.
She ran a finger under her nose, fixing up her blonde hair with a cold, tight smile. She put away the pouch, opened the window to air out the room, and sprayed a cloudy layer of vanilla perfume into the air to mask any suspicious odor.
The phone on the desk rang, shattering the silence.
Kelly answered with a ringing, perfectly calibrated voice, cold and professional, without the slightest hint of a crack.
"Taylor Events, this is Kelly. Go ahead."
The mask was back in place. For now, that was enough.