Page 7 of Nyx

"Saying that, 'I should've killed him sooner,’" she says, her voice sounding a little more distant than before. "What does it mean that you didn't?"

"I failed her."

"If you had done it sooner, what would be different?"

"She wouldn't have been hurt as much."

"And she got hurt because?"

"I didn't stop it."

"How old were you when you first thought protecting her was your job?"

"Six."

"What was a six-year-old supposed to do?"

"More than I did."

"Bring up the image of not failing her."

I tilt my head, almost pulling my eyes from the light, but I steady myself.

"What do you see?"

"Her face. His lifeless body. The blood spatter."

"What about her face?"

"She looks relieved," I whisper.

"Notice that," she urges.

Seconds tick by as the memory comes full force into my mind.

"I waited too long," I whisper.

"Notice that."

"The relief didn't last. She hated me for what I did," I whisper, my chest tightening to the point it becomes hard to breathe.

"Notice that," she says.

I swallow, heartache and pain crawling around inside of me like a virus threatening to take over my entire body. Anger bubbles up with the memories.

"I was just a kid," I manage.

"Notice that."

My memory shifts, and instead of begging for forgiveness, pleading for her to still love me like what happened in real life, it transforms.

I stand a little taller, watching her as she cries on his lifeless chest, begging him to come back to her.

"I was sixteen," I whisper. "I was just a kid."

"Notice that."

"I shouldn't have had to be the one to protect us."