Chapter 17 #2
It spilled across the space in long, golden streaks—soft, hesitant, almost shy like it wasn’t sure it was welcome here. For a few seconds, I didn’t move. Couldn’t. I simply watched, letting it warm the side of my face.
I hadn’t realized how much I missed it until now.
The glow, the way it painted warmth across my face, the way that simple warmth reminded me life still existed beyond these walls, the world still existed. People breathed. Laughed. Lived.
I’d taken morning warmth for granted my whole life. Waking to it was as natural as breathing. Now it felt like a miracle being handed back to me—fragile, unfamiliar, overwhelming.
Tears burned behind my eyes, sharp and sudden. The glow blurred into bands of white and amber. I didn’t know if I was crying because of the brightness… or because something inside me—something I’d thought had been beaten out of existence—had sparked back to life.
Hope.
It hurt.
Then memory slammed into me like a fist.
The shouting.
The crash.
The footsteps flooding the padded room.
Screams and groans tearing through the chaos.
Hands dragging me away.
Whoever had come in.
Someone had saved me.
Because now… I wasn’t there anymore.
For the first time in—God, how long had it been?—I wasn’t strapped to a bed. I wasn’t locked behind a reinforced door. I wasn’t choking on the stink of bleach or the recycled air pumped through the padded walls.
The air here smelled different.
Fresh.
Clean.
Like linen, warm sunlight, and something faintly citrus—the scent of a place where people actually lived, not where they were hidden away.
I blinked, taking in piece by piece.
Pale walls.
Warm wooden planks.
The sunlight spilling across them like a soft, golden blanket.
A sleek dresser, modern and minimalistic.
A small table set near the window, with two chairs angled like they were waiting for a conversation.
This wasn’t a prison.
The sheets under me were soft. Cotton—real cotton, not the scratchy synthetic crap from before. The pillow under my cheek was cool. My fingers skimmed the fabric as I tried to believe it.
Then—
No restraints.
No leather straps pinning my wrists or ankles.
No medical machines humming beside me.
My chest tightened. I ran my palm down my thigh. The pajamas were gone—replaced with a clean T-shirt and soft lounge shorts.
And the diaper was gone.
Thank God.
If I hadn’t been so wrung out, I might’ve laughed or cried or both.
For a moment, I lay there with both hands splayed across my stomach, grounding myself in this impossible reality. The space ramined solid around me.
No illusions.
No hallucinations.
Slowly, with the caution of a man waking inside a dream he didn’t trust, I pushed onto one elbow. My muscles trembled, weak from sedation and disuse. Every movement felt foreign, like trying to inhabit a body I hadn’t been inside for weeks.
Steady.
Slow.
Don’t fall on your ass.
I caught sight of the ensuite bathroom and moved toward it immediately, dragging my feet over the warm wood. I didn’t even need to go. I just… wanted to see it. To touch something that wasn’t padded, locked, or designed to break me.
The tiles in the bathroom were cool under my bare feet. Morning brightness filtered through a frosted window, painting soft squares across the floor. The sink gleamed. Chrome tap polished. A towel folded with neat hotel-like precision.
Normal.
I gripped the edge of the sink, knuckles whitening, and lifted my head.
The reflection staring back startled me.
Sunken eyes ringed with bruising.
Skin pale and drawn tight across sharp cheekbones.
A fading cut on my temple.
Stubble that looked more like neglect than style.
My lips dry and cracked.
I looked half-dead.
A hollowed-out version of myself.
A ghost of the man June once knew.
“Pathetic,” I muttered, the word scraping out of my throat. Maybe it wasn’t fair. Maybe it wasn’t true. But right then, it felt like the only thing I deserved.
Because this—running water, clean air, a door that didn’t lock from the outside—felt like luxury.
And that alone told me just how far I’d fallen.
But that was what captivity did.
It stripped you bare—layer by layer—until even the smallest comforts felt like luxuries. Until sunlight felt like forgiveness. Until the sound of your own breathing felt like proof you hadn’t disappeared yet.
