Chapter 26: The Weight of a Secret Shared
April woke up to the sound of rain.
For a disoriented moment, she didn't know where she was. The ceiling was the wrong color too familiar, too small. The light coming through the curtains was the amber gold of late afternoon, not the pale grey of early morning. Her body felt like it had been wrung out and left to dry, heavy and hollow at the same time.
Then she remembered. The drink fridge. The floor. Jaden's arms around her while the fluorescent lights hummed overhead.
She'd slept for almost eighteen hours.
She lay still for a long time, listening to the rain against the window and the distant sounds of her mother moving in the kitchen — the quiet clink of a spoon against a pot, the low murmur of the evening news. Normal sounds. Careful sounds. The sounds of a woman trying very hard to hold the shape of their life together with tired hands.
