4338.206 · July 25, 2018 AD
The Offer She Couldn't Take
The fire asks nothing. It simply burns—curling paper plates into ash, casting faces in amber, carving a small circle of certainty out of an uncertain world. Two people sit in its glow, close enough to speak but separated by everything they're not saying. One offers a door. The other steps around it. Sometimes the hardest walls to breach aren't built from stone—they're built from the need to stay standing.
The day has finally loosened its grip. The tent is up, supplies sorted, Jamie sleeping. Glenda sits cross-legged in the dust beside Paul, the fire crackling between them and the sky bleeding into dusk. For a moment—just a breath—something close to peace settles over her. The tension in her jaw softens. Her shoulders drop.
But stillness is a double-edged thing. Without crisis to focus on, the weight returns. Images cycle behind her eyes: the splinter, the bite, the sob she couldn't contain, the world she left behind.
Paul sees it. Everything okay? he asks. The question is gentle, the offer genuine. I'm here if you need to talk.
Glenda considers it. For one heartbeat, she imagines letting someone in. Then the instinct takes over—the years of training, the habit of holding everything together, the fear of what happens if she finally lets go.
I need to check on Jamie, she says, and stands.
Outside the tent, she pauses. Cups her hands over her mouth. Breathes. The offer lingers behind her like warmth from a fire she's already walked away from.
