~MEL~
The morning light crept through the lace curtains, soft and golden, catching the edges of dust motes that hung in the air. The house felt different, like it had been holding its breath all night. I could still feel him here. Rouger. The sound of his boots on the floor. The quiet rumble of his voice as he’d said goodbye. Even the scent of him lingered faintly in the hall, wood smoke and rain.
I sat at the kitchen table with my coffee gone cold, the laptop open in front of me. The cursor blinked on an empty page, taunting. I had been staring at it for an hour, maybe more, but words refused to come. Everything I wanted to write felt too close, too raw, too real.
It was supposed to be fiction. A love story between two people who shouldn’t want each other, who know the cost and still c
