Daniel.
I felt restless.
The kind of restlessness that clawed beneath the skin and refused to settle. I sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on my knees, staring at nothing in particular while everything inside me churned.
I needed to do something.
But what?
My jaw tightened. I tried to breathe slowly, to ground myself the way I had trained to do, but my thoughts refused to cooperate. They kept circling back to her. Over and over again.
Stay calm.
Stay sane.
That was what I kept telling myself.
But her image wouldn't leave me alone.
Maria.
Her face kept flashing in my mind, those wide, confused eyes… the way her lips trembled slightly when she was trying to hold herself together. I tried to push it away, tried to focus on anything else, but it was like trying to hold back a tide with bare hands.
I was drifting.
Too far.
And a small part of me feared that if I didn't catch myself now, I would fall into something deeper. Something I might not be able to climb out of.
