I wake up before the sun fully rises, and for a second I forget where I am because the silence is different here, thinner and less guarded than the packhouse, and then I smell dust and old wood and remember.
The air is cooler this morning, and it moves through the open windows in slow currents that make the thin curtains sway gently, and I lie there staring at the ceiling while my body waits for nausea that does not come.
I sit up slowly and press my feet to the floor, and the boards creak under my weight in a way that feels almost familiar, and I head into the bathroom to brush my teeth and splash water on my face because routine matters more now than it ever has.
I pull my hair back into a tight braid and change into clean clothes, and I stand in the small kitchen for a moment staring
