I try. I really do. But my chest is heaving, and the air feels wrong—heavy, like someone's sucking all the oxygen out of the room. The walls around us tremble. A picture frame slides off the nightstand and clatters to the floor.

The words hit like a promise I've heard a hundred times before. But this time, her voice wavers.

The handle turns. I feel it before I see it—the pressure building in my skull, the way the dust on the floor starts lifting, swirling in lazy spirals. My mother feels it too. She pulls me closer, shielding my body with hers.