And it stopped.
Silence and quiet dropped on herlike a coffin lid. She was left panting, her forehead on the barren ground, folded likea broken marionette with its strings cut. She opened her eyes.
She was not alone.
She was surrounded.
All the versions of her, all those she’d been but somehow cut off like a festered limb, looked at her. Silence was so loud, a whistle started in her ears. None of them opened their mouths, and yet, she knew. She knew what they were saying.We’re breathing truths you can never choke out. And when Daphne thought they would come at her, flood her mind, and extract their revenge, they knelt.
One by one, they fell on their knees.
One by one, their heads hung low.
One by one, they started feeding her memories. It was a pulling, dragging weight that sank into her chest and mind alike, each forcing her to relive a memory she believed she’d accepted.
The moment her mother died without a scream.
The morning she said I love you to her aunt, but couldn’t feel it.
The day she assured her therapist she was fine and smiled.
The time she flinched at a kind touch and pretended it had been out of silly spookiness.
All the times she’d chosen lies over truth.
To survive, her conscience screamed.
Liar, the voices from her old selves spat out from a throat full of ash.
The weight built inside her, unescapable and damning. Breathing was hard, so hard. Her vision whitened at the edges. The truth of what she’d never let herself grieve was toovast, too monstrous; it took up every inch of her soul and left no room to stand.
She was lost in the pain, in the splintered, jagged pieces of the reality she’d built.
She was nothing but lies.
Nothing but the emptiness of her broken heart.
Nothing but shame.
And it hurt.
It hurt.
She might as well let herself go into it. Lose herself in it, be swallowed and consumed until it didn’t hurt anymore.
I love you. Hunter’s voice slipped in like a golden thread through shattered glass and slammed into her like a new heartbeat.I love you, he repeated. And she felt it, felt his love pouring through the bond like warmth cracking through frost. Just enough to keep her from slipping under the voices.
Me, she whimpered.Not them. I buried them. I built over them.
She had. She had for a reason.
Temper. Pride.Need. They flicked their tails, coiled like memories with teeth.
One foot planted on the ground. Then the other. Her body shook with the strain, but she pulled herself upright. Like she always did.
Words clawed their way out, ragged and shaking. “I buried you,” she screamed. “I buried all of you for a reason.” She turned to where she knew he waited. And there he was, standing, tall and strong and safe. “That’s why you love me.”
She was expecting him to argue. To soothe or deny. “Yes,” he said instead. “I love you.” He nodded toward all those figures, kneeling. “I also love them, though. Each one of them.”
