Any second now.

I felt it in my bones, even though I couldn't see the sky. It was that time of night—the time when he would slip through the door, quiet and weightless as a shadow, and wrap his arms around me.

My legs protested as I crouched, eyes on the knob, waiting for it to turn. I strained to listen for his footsteps over the sound of my own pulse pounding in my ears.

Tonight was the night.

I was ready. This time, I would escape.

His approach was silent, but the click of the latch split the air like a gunshot. I flinched, and there he was—slow, steady, moving with the confidence of someone who knew he couldn't lose.

I sprang forward, ducked under his arm—

—and quick as a flash, he caught me by the waist, dragging me back inside as the door swung shut once more. Its slam echoed like the final nail in my coffin.

"Ah," he said softly, holding onto me as I clawed at his arm. "Not so fast. We need to talk."

"Let me go!" I shouted, voice hoarse from disuse.

His grip vanished. It was like he knew the second he let go, hopelessness would flood my veins and weaken my knees until I hit the floor.

Which was exactly what I did. Choking on tears, I stared up at him like a beggar, only one word on my tongue.

"Why?"

He watched in silence.

"Why do you keep doing this?" I shouted. "Why do you torture me every night? If you won't leave me alone, at least—"

My voice broke, giving way to a sob.

"—at least let me sleep."

Ever so slowly, he lowered himself until he could look me in the eyes. His were too clear, too blue. Like sapphires catching the light among dull grains of sand. They didn't belong next to misery.

"I'm so tired," I whispered. "I just want to sleep."

The corner of his lip pulled back, an almost sad smile. "Me, too."

"Then stop keeping me locked in here."

He reached for me, his hands settling on either side of my face. For a moment we both sat like that, his fingers cupping my jaw with the care of a gentle lover.

"I can't," he finally murmured, and the lines that etched themselves into his face almost looked like regret.

"Why not?" I seized his wrists, squeezing them tight but not throwing him off. Not quite yet. "Can't you see you're killing me?"

His gaze dropped to my ragged clothes, the ribs visible through the tears in my shirt, the sharp angles of my knees. I knew when he met my eyes again that he saw their sunken stupor, the dark circles underneath them, how much he had dulled their color.

"I don't want to hurt you," he said softly. "I'm not trying to—I'm not—it's not me."

"It is you," I cried, struggling to stand. His touch fell away, leaving a chill in its absence. "Every night, it's you. Your hands around my neck as I try to breathe. Your voice in my ear as I try to hear myself think. Your face on the inside of my eyelids every time I close them. It's you, it's all you, and I can't get away, I—"

I stopped, chest heaving as my throat closed and left me breathless. Almost as breathless as he did.

"Why won't you just leave me alone?"

Once again, he studied me in silence. Those eyes took me in like the ocean, drowning me all at once until he finally found his words:

"Why won't you let me go?"

He looked impossibly sad, like he'd aged centuries in the space of a heartbeat. Like the earth and moon had collided, and he had watched the beautiful destruction from the safety of space, knowing that home had been destroyed.

His pain silenced me.

"This is your prison," he said as he got up to leave. "Why do we both have to live in it?"