I was curled up in Harry's lap as we watched anything but the news. We had been crying off and on all day, randomly telling each other tidbits of information about Aleska as memories came back to us. He, like Rou-- like me-- knew she hadn't made it out. She was too high up to escape. There was no point in hoping for something so unattainable.

We stared at the television, trying to let it brainwash us, his fingertips tracing designs into my skin.

I felt tears well up in my eyes. "Why?" I asked, my voice more a sob than a word.

"I don't know," He said. He held me tight to his chest as I came undone. He whispered into my hair: "It's okay."

"It isn't," I said, crying harder. Every tear felt like acid on my skin, every breath like fire as it blazed down my throat and into my lungs. Is this what she felt as the bar burned? Was she dead before the flames reached our floor, or did she jump out of those gorgeous windows I loved? Did she look at the river as she fell, remembering me and my fascination with it? "It isn't okay."

"It's not," He said, holding me tighter, as if he could read my thoughts and was trying to quiet them. He didn't flinch as my hand pounded into his chest, his arms keeping me contained, if only minimally. "But it might be."

I didn't want to hear that so I pretended not to. He held me tighter, then tighter still, as if he could squeeze all the emotions right out of me. I wished he could've. He whispered to me all night until I fell asleep. "It might be."

It might be.  

//