The Mistress feels her breath catch and holds it back as she rolls over on the empty bed, blankets caught loosely around her.

The sky outside her window shows blue, bright and cloudless beyond the flowing white curtains which allow through a slight breeze.

Sleep calls again but she raises a hand to her face and feels dampness beneath her hands.

She breathes out again, the sound more of a sigh as she wets her lips and catches the scent, just there, of flowers on the wind.

Without a sound except for the soft shifting of the sheets she curls in on herself and wraps her arms around her shoulders, her back, finding the skin warm as she opens her mouth and lets herself continue to cry silently, as she remembers. Her fingers grip just that much tighter as she holds herself together.

She remembers an old bruise on her shoulder- gone now but purple then, deep and spread across from the top of her collarbone to the bottom of the shoulder blade under her arm in all its mottled glory.

They had kissed it softly, tenderly and then her hand and then her cheek as they whispered in words she can't recall aside from the gentleness that she needed to stop getting herself hurt.

She remembers their hands cupping their hips lightly, always careful, touch as light as if they could break her and as if no one else had tried to before despite the scars and burns across her skin which she laughs at whenever they bring them up. She can almost fingers their thumb sweep across her skin, the way it feels as it brushes over a dipped mark which has yet to heal up properly. It's healed now. Long ago.

She remembers being held close, skin crushed to skin despite the grasp sleep has over them and the smell of them all she can breathe into her lungs with her eyes closed to mimic theirs.

She swallows, well attempts to, eyelids fluttering open to see the world blurring together beyond her eyes as her throat chokes on grief.

Sleep calls again and the Mistress turns her back to the light and closes her eyes, determined to relieve herself from reliving things which may not pass again.

She's always loved them if she's honest with herself. She just wishes that could have been enough for either of them.

She remembers him kissing her and falls asleep with the tears still pouring from her closed eyes.