Chapter 41 Savannah
Savannah
The house goes quiet again, too quiet, the kind of quiet that feels like the world holding its breath.
I sit on the bed with my knees pulled up, tea cooling in my hands, and I try to convince my body that the tap on the glass was nothing. An animal. A raccoon. A branch. A stupid coincidence. But my nervous system doesn’t believe in coincidences. My nervous system believes in patterns.
Tap. Pause. Pressure. Then the lock test.
That was not a raccoon. Raccoons don’t test locks like they know what a lock means.
My throat tightens as I swallow. I stare at the door like if I stare hard enough I can turn it into steel, and I press my feet into the floor anyway. Hard. The wood is cold and smooth and real, and I whisper my sentence again like it’s medicine.
“I chose this.”
My voice shakes. I hate that. I whisper it again, stronger. “I chose this.”
The hallway stays silent. No footsteps. No voices. No shouting. No gunshots. That should comfort me, but it doesn’t, because in my head silence is what comes before the scream.
I take another sip of tea. it’s lukewarm now, still sweet, still safe.
The steam is gone, but the scent stays—chamomile and honey—and I force myself to eat the toast slowly.
One bite. Chew. Swallow. Normal actions like I’m proving I still exist. My stomach fights it at first. My stomach doesn’t trust kindness.
But I make it anyway, because feeding my body feels like rebellion.
Then I hear footsteps approaching. I know that pace.
Gabriel.
My chest tightens anyway, because even Gabriel’s footsteps can feel dangerous when my body is trapped in survival mode. He stops outside my door, and I hold my breath.
“Savannah,” he says softly.
I exhale shakily. “Yes,” I whisper.
“It’s gone,” he says.
My stomach flips. Gone. So it was real.
My fingers clamp around my pendant like it’s the only thing that can keep my skin from crawling off my bones. “What was it,” I whisper.
“Animal,” he says. “Raccoon. Rafa scared it off.”
The lie is smooth. Too smooth. But I accept it anyway—not because I believe it, but because I can’t handle the truth if the truth is worse.
“It tapped,” I whisper.
“I know,” he says.
I close my eyes for one beat. My throat burns. “I was scared,” I admit.
“And you stayed,” he says. “That’s strength.”
Strength. That word again. It hits my ribs like a bruise, because strength is what people call you right before they ask you to endure more.
I swallow hard and stare at the lock while my mind tries to picture a raccoon. Claws. Fur. Little hands.
Little hands.
My stomach turns, because little hands are never just little hands in my head.
“Are you leaving again,” I ask, careful.
“No,” Gabriel answers immediately. “I’m here.”
My throat tightens. “Promise,” I whisper.
There’s a pause, then his voice turns low and certain. “Promise.”
My chest loosens by a millimeter.
I don’t unlock the door. I don’t invite him in. Not because I don’t want him, but because my body still needs control, control of the door, control of who enters. Gabriel doesn’t push. He doesn’t ask to come in.
“I’m going to sit in the hallway,” he says. “Right outside.”
“Okay,” I whisper.
I hear him settle down, back against the wall, knees bent. The quiet rustle of fabric. The faint shift like he’s making himself comfortable without letting his guard down. I imagine him there in the dark, a wall between me and everything that wants to touch me, and the image makes my eyes sting.
“Thank you,” I whisper through the door.
“Always,” he says.
Silence again, but different now. Not empty. Occupied by him.
I stare at the lock, then at my hands. They’re still shaking. I hate it. I hate how my body refuses to forget.
“Why won’t it stop,” I whisper without meaning to.
“Because it kept you alive,” Gabriel says from the hall.
The truth lands hard. Not soft. Not pretty.
“I don’t want to be afraid forever,” I whisper.
“You won’t,” he says. “Not like this.”
“How do you know,” I ask.
A pause, then his voice goes quieter. “Because you’re already changing.”
Changing is dangerous. Changing gets noticed. Changing invites punishment.
“What if changing makes it worse,” I whisper.
“Then I make the world pay,” he answers, like it’s simple.
Something in me warms and aches at the same time, because part of me believes him and part of me is terrified to.
