She fell asleep shortly after that.
The exhaustion of the day finally caught up with her, and I watched as she softly snored, her chest rising and falling with each breath.
I had to check on the clean up going on downstairs, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave her. Every time I tried, I was filled with an immense panic that someone would try to hurt her, someone would try to take her from me.
Nearly an hour passed before I was finally able to detangle myself from her. My chest burned, like someone had injected me with pure silver. It took a considerable amount of strength to pull away from her, and with each step I took further away from her, the more my mood began to sour.
The traces of blood were gone from the steps, but the smell still hung in the air. There was nothing they’d be
