He keeps going, feeding me another bite, then another, his hand staying on my face the entire time, his thumb brushing lightly against my skin like he’s soothing me instead of holding me in place.
I don’t know how long it lasts.
It feels like it could be minutes.
Or hours.
Or something in between.
At some point the plate is empty.
At some point he’s still talking.
I don’t know when that started either.
“…we’ll get it right this time,” he’s saying, his voice drifting in and out of focus as I sit there, my head too heavy, my thoughts too slow to hold onto everything he’s saying. “It was always supposed to be like this, you just didn’t see it before. You were distracted. You let them get in your head.”
Them.
The word lands faintly.
I know what it means.
I know who he’s talking about.
But when I try to picture them, to hold onto their faces, their voices, something in my chest tightens in a way that feels wrong, like I’m reaching for something just out of reach.
They’re there.
I know they are.
I just can’t...
“You won’t fight me forever,” he continues, his tone still soft, still patient. “It’s just a matter of time. Once it’s just us, once you stop holding onto everything that was never meant to be yours, you’ll see that.”
I blink slowly.
The room shifts slightly when I do, the edges of it not quite staying where they should.
I don’t answer him.
I don’t think he expects me to.
He never really waits for my answers anymore.
At some point I’m not at the table anymore.
I don’t remember getting up.
I don’t remember walking.
I’m just...on the bed.
The chain at my ankle shifts when I move slightly, the soft sound of it dragging across the floor registering somewhere in the back of my mind before it fades again.
He’s beside me.
I know that without looking.
