Phoenix Maplewood they will never be the same; a fire in a flask to keep us warm

silence reigned then, and the boy, the leader, moved past her quietly. she was too far gone to feel anything, to bother with the burning in her head any longer. she understood that, in some sick way, she'd won this encounter, but it was a black victory she did not want to wear. and so before the footfalls of the sylph-like male had faded, she sunk to her stomach, staring at the darkness as it gathered, wishing for some feeling, some emotion, to crack through a shell scraped clean and made hard by grief.