I shift on the bed and the blanket slips, cool air hitting my skin. My body remembers Gabriel’s hands, the way he stopped when I flinched. Heat flickers low in my stomach, and fear tries to bite it, because heat feels like vulnerability. Heat feels like a door left open.
I pull the blanket tight around my shoulders. “Safe,” I whisper, and the word feels foreign in my mouth.
I hear Gabriel shift in the hall. He’s still there. My chest loosens again.
“Are you awake,” I whisper.
“Yes,” he answers immediately. Of course he is. Men like him don’t sleep when war is sniffing around windows.
“Can you talk to me,” I whisper.
“About what,” he asks.
I don’t know how to ask for comfort without feeling pathetic, so I reach for a simple question. “How do you not panic,” I whisper.
He’s silent for a beat. Then he tells me the truth.
“I do,” he says. “I just don’t show it where it can infect you.”
Infect you. That word hits hard, because fear is contagious in a house. One shaky voice can make a whole room collapse.
“So you’re scared too,” I whisper.
“Yes,” he says. “For you.”
“Why,” I ask.
Another pause, then he says it, simple. “Because I love you.”
The sentence lands heavy on my chest, not because I don’t want it, but because love is the most dangerous thing to accept. Love makes you relax. Love makes you believe the door will stay locked. Love makes you think you can sleep. And love is what gets ripped away.
“Don’t say it,” I whisper, breath shaking.
“Okay,” he says. No argument. No wounded pride. Just respect.
“I’m not saying I don’t want it,” I whisper. “I just… I don’t know what to do with it.”
“You don’t have to do anything,” he says gently. “You just let it exist.”
Let it exist. My survival brain hates that. My survival brain wants to control everything, even tenderness.
“I’m tired,” I whisper.
“Then sleep,” he says.
“How,” I whisper back, like the word is a joke.
“Feet,” he says. “Pendant. Breath. Sentence.”
My lips part. “I chose this,” I whisper.
“Yes,” Gabriel answers quietly.
I lie back slowly. I keep the lamp on low. I keep the blanket tight. Then I do what he said. Feet pressed into the mattress. Pendant in my fist. Breath in. Breath out. Sentence in my mouth like a prayer.
“I chose this.”
My eyes start to close. My body fights it, because sleep feels like giving up control. But Gabriel is in the hallway. A wall. A weapon. A promise.
And for the first time in a long time, sleep doesn’t feel like dying.
It feels like resting.
* * *
Then it happens, not outside, not glass, not gravel. Inside my head. A replay that tries to crawl up my throat. A child’s breath. A door. A man laughing softly like it’s a lullaby.
My stomach clenches and my eyes snap open.
I press my feet harder into the mattress like the bed is a boat and I’m trying not to fall off. “Gabriel,” I whisper.
“I’m here,” he answers instantly.
“I keep seeing it,” I whisper. “When I close my eyes.”
“I know,” he says.
“I hate that it still owns me,” I whisper, voice breaking.
“It doesn’t own you,” he says, softer. “It happened to you.”
That sentence is dangerous. It separates me from it. It means I don’t have to carry the blame like a necklace.
Tears slip out anyway, hot and quiet. I wipe them fast like I can erase evidence. “I don’t want to be… this,” I whisper.
“Then don’t be,” Gabriel says. “Be the woman who said no in a courtyard full of men. Be the woman who chose leaving.”
“I’m trying,” I whisper.
“I know,” he answers, and I can hear it in his voice. He’s not guessing. He’s watching me fight inside my own skin and refusing to look away.
I inhale slow and force the sentence out again. “I chose this.”
“Yes,” he says.
My eyelids feel heavy. My body still doesn’t trust it, but I try again, because this is what choosing looks like. Not a dramatic moment. A small, stubborn decision to stay.
I let my eyes close. I listen to the silence. it’s not empty. it’s occupied—by him, by the hallway outside my door, by the promise in his voice.
And when sleep finally takes me, it doesn’t feel like a trap.
It feels like a hand I get to accept.
On my terms.
* * *
Savannah’s Diary
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Raccoon.
I can’t handle the truth.
His love feels like the most dangerous weapon in the world.
Tonight I’m trying to let it exist.
I chose this.