Page 83 of Hollowed

But something in his jaw tightened.

Like I’d struck a sacred chord.

He walked to me.

Lifted the ribbon from the table.

He didn’t bind me.

He didn’t ask me to stay.

He handed it to me.

“In case you forget what your hands are for,” he said.

My throat closed.

I reached for him.

He kissed my fingers.

And let go.

I walked to the chapel doors.

My robe loose around my shoulders. The ribbon clutched in my hand like a relic.

And I stepped outside.

Not because I wanted freedom.

But because I wanted hunger.

Because I needed to remember what starving for him felt like.

The air outside didn’t feel like air.

It felt like absence.

Like breath I hadn’t earned. Like light that had never touched me before.

The sky was pale and too open. The wind had no weight.

I blinked against the brightness.

And I felt my ribs curl inward.

Because everything out here moved.

And nothing here saw me.

I walked.

Not fast. Not with purpose.

Just forward.

The ground was soft. The soil forgiving. Grass touched my feet like apology.

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