In my blood.
Inside my mouth like the echo of a kiss that didn’t happen but feels like it did.
My breath rips out of me in a jagged, broken exhale. I fold forward on the cold tile, palms spread against the floor like I need the house to hold me up because my own body won’t.
My vision pulses in and out, a sick heartbeat of light and shadow.
My throat is raw.
My chest is tight.
My skin is too hot and too cold at the same time.
I can still hear his voice.
Not in the phone.
In the room.
Inside the walls.
Inside my head.
Inside my fucking bloodstream.
“I’m not knocking next time.”
The sentence wraps itself around my spine like fingers, slow and possessive and terrifyingly sure.
My breathing turns uneven—fast, shallow, bordering on hyperventilation. I press the heel of my palm to my sternum, trying to stop the feeling like something is clawing its way out of me.
My fingers catch on the locket.
Cold.
Heavy.
His.
The metal burns against my skin like it’s part of him, like it’s watching me fall apart on the floor he walked across like he owned it.
A sob tears out of me—but it’s not all fear.
And that’s the part I can’t breathe around.
I curl in on myself, knees to chest, forehead pressed to them, arms wrapped tight like I’m trying to hold together pieces that don’t fit anymore.
My tears drip onto the tile.
Each one hits like a confession.
I shouldn’t have listened.
I shouldn’t have called.
I shouldn’t have?—
But I did.
