NATALIE
I pulled into the driveway of my new apartment building and cut the engine, but I didn’t move. My forehead fell against the steering wheel with a soft thud. I just sat there, staring down at nothing, the cool silence of the car wrapping around me like a blanket I didn’t ask for.
“You moved here to be free,” I muttered to myself. “You moved to start again.”
So why did I feel like I couldn’t breathe?
The engine ticked as it cooled, but inside me, everything still burned—my chest, my eyes, my throat from holding in the things I didn’t say to Edwin. From the tears I didn’t let fall until I was driving 70 down a road I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t the sobbing kind of crying either. No, it was the cruel kind. The quiet, breath-stealing, hot-tears-streaming-down-your-face-without-permi
