Sometimes silence has weight.
A weight that sinks into the bones, presses against the skin, and fills the space between thoughts.
That was the silence that followed us as we walked—a never-ending rhythm of footsteps over wet leaves, of held breaths, of glances carefully avoided.
The forest seemed to swallow us whole, and every step looked the same as the last: crooked trees, the sour scent of moss, the distant murmur of water running through some unseen stream. Dawn had passed unnoticed; the sun was nothing but a pale stain behind the clouds, refusing to show itself.
No one spoke.
Not Nellie. Not Ethan. Not Mara.
Only the brush of wind through branches and, from time to time, the rough caw of a crow fading into the distance.
I walked at the rear of the group—not because we had agree
