(Clara)
I didn’t think I would say it out loud, but I was starting to feel… normal again.
Not the fake kind of normal where you force yourself through the day and pretend your thoughts aren’t falling apart in the background. Real normal. The kind that didn’t hurt when you woke up in the morning.
It had been days since I last let my mind drift in that direction. Days since I replayed anything I shouldn’t. And somewhere between lectures, library sessions, and Ethan’s constant insistence that I take breaks, something inside me finally loosened.
I was sitting on the steps outside the faculty building when Ethan dropped down beside me with two bottles of water.
“Hydration,” he said, handing one to me.
I stared at it. “You’re starting to sound like my mother.”
“Your mother is right then,”
