The Fire He Chose
Don't come back.
She sat up slowly and pulled the thick duvet around her shoulders like armor. Her body ached in strange places - her neck, her feet, her jaw from clenching it all night, her eyes from crying. Soft grey light came through the thick hotel curtains, diffused and gentle, the kind of light that comes after a storm when the world has been washed. The rain had stopped, but the window was still streaked with last night's water, making the city outside look blurred and washed clean, like a painting left in the rain. From this high up, on the 34th floor of the Vale Hotel, the city looked different. Quieter. Smaller. Less cruel. The cars below moved like tiny toys, silent. She had neve