Everyone thought the contracts were the point.
The press said she was "back on schedule."
Studios said she was "reintegrating."
Fans said she was "finally home."
Aria knew better.
She sat at the kitchen table with a single document open on her tablet—not a deal, not a script, not a brand agreement. A one-page memo. Her memo.
Noah leaned over her shoulder. "That's it?"
"That's all I signed," she said.
He read it once, then again.
Public reappearance. Limited professional activity. No exclusivity. No behavioral clauses. No obligation beyond presence.
"They think you agreed to a comeback," Noah said slowly.
"I agreed to visibility," Aria corrected. "Those aren't the same."
She closed the tablet and slid it aside.
What she had not agreed to was more important.
No long-term representation.
No image management team.
No crisis protocol.
No silence clauses disguised as protection.
She hadn't promised accessibility.
She hadn't promised stability.
She hadn't promised to be understandable.
"She's cooperative," someone had told a studio executive that morning.
Aria almost smiled at that.
---
Later, at a pre-production meeting, a producer leaned forward, voice friendly but cautious.
"We just want to make sure expectations are aligned," he said. "This is a sensitive moment for you."
"For you," Aria replied.
He blinked. "Pardon?"
"You're worried about how I'll behave," she continued calmly. "I'm worried about whether you'll overstep. That's the alignment issue."
Silence followed—brief, uncomfortable.
Someone laughed nervously. "She's joking."
Aria didn't correct them.
---
That night, Noah scrolled through internal chatter he wasn't supposed to see.
"They say you're unpredictable," he said.
"Good."
"They say you didn't commit."
"Also good."
He looked up. "They're trying to figure out what you want."
Aria stood by the window, city lights reflecting faintly in the glass.
"That's the mistake," she said. "This isn't about what I want."
She turned back to him.
"It's about what I didn't give them."
In a quiet system far from cameras and contracts, her status remained unchanged.
Active.
Uncontained.
And for the first time since her disappearance, that wasn't an oversight.
It was the agreement.