The next text came in while I was still half asleep.
Rhys doesn't know what happened between you two. Does he?
I sat up and read it twice. No name, same as always. I didn't answer. I never answered anymore, not since that first stupid reply that got me nothing but three words back.
I got dressed and went out to the grounds before the house was properly awake. Cold enough that my breath showed. I found the spot I'd been using and stripped my shirt off and let the shift come.
It held longer this time. Maybe a minute. Long enough that I thought, for a second, that this was it, that I'd finally gotten past whatever was broken between me and the thing I used to be. Then it slipped sideways and dropped me on my hands and knees in the wet grass, the same as every other time.
I stayed down there a minute, breathing hard.
"A minute," I said out loud, to nobody. "Big improvement."
