This isn't weird.

America

Millie had collapsed into bed that morning so exhausted that she fully expected to sleep well past sunset, but when her eyes opened, daylight was still peeking through the blinds. She rolled over to reach for her phone, only to remember that it wasn't there, and groaned. "You chose the perfect time to lose your phone, didn't you?" she muttered out loud as she sat up. "And now I guess you're the kind of person that talks to yourself, too."

Heaving a sigh, she leaned forward and passed her hands over her face. This was the worst part of even a good day, always—that miserable moment of transition as her body adjusted to the everyday trauma of being awake, when she felt as if all of her organs were ever so slightly out of alignment. A sick, viscous feeling that made her ache in places she was normally unaware of; the webbing between her toes, the underside of her knees, the back of her teeth. And this day—this day was not a good day. There would be no good days in her foreseeable future at all. It seemed quite possible, even probable, that she'd already used up her entire allotment of good days for this lifetime, and now, all that lay ahead of her was empty, mechanical subsistence.

"I miss Ben," she whispered, the words on her lips before they had even coalesced in her mind. It was a force of habit; she'd groggily mumbled the phrase to herself every morning for the last six months, but this time, it made her shudder. This time, she knew that Ben missed her, too. It was a responsibility she wasn't equipped for.

Turning her head, she peered at the digital clock on her bedside table. She hadn't slept long—it was barely past two. How was that possible? Their conversation already felt like it had been days ago, but it hadn't even been twelve hours.

He'd called her. He'd actually called her. Sure as she had been for all this time that he never wanted to speak to her again, she'd had only to give him the tiniest sign, and he'd seized the chance without hesitation. As if he'd been waiting.

Because he had been waiting.

While she had been...

Her hand moved swiftly over her mouth as she felt herself begin to gag, but her stomach was too empty for anything to come of it. She closed her eyes and waited for the nausea to pass. When she opened them, her gaze fell on the little notebook tangled in the sheets beside her. The letter—she'd been three pages deep and smack dab in the middle of a sentence when sleep had finally taken her. Millie picked up the pad and skimmed it over, frown deepening as she neared the end.

"Stupid," she muttered, then tore the pages from the notepad, crumpled them up in her fist, and tossed them into the wastebasket. For a long, still moment, she just sat there, trying to understand what she was feeling. Hungry? A little. Thirsty? A lot. But there was something else her body was telling her, something more pressing. A nagging, awful feeling, making her skin crawl—

Dirty.

That was it. She felt dirty.

The shower was cramped, but the water pressure was good, and the water heater even better. Tiny little shampoos and soaps—she liked those. Nothing like miniature hygiene products to make a body feel entirely elsewhere. Turning the temperature up as hot as she could stand, she stepped into the water and scrubbed every last inch of her body until her skin was raw. 

She didn't feel any cleaner. She repeated the process again.

And again.

A half hour of scouring did nothing to ease the sensation of filth on her flesh. Defeated, she sank down to the tiled floor, head between her knees, and let the water run over her body in steaming rivulets.

Arthur.

She couldn't unfeel the disgust of his body on hers.

His words kept popping into her head.