Page 136 of Saint Céline
Anya nodded solemnly. “I can be calm.”
“No, you can’t,” Sophia and I said at the same time.
Anya placed one hand over her chest. “This is bullying.”
For a few hours, the apartment became almost normal. Anya ordered soup because she said fear required sodium. Sophia made tea that none of us drank. Miss Astoria slept in my lap while I pretended to read through Katherine’s proposal and understood almost none of it because my brain kept looping back to Daniel’s voice.
Fancy name. Fancy people. Would be a shame.
By evening, my phone buzzed again.
Unknown number.
I froze. The soup spoon slipped slightly in my hand and struck the bowl with a small ceramic sound. Sophia looked up immediately. Anya’s expression changed into fury. The phone rang once. Twice. Sophia reached for it, but I picked it up first. I did not answer. I only watched the screen until the call ended. Then a message appeared.
Unknown:Don’t ignore me, sweetheart.
My stomach turned so violently I thought I might be sick. Anya whispered something under her breath in Malayalam that sounded like a curse. Sophia held out her hand.
“Give me the phone.”
This time I did. She took screenshots. Saved the number. Sent them to herself and Anya. Then she looked at me. “We are reporting this.”
“Not yet.”
“Céline.”
“I said not yet.”
My voice came out sharper than intended, but the room had started shrinking again. The walls were too close. The air was too warm. Miss Astoria’s fur was too soft under my hand. My heartbeat moved up into my throat, fast and irregular, as if my body had mistaken a text message for a hand around my neck.
Sophia saw it. Her anger vanished.
“Breathe, Céline .”
“I am breathing.”
“No, you’re arguing. Just breathe.”
Anya moved the soup away from me gently.
“I’m fine,” I said. My voice broke on the last word. The humiliation of that was immediate and total.
Sophia crouched in front of me. “Do you want the medication?”
“No.”
“Okay.”
The room tilted slightly. I hated my body. I hated how quickly it betrayed me, how Daniel could reach through a phone and turn me into a child with locked doors and silent footsteps.
“I don’t want to feel like this,” I whispered.
Sophia’s face softened.
“I know.”
I took the pill because the psychiatrist had told me to take it if the panic became unmanageable, and because, for once, I did not trust myself to outthink my own body. Sophia brought water. Anya sat beside me without making jokes. Miss Astoria remained in my lap, purring with the solemn dedication of a creature who believed vibration could solve most human problems.
