Chapter 301 Ssxsm 10

• 10
• Vivian.
• There’s a peculiar numbness that follows fear—the kind that settles into your bones after days and days of anxiety, when you’ve spent so long bracing for disaster that you forget how to stand upright. I felt it that morning as I stood by the window, arms wrapped around myself, sunlight painting gold across the floor. Everything in the house felt unfamiliar. Even the birds outside seemed too loud, as if nature itself was conspiring to remind me that nothing would ever be the same again.