EMMALINE
I know something’s wrong the moment I wake up. It is not a slow realization, not the kind that creeps in with the soft haze of morning. No, this comes sharp and immediate, like a blade cutting through the fog of sleep. I feel it in my bones, deep and restless, like something clawing to get out. Every fibre of my being is screaming that something isn’t right.
My skin is sticky with sweat, my nightgown clinging to me as though I’ve been running for hours, though the air conditioning hums steadily above me. The sheets are tangled, damp, suffocating, and my throat burns with heat as though fire lives inside me.
It’s the heat.
Even now, the word alone makes my chest tighten. But even then, the symptoms. The ones I’ve been feeling so far, don’t come like this. This… this is worse.
