Remain

In Verren, every major choice leaves behind a living remainder: the person who might have been, made whole at the instant someone else walks on.

Fifteen years ago, Anouk was left at a kitchen table with an abandoned lease, an unfinished clockmaker's apprenticeship, and a name she was permitted to keep. She made them a life: warm rooms, skilled hands, work that became her own, and love her original never knew.

Then a rain-soaked woman with Anouk's face arrives to reclaim the name, the apartment, and everything built inside them. Verren has etiquette for the discarded, but no registry, no court, and no rule for a life claimed by two women at once.

With one kettle, two coats, and no authority willing to choose between them, Anouk must decide whether dignity can be divided without making either woman less real.

A tender, wry speculative novel about discarded selves and the dignity of a life no one chose.