IRIS

I reach the bedroom door and pause, hand on the handle. My fingers feel cold, almost numb, but it’s not from the temperature. It’s the weight of everything that happened tonight. The way Kelvin… gave himself so that Darian could live. So that I could live.

I want to scream. I want to cry. I want to curl into a ball and disappear, because no matter how much relief I feel that Darian is alive, the thought of Kelvin’s lifeless body burns my chest. It’s not just grief. It’s guilt. How can I be here, breathing, when he… He chose to die so that we could survive. My mind...