Chapter 227

• Christa
• The door to our house opened softly, and the three of us filed inside. Everything was exactly as we had left it, and yet everything had changed. The ticking clock on the mantle echoed through the room, somehow louder than it had been before. The cars in the streets and the sounds of children laughing from the houses next door seemed at odds with the somber feeling in the room. Yet, they fit right in. Life had continued while we had fought to preserve ours. It was exactly as it should have been.
• Jenny and Colson sat on the couch, sitting silently as the adrenaline from the day left their systems. It had been a long walk back, and we were all exhausted. I stood silently near the door, staring at the faces of the two people who meant more to me than life itself. I couldn’t seem to tear my eyes away from them, afraid that if I so much as blinked, they might vanish in front of me.