She watched the sunlight shift across the ceiling.
11:00 AM. The square of sunlight was near the doorway. 2:00 PM. It reached the top of the stairs. 6:00 PM. The golden light turned blood-orange, then faded into gray shadows.
Her thirst grew agonizing, her tongue feeling like sandpaper against the roof of her mouth. Her muscles cramped continuously, locked in an involuntary battle against the damage in her neck. Tears tracked slowly down her cheeks, pooling in the tiny grooves of the dark slate floor she had spent the morning perfecting.
She fought for every agonizing breath, listening to the quiet ticking of the hallway clock. Tick. Tick. Tick.
By midnight, the pain had dulled into a heavy, suffocating numbness. Her vision blurred around the edges, dark vignettes closing in as her lungs grew too tired to lift her chest against the weight of the floor. Her last conscious thought was not of terror, but of a heartbreakingly simple realization: how fragile a life could be, separated from safety by nothing more than a fraction of an inch of water.
When her husband finally unlocked the front door late Sunday night, calling her name into the quiet house, the floors were completely dry.
Gleaming, spotless, and still
