Because the next time she lifts something to her skin with the intent to disappear, I won’t knock it from her hand—I’ll break her fucking fingers for trying.
Tahlia
The silence is deafening.
It drips down the walls, thick as oil, sticky as guilt that won’t wash away. There’s no door slam. No shouted orders. No rage spilling back into the room to devour me. Just the sound of my breathing—too loud, too shallow—echoing in the space like it doesn’t belong to me anymore.
He left.
For the first time, he walked out without a parting threat.
Not because I begged. Not because I fought.
But because I broke.
And I don’t know what that means.
I don’t trust it.
I curl my knees to my chest, digging my fingernails into the sides of my calves hard enough to leave crescent-shaped moons behind. My bones ache. My skin feels too tight, like I’ve been stuffed into a body that wasn’t built to survive this kind of psychological warfare.
My head drops back against the wall.
I stare at the mirror. The crack he didn’t repair.
The one I made.
It’s still there—jagged, ugly, honest.
I wonder what he saw when he looked in it.
I wonder what I see now.
Not a fairy. Not a toy. Not a prisoner.
Just a girl with glass on her hands and war in her blood.
The necklace is beside me on the floor. The chain’s snapped. The charm’s bent. It smells like him—cologne, leather, iron—and when I press it to my lips, I don’t know if I’m trying to remember him or erase him from my senses.
I should hate him.
I do hate him.
But hate has teeth, and mine feels dull now.
Like I’ve used every ounce of fire I had left trying to keep him out.
And still he seeped in—like poison in the water supply.
He left the room.
But not me because I can still feel him. The imprint of his voice behind my ribs. The weight of his eyes on my spine like gravity itself bent just to make sure I couldn’t stand.
I’m still shaking.
Not from fear. Not anymore.
It’s the kind of tremble you get after a storm. When everything looks still on the surface, but you know something underneath has been split wide open.
