Location:Ashford Crossing — Satellite Settlement
Date/Time:TC1855.03.14-15
Bess woke at four because the bed moved.
Not the mattress — the child. Lily shifted in her sleep, pulling closer, one small fist closed around the fabric of Bess's nightshirt. Her grip tightened and released in a rhythm that had nothing to do with dreams and everything to do with checking. Making sure Bess was still there. Making sure the body next to her was the right one.
The other side of the bed was empty. It had been empty for twenty minutes. The garden door had opened and closed at three forty, the same quiet click it made every morning, and the man who used to be her husband had gone outside to tend the soil in the dark.
