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Chapter 7 - Chapter 7 — Blue on Her Hands

The evening settled soft and slow over Maple Harbor, the kind of quiet that pressed in on you once the sun dipped behind the trees. Hannah sat at her kitchen table with the day's paperwork spread in front of her, but the numbers blurred into meaningless shapes.

All she could see was the streak of blue across her hand.

It wasn't bright anymore — just a faint smudge near her thumb — but it caught the light every time she moved, a small reminder of the hours in Emma's studio. She could have washed it off. She'd meant to. But somehow she hadn't.

She leaned back in her chair, staring at the ceiling. The house was silent except for the hum of the refrigerator and the faint rustle of wind through the open window. Her own heartbeat felt too loud.

She told herself it was just a friendship. Emma was kind, open, easy to talk to. Hannah hadn't had that in a long time — not since before she'd learned how to keep her walls up. But when she thought of Emma standing in that golden light, paint on her skin, eyes full of warmth and curiosity — the thought didn't feel like friendship at all.

It felt like something dangerous.

She pushed her chair back and walked to the sink, running her hands under the water. The paint dissolved slowly, staining the clear stream with faint swirls of blue. Still, even after she scrubbed, a shadow of color remained — faint but stubborn.

Like the memory itself.

Hannah turned off the tap and stood there, her reflection caught in the dark window above the sink. She barely recognized herself — the steady, measured woman she showed to everyone else seemed gone, replaced by someone uncertain, someone pulled by things she couldn't control.

She thought of Emma's words: Maybe that's just because you let yourself be seen.

No one else had ever said that to her. No one else had looked at her the way Emma did — not as the dependable teacher, not as the girl who'd never left town, but as someone still becoming.

Hannah wrapped her arms around herself, trying to still the ache in her chest.

She wasn't ready for this. She didn't even know what this was. But it was growing — steady, patient, and impossible to ignore.

The clock on the wall ticked steadily. Outside, a car door slammed somewhere in the distance, the sound swallowed by night.

Hannah looked down at her hand again. A faint shimmer of blue still clung to her skin.

And for reasons she didn't understand, she smiled.

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