Days into her stay, the nurses encouraged Autumn to get some independence. They didn’t understand the fear, didn’t quite get the nightmares she shot awake with nightly. There wasn’t a believable story she could weave on what’d happened, why she was so terrified. If she hadn’t been there, honestly, she wouldn’t believe it either. A man made of coals, filling her lungs with smoke? Even with all the magic she’d adjusted to, it was beyond belief. Especially the fact that it’d been her. She had been kind, had… reached out to everyone. And yet, here she was. What had she done wrong?

They gave her a walker. Not that you’ll need it, the nurse quickly supplemented! But just to be steady. Something to fall back on, if she got overwhelmed. It was kind of depressing, but she understood. Baby steps to get better, after all.

So she walked. Only a little bit, at first. It turned out? Away from the beeping of the machines in her room, she was ******** tired. Even little ventures down the barely-lit hallways had her breathing as deeply as she could (and god, that was shallow. Soft, barely-there breaths that left her aching.)

“Strange to see someone so young,” She heard someone call from the living room, and forced herself to turn. Sitting in the chair was an older woman, likely in her seventies. Her hair was curled and grey, and Autumn couldn’t help but notice that despite her smile, she looked sad.

“I had an accident,” Autumn said quietly, wincing at the pain. The woman nodded, understandingly. Not wanting to be rude, Autumn shuffled over, taking the chair across from the woman’s.

“Diane, dear. What’s your name?”

“…Autumn,” Autumn replied quietly, trying to force herself to smile. It was hard to smile here, in a hospital, tired as she was.

She got the feeling Diane understood.

It was a comfortable silence between them. When they spoke, it wasn’t forced. Just soft, casual conversation. Nothing too heavy. What kind of things did she do? Did she have a boyfriend? Just…sweet.

Diane liked to knit. Unsurprising. Autumn joked about living out clichés, and Diane seemed to appreciate the humor as well. Probably was happy just to have someone to talk to.

What was odd, though, were the shadows. At first, they’d almost seemed like bugs. In her exhaustion, Autumn had assumed they were just hallucinations. But then… the rest of it had been real. Why not these? She wasn’t going to alert the old lady or say anything, but there they were. Dancing. Taunting her.

Was Other Ashdown going to creep into this poor woman’s life, too?

She couldn’t watch the little dancing shadows. Couldn’t think about it. Diane’s children didn’t visit, grandchildren didn’t visit… and now this.

God, life sucked.

But maybe she was just hallucinating. Maybe it was all just a vivid, drug-induced sight. If she ignored them…

The nurse was back for her. She’d done a lot of talking- too much, Autumn got the impression- and it was time to go back to her room. Autumn bid Diane farewell, got back up, and hobbled off to her own little hellhole. If they were there the next day… well. Maybe Autumn would ask about it.

Only… it turned out that ‘maybe’ was a ‘no.’

Diane died that night.

Autumn didn’t sleep for days after.