Alle Kapitel von 37 Times You Called My Name : Kapitel 131 – Kapitel 140

MIA POV Thursday arrived with a sky the color of old metal. I sat in Dr. Ruiz’s office with my spine too straight and my hands locked together in my lap, trying to find a doorway into the thing I had been circling for weeks. The desk. The locked door. The way he had made me count while my body betrayed every boundary I thought I still owned. Dr. Ruiz waited with her usual calm. She never rushed the silence. She simply let it exist until I could step into it. “I don’t know how to talk about it without feeling like I’m handing him another victory,” I said eventually. “Even here. Even now.” “This isn’t his room,” she answered. “It’s yours. The story belongs to you. You’re allowed to tell it in whatever pieces you can stand.” So I told it. I started with the threats against my mother. The way fear had already hollowed me out before he ever locked the door. I described the weight of h

MIA POVI woke to the gray light of early morning and the quiet fact of his hand still loosely holding mine.The space between our bodies remained. He had kept his word through the night—no drifting closer, no unconscious reaching, just the single point of contact I had allowed. His breathing was deep and even. For a long time I lay still and watched the ceiling, letting the residue of the previous day settle across my skin like a thin film.The desk session had left me hollowed out. Speaking the memory in Dr. Ruiz’s office and then again in our living room had taken something from me, but it had also moved the thing out of the sealed place where it had been living. It still hurt. It still lived in my body. But it no longer felt like a private landmine only I could step on.Ryder’s fingers tightened slightly as he woke. His eyes opened and found mine in the soft light. He didn’t speak right away. He simply looked at me, waiting to see which versio

MIA POVThe quiet held.For three full days after the desk session, the alarms stayed low enough that I could hear other things underneath them—the sound of Ryder’s breathing in the dark, the soft clink of coffee mugs in the morning, the way my own laughter sometimes surprised me when it showed up without permission. Integration, Dr. Ruiz had called it. The word still sat under my ribs like a smooth stone I kept turning over with my tongue.Friday morning I woke tangled with him in the best way—my leg over his, his hand splayed warm against the small of my back, the sheets smelling like both of us. Sunlight cut across the bed in clean lines. I watched it move for a while before I felt him wake.“Volume?” he asked, voice rough with sleep.I smiled into his chest. The question had become our shorthand, gentle and precise. “Low. Almost background.”“Good.” He pressed a slow kiss to the top of my head. “Stay here a minute.”

MIA POVThe quiet had started to feel less like a temporary truce and more like a language we were both learning to speak fluently.I woke on a slow Sunday morning to the feeling of Ryder’s mouth against my bare shoulder—soft, unhurried, the kind of kiss that didn’t ask for anything beyond the moment it occupied. Sunlight pooled across the bed in warm gold. His arm was heavy around my waist, his chest solid against my back. For a long time I simply breathed and let the present register in my body without immediately scanning for exits.*Notice the alarm.* It stirred, faint and almost polite: *Don’t get used to this.* *Name it.* Old fear of loss. *Check the present.* His breath was steady against my neck. His hand flexed once when I shifted, then relaxed, giving me room. The present held.I turned in his arms until we were face to face. His eyes were already open, watching me with that quiet, careful attention he wore more often now.“Morning,” I said.“Morning.” His voice was ro

MIA POV The days had begun to stack on top of one another in a way that felt almost like a real life. Not the braced, provisional version I had been living for years—something quieter and more deliberate. Mornings that started with shared coffee and soft kisses. Evenings that ended with my head on Ryder’s chest and the alarms low enough to ignore. Therapy sessions that left me tired but clearer. Visits with my mother that felt less like checking a vital sign and more like spending time with the person who had known me longest. I woke on a rainy Tuesday to the sound of water against the glass and the solid warmth of Ryder’s body curved around mine. His hand rested open against my stomach, his breath steady at the back of my neck. For a long time I simply listened to the rain and to him and let the present register without immediately scanning for cracks. *Notice the alarm.* It was there, faint: *This is the part where it usually starts to slip.* *Name it.* Old pattern reco