She saw herself in the mirror before she was ready to.
The bathroom light was honest in the way morning light always is — and she stood in it and looked at her reflection and felt something shift in her chest that was not quite shame and not quite the opposite.
She heard him before she saw him. His presence behind her — certain, unhurried, the specific weight of a man who moves through spaces as though they have always belonged to him.
His eyes found hers in the mirror.
Then, slowly, deliberately, he touched each mark. His fingertips tracing what his mouth had left behind — not with apology, with ownership. As though he were reading something he had written and found it exactly as intended.
He pressed his mouth to the curve of her neck.
“I need to wear something full,” she said. Her
