count it.

one thousand, two hundred, and two hours.

that's how long it's been since she fell for the wrong person and started to crumble. and everything she'd built fell, so quickly that she could barely remember what had come before the billionth destruction. she couldn't remember anything. sometimes that can be a blessing, sometimes a curse. but what happens when even memory fails to be clear? how cloudy the present is, how foggy the future. it's like it never has been, never will be, never is. it's like she was never even there.

twenty-two minutes.

it's how long it's been since she last thought of the few memories that she hasn't forgotten. the ones that hurt the most, the ones that make the least sense. she wants context, but even context wouldn't make the videos in her head any less bad. if anything-- worse. and so she tries to forget what's branded in her neurons and dancing on her eyelashes and twisting through her veins.

eleven seconds.

how much time she lost in frozen terror, time she'll always regret. because sometimes time gives her too much room to reconsider, and making the wrong choice has always been her fear. well, she'd lose the lottery pretty quickly with the types of odds she's got. she lost every piece of sanity left with those odds; she lost her last shot at love. hope. anything that mattered.

one breath.

it's the thing that killed her more than the carbon dioxide ever could.