ROWAN
Seconds ticked away. Roughly a minute now and still no sound in the hall. It's pin-drop silent and I can hear the unsteady slamming of my heart.
I haven't moved since Chester said those words. For a few seconds, I couldn't breathe either. Everything just seems to have gone static. And I feel like I'm being dunked in the deepest part of an ocean.
An overwhelming tide of emotion takes over my heart. A deafening frenzy erupts deep inside me. The once-buried agony from my childhood is breaking free. The irreparable hurt that still lingers is surfacing. The misery I locked in the basement of my heart because it's impossible to heal from them — I can feel them all now.
But more than that, I'm being poked by the tiny restraint I had held so dear regardless of my feud with him over the
