The apartment light blinked once—flickered, like it was thinking too hard—before settling into this weird, soft hum. Yellow glow against the cracked walls, threadbare carpet underfoot, and Ellie’s tiny fingers still clutching that crumpled unicorn drawing with “Mommy Camille” scribbled in purple crayon like it meant something permanent.
Camille sat beside the bed, breath shallow, hands sticky with sweat, pretending she didn’t notice how tight her chest still felt. The air smelled like eucalyptus and dust and maybe something burnt—God, was it her brain? Everything was… off. Crayons scattered on the table behind her like stars someone knocked out of the sky and forgot to clean up. Her stomach still twisted, not fully settled. And the quiet? Too quiet. The kind that used to come before somet
