For many long months after her arrival, I sat across the room from her, feeling her pain, her hunger for more than life had unfairly dealt her, her desire to end. It was that, perhaps, which drew me most of all. I needed her badly, and far beyond my own needs were her own. I wanted to ease her suffering, to offer her the comfort of a warm embrace before the end, which she truly sought with all her heart.
I found my way to her in the common cell we all shared. She sat in a far corner where it was dark and shadowed. I stood before her for a small eternity, looking down as a mother might upon a pouting child. Slowly, I sank to the floor beside her, put an arm around her and gathered her close. All around us people milled about, each held within their own despair and unnoticing of the dark da