I turned on the tap and let the water run for several seconds, watching steam coil upward from the tap. Then I collected it in my hands and splashed it onto my face.
The shock punched the air from my lungs.
Chilled. Clean. Real.
For a moment, I just stood there, drops sliding from my chin as I gazed into the glass at the stranger wearing my features.
My cheeks were sunken, my jawline too sharp, the outline of bone visible beneath flesh that once carried strength. I was dehydrated—dried out.
This was starvation disguised as medical care.
A slow erasing.
Evil Angela hadn’t exactly been generous while “looking after” me. Liquid meals. Watery porridge. Fruit juice—but only if the witch remembered. My stomach felt tight, shrunk, as if unused to the idea of nourishment.
My fingers locked tighter around the sink, grounding myself against the chilled porcelain—something solid, something that couldn’t sedate me or tie me down.
Then I heard it.
A faint noise.
Soft.
Subtle.
But real.
My body reacted before my mind did. I shut off the tap instantly, a thunderous rhythm pounding in my chest. Every nerve in me stood on edge, braced for footsteps, for the scrape of a lock, for my mother’s voice dripping poison into the air.
Silence.
But the kind of silence that had weight.
Presence.
I dried my fingers on the towel—quick, frantic, almost clumsy—and stepped toward the doorway. My hand hovered over the handle for a beat too long, the tremor in my fingers betraying me.
Then I turned.
The entrance swung open.
Brightness from the main room spilled in, warm and bright—too bright. My eyes narrowed, adjusting. Shapes sharpened.
And then—
“Told you I’d come back for you.”
The words hit me like a punch straight to the chest.
I blinked hard, water dripping from my chin, and the blurry outline sharpened into a solid figure. Broad shoulders. Eyes warmed with recognition. Familiar posture. Familiar confidence.
Dannie.
I opened my mouth, waiting for the thousands of questions that should’ve come spilling out. They crowded behind my teeth, tangled and urgent, each one clawing for release.
But nothing came.
Just the pounding of my own heartbeat in my ears.
“Xiao Wu,” I finally managed.
His smile curved slowly—familiar, hauntingly familiar—but I couldn’t tell whether it carried comfort… or something sharper underneath.
“You remember me now?” he asked quietly.
I nodded, though the motion tugged at something raw inside my skull.
“Did you save me?”
The question slipped out on instinct, small, weak, humiliatingly unsure. A part of me braced for the worst—because maybe I hadn’t been rescued at all. Maybe I’d just been transferred from one prison to another.
Still… at least this one had a toilet.
“Yes. I owe you that,” he said, his tone light but frayed at the edges. Then a sharp, painful breath tore out of him.
It hit me then—he was in rough shape.
Not as pale as me, but damn close.
Dark circles smudged under his eyes, his lips cracked, his posture slumped as if someone had siphoned the last bit of his energy.
He didn’t just find me.
He fought his way here.
A tangled knot of anger and gratitude twisted beneath my ribs.
“So…” I hesitated, bracing myself. “You didn’t break me out just to keep me captive again?”
The words were pathetic. Small. The kind of thing a broken man would say. I hated myself for it.
But the man didn’t mock me.
He didn’t flinch.
“No, brother.” His smile softened. This time, it actually reached his eyes, warming something inside me I didn’t realize had gone numb. “Not this time.”
He exhaled, long and weary, like he’d been carrying his words for years.
“For so long, I carried the guilt of leaving you in that hut,” he said, voice just above a whisper. “I should’ve stayed. I should’ve protected you. I swore I’d come back but… I was young. Weak. Powerless.”
His fingers curled loosely in his lap. “And the people I thought were my family—” he paused, jaw twitching, “—they turned their backs on me. Betrayed me and my family.”
The spark in his gaze dimmed, shadow pooling there before he forced it away. Like he couldn’t afford to hold the grief any longer.