"Do you ever feel," Elias began, his voice echoing in the minimalist room, "like we’re waiting for the real thing to start?"

Elias sat at his kitchen table, eating from a box labeled . It tasted of toasted grain and nothing else. He looked at his wife, who was wearing a DRESS (BLUE) .

"You shouldn't have gone there," she said, her voice trembling. "Specificity is dangerous. It leads to preference. Preference leads to conflict."

He realized then that they weren't living in a world; they were living in a draft. They were the placeholders, the "Insert Character Here" of a story that hadn't been written yet.

"The details," he said, gesturing to the smooth, featureless walls. "The scratches on the floor. The logos on the milk carton. The names of the streets. Everything here is just... a category."

"I found something today," Elias whispered. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, jagged piece of metal. It was a rusted Coca-Cola bottle cap, vibrant red and white, with sharp, irregular teeth.