Daisy's POV
I woke up to a shout. The sound was sharp, cutting through the fog of sleep that had settled over me. My heart slammed against my ribcage as I jerked upright on the floor, gasping for air. My body was tense, every muscle straining, trying to process the moment. The room was dark, the only source of light was from the lamb by the bed stand. I blinked, trying to clear the haze from my mind, but the fear, it was instant, rushing in like a flood.
I looked around the room, eyes darting across the dim shadows of the small, barren space. The walls felt closer somehow, like they were inching in toward me. But then I saw him, Lorenzo. He stood behind the door. His presence was like a weight in the room. A presence that suffocated everything around it.
He just stood there, watching me with cold, calculating eyes. His gaze was piercing, unwavering, as if he were trying to see straight through me. Fear gripped me like icy fingers around my heart. The kind of fear that tightens your chest and leaves you gasping, like you've just run a marathon and haven't had a chance to catch your breath. The kind of fear that makes you want to freeze, to shrink away, to do anything to make it stop. But I knew better. I knew what would happen if I let that fear show.
I tried to swallow, but my throat was dry, tight. My stomach growled in protest, the hunger gnawing at me. But I ignored it, the empty ache taking a backseat to the pressing terror of Lorenzo's presence. I didn't want punishment. I didn't want to face whatever was coming next.
I whispered to myself, asking for mercy, asking for some way out. Anything to make him leave. But it didn't seem to matter. Lorenzo remained still, like a statue carved from ice. His eyes never left me. The silence between us stretched, taut and thick, the air becoming heavier with each passing second. It felt like an eternity.
I couldn't move. I couldn't look away. I was frozen. The room was frozen. Everything around me seemed to stop, like time itself had paused in that one moment, but my mind raced, running through all the possible outcomes, all the ways this could go. The dread in my chest grew heavier. If I moved, if I spoke, what would happen? What did he want? Why was he just standing there, staring at me with those eyes that seemed to see everything? I didn't understand. I couldn't make sense of it. Nothing made sense in this place.
Lorenzo shifted slightly, but not enough to break the tension. The slightest movement, like the anticipation before a storm. I wanted to scream. I wanted to shout for help, for someone, anyone, to break this moment, to end this suffocating silence. But I knew better. I knew there would be no help. There never was. I was alone.
And then, finally, after what felt like an eternity, Lorenzo turned. His movements were slow, deliberate, as though he was savoring the moment. He didn't say anything, not a word. He didn't even glance back at me, his gaze fixed straight ahead, his face unreadable. It was as if I wasn't even there, as if I was nothing more than a fleeting shadow in his mind.
He just turned and walked out of the room with the same coldness that had defined him ever since he entered my life. The sound of his footsteps was muffled by the thick carpet in the hallway, but even through the soft padding of the floor beneath, I could still hear them. Each step reverberated in the silence that filled the room, a slow, rhythmic reminder that he was leaving, and yet it felt like he was taking a part of me with him. His steps grew fainter as he moved further away, fading until they were nothing more than a distant echo.
For a long time, I just sat there, paralyzed, unsure of what to feel. Was I supposed to be relieved? Was this a reprieve? Or was there something far worse in store? There was a gnawing sense of uncertainty deep within me, a pit that seemed to grow with every passing second. I couldn't shake the feeling that this wasn't over—that something was coming, something I couldn't yet understand.
The longer I sat there in the suffocating silence, the more unsettling it became. There was supposed to be punishment, pain, humiliation, but never this… this strange, unnerving stillness. It didn't feel like the anger was directed at me, not in the way it usually was.
The silence stretched on, each second heavier than the last. I couldn't move. I couldn't bring myself to do anything but sit there, a prisoner to the unknown. My heart beat erratically in my chest, the sound loud in my ears, as though trying to remind me that I was still here, still alive, still waiting.
It was the waiting that was the worst part. The uncertainty. The dread of not knowing what was going to happen next. I didn't know what he was thinking, what his next move would be. All I knew was that, for some reason, this moment didn't feel like a victory. It didn't feel like I had escaped unscathed.
I was left with nothing but the thick, suffocating silence and the unease that gnawed at my insides. He had walked out, yes, but he hadn't left. Not really. His presence lingered in the air like a dark cloud, heavy and oppressive. And with it came the knowledge that something was coming. Something I wasn't prepared for. Something worse than anything I had experienced before.
The door slammed shut behind him with a force that shook the room. The sound reverberated in the silence, echoing in my ears long after it had stopped. The slam of the door felt like a finality, like a conclusion, but it also felt like something unresolved, something left hanging in the air.
I remained where I was, still sitting up on the floor, my hands trembling in my lap. My breath was shallow, ragged, like I had just run a race. My body was tense, every part of me coiled, waiting for something—anything—to happen next. But nothing did. The silence stretched on, thick and oppressive, like a weight pressing down on me from all sides.
I didn't know how long I sat there, but it felt like hours. My thoughts were a blur, spinning in circles. I couldn't make sense of anything. I couldn't make sense of Lorenzo's behavior, of why he hadn't hurt me like the others did, why he hadn't done what I had come to expect from him. It was unsettling. It was worse than if he had just followed through with whatever.
I waited. I waited for the sound of the door to open again, for the footsteps to return, for Lorenzo to come back. But they didn't. The house was quiet. My stomach growled again, a harsh reminder of how long it had been since I had eaten. But I didn't move. I couldn't. The hunger was a distant thing, something I could ignore as long as I focused on the stillness, on the silence. The emptiness of the room felt like a trap, and I didn't want to move, didn't want to disturb it.
And so, I waited. The minutes dragged on, feeling like hours. The room felt colder now, even though the air conditioning wasn't on. The silence seemed to press in closer, suffocating me. My heart was still pounding in my chest, the fear still hanging in the air. I waited for the inevitable, for Lorenzo to come back and for whatever he had planned to come to pass. But nothing came.
The door remained closed. The house remained silent. I didn't know how much longer I could stay like this, how much longer I could just wait.