Chapter 167. Don’t Let Me Die

I strained to will myself to sleep, but sleep slipped farther away the harder I tried—here, in this same dreadful place, with my thoughts racing in endless circles. I could not bear it, not tonight, not ever again.

Something about this cramped, sparsely furnished chamber struck me as profoundly wrong. The heavy air dragged at my lungs. I didn’t want to spend another minute here, let alone another day. My gaze roamed restlessly from the peeling wallpaper to the grimy window pane high on the far wall, searching for a way out, a flicker of hope—only to find the glass cold and unyielding, sealing me in. With an exasperated sigh that felt as hollow as the room itself, I slid my feet beneath the neat, too-thin sheets and lay back on the narrow mattress, turning my head to stare at the ceiling, lost in dark contemplation of my life’s course.

Would things have been different if I had never told Alex ab